This is something I have always felt on a regular basis, but rarely do because I am very embarrassed to call myself a children’s literature author as a title (for convenience in this NOTE).
I try not to use the word “children” in my works as much as possible, because it reminds me of child pornography, which is a very heinous NG word that I often hear these days, and I feel that the word “children” itself has a somewhat superior or educator’s viewpoint.
However, I am looking for an alternative word, but I can’t seem to find one. Even if I make up a word on my own and call myself that, I’m afraid I’ll lose the meaning of it.
Children’s literature author” sounds childish, and “kids’ literature author” reminds me of a naughty American child. I keep wondering if there is a name that is easier to understand and lighter, such as picture book or comic book.
At any rate, I call what I write stories that can be read by small children, but to be honest, I can’t deny that they are somewhat awkward (by the way, I call children “little children” because of the influence of Noppo-san, who used to appear on NHK’s “Can You Do It?)
There was a time when I said I was a writer of easy-to-understand little stories, but I soon quit because people said I was kind of rakugo-like.
On the other hand
Junbunshu writers, don’t you feel that they are somehow strangely grating, good-looking, artist-like, and somewhat dignified? (This is a complete aside, but none of the recent Akutagawa award-winning works are interesting, and I feel as if I am being forced to eat a hard stone when reading them.)
Leaving the complicated categorization of pure literature, popular literature, and literature in between (Haruki Murakami and Yoshimoto Banana are said to be in this category) to the experts, where does existing children’s literature fit in?
Is it still a category for children’s literature as a whole?
If so, Michaela Ende who wrote “Momo”, Tove Jansson who wrote “Moomin”, J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter”, etc. would also go crazy if they were lumped together as children’s novels.
And if I were to write a children’s novel that adults could also read, would it be an Akutagawa Award nominee, a Naoki Award winner, or would it be laughed out of the competition? I think about it a lot.
As for myself, I am always open to receiving an award, but as someone who has devoted myself to creating stories that can be read by young children, I would like to have an independent award that everyone can aim for and that can be used as a benchmark. For example, something like the Andersen Award, which is considered the world’s leading award for children’s literature.
Even so, the naming of the prize is still a problem.
Then, how about this? How about the “Grand Prize for Not-So-Difficult Stories”…sounds kind of silly, doesn’t it?
I wish someone would come up with a more appropriate naming and popularize it.
After all, children’s literature has far more potential than pure literature, which is not at all interesting and the market is shrinking, and I think it is a world that will be more and more in the limelight in the future because it is open to the world (universalization of language is easy) (although not literature, Ghibli works are a good example).
At any rate, if we were to create a prize, if it were the Andersen Grand Prize internationally, it would still be the Kenji Miyazawa Grand Prize domestically. Mr. Akutagawa has also created many wonderful stories for children, so the Children’s Akutagawa Award … well, this is a bit confusing.
See you soon!
