Modern emerged in the 19th century when ballet had previously dominated the dancing world, receiving its widespread success in the 20th. It is a style of dance that emerged as a reaction to the strict rules of classical ballet.
According to historians, modern has two main birthplaces: Europe (specifically Germany) and the United States. Each rebelled against the rigid formalism and superficiality of classical ballet with the aim to inspire audiences to a new awareness of inner or outer realities. Some historians have suggested that socioeconomic changes in both the United States and Europe helped to initiate the shifts in the dance world. In United States, the increasing industrialisation created the rise of a middle class with more disposable income and free time, while the decline of Victorian social structures in Europe led to many changes such as a new interest in overall wellbeing.
Although Modern evolves as a concert dance form, it has no direct roots with any ballet companies or academic institution. Modern dance emerges as a consequence of its time, alone and per choreographer.
François Delsarte (1811 – 1871), a French singer and coach was considered as a precursor by modern dance history as he invented a theory on the relationship between human movement and feelings. He concluded that each emotion will correspond a movement and the source of dance comes from inside the dancer. His idea boosted one of the main ideological components of modern dance: inner feelings and intensity as the cause of movement and quality.
Émile Jaques-Dalcroze (1865 – 1950), a Swiss composer, pianist, educator and conductor who invented a new approach to movement called Eurhythmics; an approach to studying and experiencing music through movement. His teaching used the body to express musicality and delivered his discoveries in his school, Institution of Emile Jacques-Dalcroze, mainly to musicians and not for dancers. However, his approach reached some of the most important modern dance figures of the time, like V. Nijinsky (through Marie Rambert), Mary Wigman and Rudolph Laban.
The Pioneer of Modern Dance
Isadora Duncan (1877 – 1927), an American dancer who performed to great acclaim throughout Europe was a prime predecessor of modern dance and was largely self‐taught. She thought that ballet was ugly and meaningless. She created a vocabulary of basic movements to heroic and expressive standard as dance is the expression of her personal life. She discarded the corset, slippers, ballet tutu and adopted tunics. She stressed on the torso, bare feet, loose hair, free-flowing costumes, and humor expression. She created her dances around nature such as waves, clouds, wind and trees. She abstracted the emotions induced by the music from which she translated its emotions with composers Beethoven, Wagner, and Gluck. She was also inspired by classical Greek arts, folk dances, social dances, natural forces, and new American athleticism such as skipping, running, jumping, leaping, and abrupt movements. Duncan established her first school of dance just outside of Berlin, where she began to develop her theories of dance education and to assemble her famous dance group, Isadorables. Her contribution is not considered so much in terms of technique but mostly on the means for the cultural process of opening minds. Although she returned to the United States at various points in her life, her work was not well received there. She returned to Europe and died in Nice in 1927.
Loie Fuller (1862 – 1928), an American actress turned dancer whom first gave the free dance artistic status in the United States. She used dance to imitate and illustrate natural phenomena, movement and improvisation techniques: flame, flower, butterfly. She experimented with the effect of theatre’s gas lighting equipment, and patented her apparatus and methods of stage lighting that included the use of coloured gels and burning chemicals for luminescence as well as her translucent voluminous silk stage costumes. Fuller having little dance training, her main concern was not dance, storytelling or expressing emotions, but rather emphasised on visual effect. She is acknowledged by modern dance history for her great contribution in new possibilities of scenic illusion, thanks to the use of the development of electricity.
Ruth St. Denis (1879 – 1968) was an American modern dance pioneer, introducing eastern ideas into the art. She was raised and encouraged to perform from a young age. She grows within an ideological ambience of oriental religions, which reflected in her choreography. She believed that dance could transcend into the spiritual realm and experimented with dance forms that derived from the religious influences of Asia, India and Egypt. She relied on elaborated costumes to evoke mystical feelings where female dancer are priestess, which contrasts with the dancer as a woman of little virtue. She debuted as a skirt dancer, what was then a rather indecent form of dancing because of the woman’s legs being briefly visible. Her distinctive dance style combined spiral form with equal parts voluptuousness, mysticism and erotica. Despite local opposition, St. Denis’ new style of dancing was a hit, particularly in Europe where she built a stunning career as a soloist and in 1914, married a professional and partner, Ted Shawn.
Ted Shawn (1891 – 1972) successfully achieved the formal teaching of modern dance. He was the first notable male pioneers of American modern dance, who became Ruth St. Denis partner and husband in 1914. He promoted and innovated masculine movement with the first company composed by men only. He toured around the United States and attracted many young people from the high intellectual level. In 1915 St. Denis and Shawn formed the The Denishawn School and helped increased the popularity of modern dance throughout the United States and abroad, and nurtured the leaders of the second generation of modern dance such as Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman. To add to St. Denis’ mainly eastern influence, Shawn brought the spirit of North African, Spanish, American and Amerindian influence to the table. St. Denis was responsible for the creative work, and Shawn for teaching technique and composition. Though St. Denis and Shawn had a stormy relationship, both on and offstage, what they accomplished together had a lasting impact.
Early Modern – The First Generation of Modern Dance
During the 1920s, a passion for interpretive dancing swept America. Duncan’s fame and Denishawn’s tours had introduced audiences and dancers alike to the concept of a new form of serious theatrical dancing. During this period, artists began developing and codifying new dance techniques. This first generation included Rudolf Laban, Martha Graham, Mary Wigman, Hanya Holm, Doris Humphrey, Francois Delsarte, Charles Weidman, Agnes de Mille, Lester Horton and many others.
Rudolf Laban (1879 – 1958), an Austro-Hungarian Empire dance artist and theorist founded a school in Munich 1910 at which Mary Wigman was one of his students. Exiled in the 1930s, he immigrated to England, where he established the Art of Movement Studio 1946 in Manchester and worked until his death on his system of notation. His notation, Labanotation, is the most complete and effective system for analysing and writing movement, created till time. He opened a completely new theoretical frame for movement shape and quality analysis. Anne Hutchinson Guest brings his movement notation system to the United States, where it is now taught in many institution for high level dance education.
Mary Wigman (1886 – 1973) was a German dancer and choreographer, notable as the pioneer of expressionist dance, dance therapy, and movement training without pointe shoes. She opposed radically to classical dance values and methods. She performed in Germany after studying with Laban and opened her own, Wigman School 1920 in Dresden which was closed by the Nazis but reopened in Berlin 1948. Mary Wigman choreography often employed non-Western instrumentation such as bells, gongs, percussion and drums from Asia and Africa. She used fundamental human emotions, relationships, superstitions, and ecstatic spinning in her choreography. Her costumes were simple, made with dark rough fabrics, and often included masks. Her dance pieces are tragic with dark characters, as well as vibrant, excited and passionate. Her choreographic work and thought are considered as part of the artistic trend called German expressionism or “Ausdrückstanz”. She created several schools and among her renowned students are Hanya Holm, Harald Kreutzberg, Gret Paluca and Kurt Joos.
Hanya Holm (1893 – 1992) was born in Germany and studied at the Institution of Emile Jacques-Dalcroze and, later learn and teach with Mary Wigman’s Wigman School. She launched Wigman branch in New York City 1931. Holm had a unique form of technique that shaped generations of dancers and choreographers including Alwin Nikolais, Mary Anthony, Valerie Bettis, Don Redlich, Alfred Brooks, Liz Aggiss and Glen Tetley. Her technique stressed the importance of body’s relation to space and emotion, which was an extension of Wigman and Laban. For example, the pulse, planes, floor patterns, aerial design, direction, and spatial dimensions. Holm’s movement emphasised the freedom and flowing quality of the torso and back, but remained based on universal principles of physics for motion. Her choreographic regularly use improvisation and with absolute dance without pantomime or dramatic overtones in which, conveying an idea in her choreography was far more important than dancers’ technical ability. Her theatre work achieved a rare degree of dramatic and choreographic fusion. In 1936, in response to rising antifascist sentiment, it was renamed the Hanya Holm School of Dance. She choreographed successfully on Broadway with dances for Kiss Me, Kate (1948), My Fair Lady (1956), and Camelot (1960).
Intermediate Modern – The Second Generation of Modern Dance
Martha Graham (1894 – 1991), an American dancer began studying at Denishawn. During the next seven years, Graham evolved from a student, to a teacher, to one of the company’s best‐known performers. Martha Graham began to open up fresh elements of emotional expression in dance and focuses on contraction, release and spiral. She found the breath pulse as the primary source of dance; exaggerating the contractions and expansions of the torso and flexing of the spine caused by breathing. She devised a basis for movement that represented the human being’s inner conflicts. Graham explored themes from Americana, Greek mythology, and the Old Testament. She viewed music merely as a frame for dance. In 1926, Martha Graham founded her dance company and school, living and working out of a tiny Carnegie Hall studio in midtown Manhattan. It is now known for being the oldest American dance company.
Doris Humphrey (1895 – 1958) was American dancer and choreographer of the early 20th century, and creator of the technique known as fall and recovery; an original dancing technique by observing the relationship between gravity and human body; the arc between balance and imbalance of the moving human body, represented one’s conflicts with the surrounding world. She taught extremely important technical notions like weight, rebound, suspension and the importance of breath. She studied at the Denishawn school in Los Angeles, where her teaching and creative abilities were quickly recognised. Doris Humphrey emphasised craftsmanship and structure in choreography, also developing the use of groupings and complexity in ensembles. Her work has an unerring sense of form, as well as an interest in large‐scale abstract works. Her book, The Art of Making Dances (1959), was based on her theories about dance composition. Humphrey experimented more with sound; in a 1924 work she discarded music altogether and performed in silence, and later she used nonmusical sound effects, including spoken texts and bursts of hysterical laughter. Her themes were social and often heroic in scale, e.g., the trilogy New Dance (1935), which treats human relationships.
Charles Weidman (1901 – 1975) an American dancer was inspired to become a dancer at fifteen after seeing Ruth St. Denis during a touring performance. In 1920, he received a scholarship to spend the summer studying at the Denishawn school in Los Angeles. Before the session had ended, Weidman was hired as a dancer for the Denishawn company. Weidman brought a very masculine approach to dancing that drew other men to the art form. His kinetic pantomime and abstract movement added remarkable appeal to his dances. In 1928 Charles Weidman together with Doris Humphrey formed the Humphrey‐Weidman Studio and Company in New York. Weidman’s movements were abstracted from everyday situations provided a different kind of social commentary from comedy to seriousness, and created a new style of dance by rejecting ballet and embracing gravity. He established the Charles Weidman Theater Dance Company after Doris Humphrey retired from performing in 1945. In his company he trained famous choreographers such as José Limón, Bob Fosse and Louis Falco.
Agnes de Mille (1905 – 1993) had a love for acting and originally wanted to be an actress, but was told that she was not pretty enough, so she turned her attention to dance. She made her solo debut in New York in 1928. In the 1930s in London, she studied with Marie Rambert, danced in the premiere of Antony Tudor’s Dark Elegies (1937), and worked on concert pieces that inspired her successes of the 1940s. Among these was Rodeo (1942), the Americana classic she choreographed for the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, and the dances for the Broadway musical Oklahoma! (1943). Oklahoma! was a turning point in Broadway history, and required training in ballet and modern dance. During the 1940s de Mille created a number of works for Ballet Theatre that revealed the light touch of her Broadway choreography and the interest in American material that inspired her to form the Agnes de Mille Heritage Dance Theatre in the 1970s. A gifted writer, she is the author of several books, including a highly‐regarded biography of Martha Graham.
Lester Horton (1906 – 1953) studied at the Denishawn School, besides having early classes in ballet and Native-American dance. The Lester Horton Dance Group first appeared in 1932 and became noted over the ensuing two decades for an individual technique and theatrical style that embraced themes of social and political protest. Horton developed his own approach to dance that incorporated diverse elements including Native American Folk Dance, Japanese arm gestures, Javanese and Balinese isolations for the upper body, particularly the eyes, head and hands, Afro-Caribbean elements, like hip circles. Horton Technique has no style and emphasises a whole body, anatomical approach to dance that includes flexibility, strength, coordination and body and spatial awareness to enable unrestricted, dramatic freedom of expression. Highlights of his repertory include at least six versions of Oscar Wilde’s erotic Salome, Le Sacre du Printemps (1937). Horton also choreographed commercial projects and created the dances for Hollywood films. His students included Alvin Ailey and Merce Cunningham.
Development – The Third Generation of Modern Dance
By the end of World War II, young choreographers had begun breaking the rules of the modern dance establishment, creating dances that had no theme, expressed no emotion, dispensed with the dance vocabulary of fall and recovery, contraction and release. This generation of modern dance included artists such as Sybil Louise Shearer (1912 – 2005)’s random fantasies, Erick Hawkins’s impressionistic soft rhythms, Merce Cunningham, Paul Taylor, José Limón, Katherine Dunham, Pearl Primus, Alvin Ailey, Anna Halprin, Yvonne Rainer, and Twyla Tharp.
Merce Cunningham (1919 – 2009) was a prime influence on the development of postmodern dance in the 1960s and later. Trained at the Cornish School, Mills College, and the School of American Ballet, he danced with the Martha Graham Company from 1939 to 1945, creating lead roles. He began to present his own choreography in the 1940s and in 1953 founded Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Cunningham freed dance from spatial restraints devising dances that can be viewed from any angle and also released dance from traditional musical constraints by using electronic music and other compositions of his musical director, John Cage. In addition, he liberated his own choreography from structural limitations by using techniques of chance, such as throws of the dice, to determine the order in which sections of a work should occur. Eventually rejecting psychological and emotional elements present in the choreography of Graham and others, Cunningham developed his own dance technique and method which emphasised more balletic movement and flexibility of the back and torso, influenced generations of dancers and choreographers.
José Limón (1908 – 1972) was born Mexico but moved to Los Angeles in 1915. His powerful dancing shifted perceptions of the male dancer and his choreography continues to bring a dramatic vision of dance to audiences worldwide. Limón moved to New York City in 1928 and in 1946, after studying and performing for 10 years with Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman, he established his own company with Humphrey as Artistic Director. Limón’s choreographic works were quickly recognised as masterpieces and the Company itself became a landmark of American dance. His Limon technique comes from human movement, feeling and the sensations the body experiences in motion, rather than how it looks for performance. His concepts include breath and its influence on movement, the impact of weight on individual body parts and how the expression created, flexibility of the spine, body-part isolations, the dynamism between fall and recovery, rebound, weight, suspension and succession. In 1997 he was inducted into the National Museum of Dance’s Hall of Fame in New York.
Katherine Dunham (1909 – 2006) studied at University of Chicago and was an African-American dancer, choreographer, anthropologist and social activist. She examined, interpreted and dwell into the roots of black dances, rituals, and folklore in the Americas, Africa and Caribbean, and transformed them into artistic choreography. By incorporating authentic regional and anthropological dance movements, she developed a technical system that educated her students mentally as well as physically. Her technique led toward a total rhythmic immersion. Katherine Dunham is credited for developing one of the most important pedagogy for teaching dance that is still used throughout the world, called the “Matriarch of Black Dance”. Her groundbreaking repertoire combined innovative interpretations of the Caribbean dances, traditional ballet, African rituals and African American rhythms to create the Dunham Technique. The Dunham Company toured for two decades around the globe in 57 countries.
Pearl Primus (1919 – 1994) was an American dancer, choreographer, anthropologist and played an important role in the presentation of African dance to American audiences. Primus was born in Trinidad and raised in New York City, where she attended Hunter College. After graduating with a degree in biology in 1940, she studied at the New School for Social Research in New York with a scholarship. She studied African and African-American material, and developed a repertory of dances emphasising the rich variety of African diasporic traditions. In 1948, she received a grant to collect material and document dances in Africa that in some cases were fading into history. Back in New York, she opened the Pearl Primus School of Primal Dance. In 1961 she became the director of the African Performing Arts Center in Monrovia, Liberia, the first organization of its kind in Africa. A buoyant and charismatic performer, Primus lectured widely and taught courses in anthropology and ethnic dance on many campuses.
Paul Taylor (1930 – 2018) was born on July 29, 1930 and grew up in and around Washington DC. He attended Syracuse University on a swimming scholarship in the late 1940s until he discovered dance through books and then transferred to The Juilliard School. He performed the works of Doris Humphrey, Charles Weidman, Merce Cunningham, Martha Graham and George Balanchine. He was a soloist with Graham’s company from 1955 to 1962 while founded his own company, Paul Taylor Dance Company in 1954. He had his interest in everyday gesture and carried an incredible range of motion, emotion, imagination and issues such as war, piety, spirituality, sexuality, morality and mortality. For example, by having dancers move one-by-one into the wing as they wait to use a public telephone. He also presented an evening of minimal dance, which consisted of him standing on the stage alone in street clothes and making only tiny changes in posture to a recorded voice of a telephone operator announcing the time at 10-second intervals; outraged dance critics and ignored the performance.
Alvin Ailey (1931 – 1989) was an African-American dancer, director, choreographer, and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in 1958. He was influenced primarily by Lester Horton and later with Katherine Dunham, Doris Humphrey and Martha Graham. He combined elements of modern, jazz, and African dance in his work. His company has been internationally acclaimed and has brought recognition to many African-American and Asian dancers. Although the company was initially accused of amplifying and transforming the emotivity characteristic of Graham into metaphors of the American black experience and feelings, Ailey denied and continued to employ artists based solely on artistic talent and integrity, regardless of their background.
Other famous dancers include Anna Halprin, Yvonne Rainer, Twyla Tharp, Bela Lewitzky, Jerome Robbins, Paul Horton, Daniel Nagrin, Erick Hawkins, David Winters, Eliot Feld and Jaime Rogers. Jazz/modern dance choreographers include Bob Fosse, Gus Giordano and Luigi. Other important and more recent German dancer-choreographers include Kurt Joos and his student Pina Bausch.
For many dancers, dance tell stories and make statements about the current society. The dancers who developed modern dance wanted to make a statement about previous limitations of dance and the body. Since its founding, modern dance has been redefined many times and changes in the concepts and practices of new generations of choreographers, the term modern grows more ambigous.
References & Further Reading
https://www.britannica.com/art/modern-dance https://study.com/academy/lesson/modern-dance-history-types.html https://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/arts/performing/dance/modern-dance/the-beginnings-of-modern-dance https://www.danceus.org/modern-dance/modern-dance-history-movements-styles-dancers-competitions/#:~:text=History%20of%20Modern%20Dance&text=Historically%2C%20modern%20dance%20began%20as,careers%2C%20according%20to%20their%20biographies. https://www.contemporary-dance.org/modern-dance-history.html https://educationcloset.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Modern.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Ailey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Lim%C3%B3n https://www.dancespirit.com/limon-technique-2326036526.html https://noisilyfestival.com/discography/contemporary-dance-the-limon-technique/ http://kdcah.org/katherine-dunham-biography/ https://www.britannica.com/biography/Pearl-Primus https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Modern_dance http://www.dancefacts.net/dance-types/contemporary-dance/ http://kdcah.org/katherine-dunham-biography/#:~:text=She%20appeared%20at%20the%20Martin,American%20and%20Afro%2DCaribbean%20dance. https://www.thirteen.org/freetodance/biographies/primus.html https://www.ptamd.org/main/about-ptamd/paul-taylor/ https://www.wnyc.org/story/dancer-ruth-st-denis-shares-thoughts-politics-feminism-and-new-work/
- François Delsarte 1864. Photo by R. Carjat / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fran%C3%A7ois_Delsarte_1864.jpg
- Emile Jaques Dalcroze. Photo by the original uploader was Bärnherz at German Wikipedia.(Original text: Bärnherz) / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Emile_Jaques_Dalcroze.jpg
- Isadora Duncan 1915–1918 American tour. Photo by Arnold Genthe (1869–1942) / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Isadora_Duncan_(grayscale).jpg
- Loie Fuller. Photo by Frederick Glasier / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Loie_Fuller.jpg
- Ruth St. Denis. Photo by Bain News Service / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ruthstdenis1.jpg
- Ruth St Denis & Ted Shawn 1916. Photo by New York Public Library, for National Geographic Magazine, April 1916, reprinted May 1951.. 1915. / No restrictions. Sourced from https://www.flickr.com/photos/32951986@N05/3110037731/
- Laban’s School in Berlin 1929. Photo by Bundesarchiv, Bild 102-08707 / Licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0 / CC BY-SA 3.0 DE (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en). Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bundesarchiv_Bild_102-08707,_Berlin,_Tanzschule_Laban.jpg
- Mary Wigman dance studio 1959. Photo by Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-P047334 / Schütz, Klaus / Licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0 / CC BY-SA 3.0 DE (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en). Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bundesarchiv_B_145_Bild-P047334,_Berlin,_Mary_Wigman-Studio.jpg
- Martha Graham 1948. Photo by Yousuf Karsh / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Martha_Graham_1948.jpg
- Doris Humphrey & Charles Weidman 1933. Photo published by Encyclopædia Britannica. Sourced from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Doris-Humphrey#/media/1/276354/32304
- Charles Weidman. Photo by Carl Van Vechten / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Charlesweidman.jpg
- Agnes de Mille. Photo by Carl Van Vechten / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Agnes_de_Mille_3.jpg
- Lestor Horton. Sourced from https://www.alvinailey.org/alvin-ailey-american-dance-theater/lester-horton
- Merce Cunningham, in Changeling 1957. Photo by Richard Rutledge. Sourced from https://trinitylaban.wordpress.com/2017/06/08/historical-project-merce-cunninghams-minevents/
- Jose Limon 1965. Photo published by Encyclopædia Britannica. Sourced from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jose-Limon#/media/1/341535/12622
- Katherine Dunham. Photo by Phyllis Twachtman, World Telegram staff photographer / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Katherine_Dunham.jpg
- Pearl Primus 1945. Photo by Gerda Peterich. Sourced from https://danceinteractive.jacobspillow.org/themes-essays/african-diaspora/pearl-primus/
- Paul Taylor. Photo by The original uploader was Noirish at English Wikipedia. / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Paul_Taylor.jpg
- Alvin Ailey. Photo by Carl Van Vechten / Public domain. Sourced from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alvin_Ailey_Ellington_career.jpg


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Graphic Novels & Comics
A Comic Book is defined by the Collins Dictionary as a magazine or serial that "contains stories told in pictures." A Graphic Novel, by extension, is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as "a full length story published as a book in comic strip format."
Reference Works at CCBC Libraries
The Cambridge Companion to the Graphic Novel by Since the graphic novel rose to prominence half a century ago, it has become one of the fastest growing literary/artistic genres, generating interest from readers globally. The Cambridge Companion to the Graphic Novel examines the evolution of comic books into graphic novels and the distinct development of this art form both in America and around the world. This Companion also explores the diverse subgenres often associated with it, such as journalism, fiction, historical fiction, autobiography, biography, science fiction and fantasy. Leading scholars offer insights into graphic novel adaptations of prose works and the adaptation of graphic novels to films; analyses of outstanding graphic novels, like Maus and The Walking Man; an overview which distinguishes the international graphic novel from its American counterpart; and analyses of how the form works and what it teaches, making this book a key resource for scholars, graduate students and undergraduate students alike.
Call Number: PN6710 .C34 2017
History, Theme and Technique by The fourth set in the series, Critical Survey of Graphic Novels: History, Theme & Technique is a one-volume set that contains over 70 essays covering themes and concepts of graphic novels. It includes genres, time periods, foreign language traditions, social relevance, and craftsmanship such as penciling and inking.
Call Number: PN6725 .C7536 2013
Supergods by From one of the most acclaimed and profound writers in the world of comics comes a thrilling and provocative exploration of humankind's great modern myth: the superhero The first superhero comic ever published, Action Comics no. 1 in 1938, introduced the world to something both unprecedented and timeless: Superman, a caped god for the modern age. In a matter of years, the skies of the imaginary world were filled with strange mutants, aliens, and vigilantes: Batman, Wonder Woman, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, and the X-Men--the list of names as familiar as our own. In less than a century, they've gone from not existing at all to being everywhere we look: on our movie and television screens, in our videogames and dreams. But what are they trying to tell us? For Grant Morrison, arguably the greatest of contemporary chroniclers of the "superworld," these heroes are powerful archetypes whose ongoing, decades-spanning story arcs reflect and predict the course of human existence: Through them we tell the story of ourselves, our troubled history, and our starry aspirations. In this exhilarating work of a lifetime, Morrison draws on art, science, mythology, and his own astonishing journeys through this shadow universe to provide the first true history of the superhero--why they matter, why they will always be with us, and what they tell us about who we are . . . and what we may yet become.
Call Number: PN6725 .M67 2011
Will Eisner by Will Eisner's innovations in the comics, especially the comic book and the graphic novel, as well as his devotion to comics analysis, make him one of comics' first true auteurs and the cartoonist so revered and influential that cartooning's highest honor is named after him. His newspaper feature The Spirit (1940-1952) introduced the now-common splash page to the comic book, as well as dramatic angles and lighting effects that were influenced by, and influenced in turn, the conventions of film noir. Even in his tales of crime fighting, Eisner's writing focused on everyday details of city life and on contemporary social issues. In 1976, he premiered A Contract with God, and Other Tenement Stories, a collection of realist cartoon stories that paved the way for the modern "graphic novel." His 1985 book, Comics and Sequential Art, was among the first sustained analyses and overviews of the comics form, articulating theories of the art's grammar and structure. Eisner's studio nurtured such comics legends as Jules Feiffer, Wally Wood, Lou Fine, and Jack Cole. Will Eisner: Conversations, edited by comics scholar M. Thomas Inge, collects the best interviews with Eisner (1917-2005) from 1965 to 2004. Taken together, the interviews cover the breadth of Eisner's career with in-depth information about his creation of The Spirit and other well-known comic book characters, his devotion to the educational uses of the comics medium, and his contributions to the development of the graphic novel.
Call Number: PN6727.E4 Z92 2011
Will Eisner by Will Eisner (1917-2005) is universally considered the master of comics storytelling and is best known for his iconic comic strip The Spirit and for his seminal work A Contract With God. Considered the first significant graphic novel, upon publication in 1978 it ushered in a new kind of personal, non-super-hero genre of comics storytelling. Since then, Eisner went on to write and illustrate over twenty award-winning graphic novels. Will Eisner: Champion of the Graphic Novel by noted historian Paul Levitz celebrates Eisner by including not only unpublished and rare art, photographs, letters and sketches from the archives, but original interviews with creators such as Jules Feiffer, Art Spiegelman, Scott McCloud, Jeff Smith and Neil Gaiman, all of whom knew and were inspired by Eisner and have offered their support to help publicise this long-awaited tribute to a comics legend.
Call Number: PN6727.E4 Z69 2015
CBLDF Presents: She Changed Comics by SHE CHANGED COMICS celebrates the women who changed free expression incomics, with profiles of more than sixty groundbreaking female professionals andinterviews with the women who are changing today's medium, including RAINATELGEMEIER, NOELLE STEVENSON, G. WILLOW WILSON, and more! SHE CHANGED COMICSalso examines the plights of women imprisoned and threatened for making comicsand explores the work of women whose work is being banned here in the UnitedStates. A must for readers of all ages, students, and educators.
Call Number: PN6710 .S34 2016
Faster Than a Speeding Bullet by The groundbreaking history of the graphic novel, fully updated to include all of the latest must-reads, the milestones and the future of this exciting medium. The author of 101 Best Graphic Novels now tells the whole history of the graphic novel revolution, from the first modern urban autobiographical graphic novel, Will Eisner's A Contract With God, to the hip indie comics of the Hernandez Bros' Love and Rockets, the dark mysteries of Neil Gaiman's Sandman and the postmodern superheroics of Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight.
Call Number: PN6710 .W45 2012
Comics, Manga, and Graphic Novels by This text examines comics, graphic novels, and manga with a broad, international scope that reveals their conceptual origins in antiquity. * Includes numerous illustrations of British satirical prints, Japanese woodblock prints, and the art of prominent illustrators * Includes a chapter on the latest developments in digital comics
Call Number: PN6710 .P415 2011
Contemporary Comics Storytelling by What if fairy-tale characters lived in New York City? What if a superhero knew he was a fictional character? What if you could dispense your own justice with one hundred untraceable bullets? These are the questions asked and answered in the course of the challenging storytelling in Fables, Tom Strong, and 100 Bullets, the three twenty-first-century comics series that Karin Kukkonen considers in depth in her exploration of how and why the storytelling in comics is more than merely entertaining. Applying a cognitive approach to reading comics in all their narrative richness and intricacy, Contemporary Comics Storytelling opens an intriguing perspective on how these works engage the legacy of postmodernism--its subversion, self-reflexivity, and moral contingency. Its three case studies trace how contemporary comics tie into deep traditions of visual and verbal storytelling, how they reevaluate their own status as fiction, and how the fictional minds of their characters generate complex ethical thought experiments. At a time when the medium is taken more and more seriously as intricate and compelling literary art, this book lays the groundwork for an analysis of the ways in which comics challenge and engage readers' minds. It brings together comics studies with narratology and literary criticism and, in so doing, provides a new set of tools for evaluating the graphic novel as an emergent literary form.
Call Number: PN6710 .K836 2013
The Graphic Novel by This volume offers an examination and analysis of the contemporary graphic novel as literature. Specific attention is paid to the use of narrative genre in the graphic novel (e.g. superhero, crime, horror, realistic/fantastic). The most important and most frequently discussed graphic novels are also discussed, including Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, The Crow, Sin City: The Hard Goodbye, The Walking Dead:Days Gone Bye, and Road to Perdition.
Call Number: PN6719 .G736 2014
Graphic Subjects by Some of the most noteworthy graphic novels and comic books of recent years have been entirely autobiographical. In Graphic Subjects, Michael A. Chaney brings together a lively mix of scholars to examine the use of autobiography within graphic novels, including such critically acclaimed examples as Art Spiegelman's Maus, David Beauchard's Epileptic, Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, Alan Moore's Watchmen, and Gene Yang's American Born Chinese. These essays, accompanied by visual examples, illuminate the new horizons that illustrated autobiographical narrative creates. The volume insightfully highlights the ways that graphic novelists and literary cartoonists have incorporated history, experience, and life stories into their work. The result is a challenging and innovative collection that reveals the combined power of autobiography and the graphic novel.
Call Number: PN6710 .G7375 2011
Power of Comics by The Power of Comics is the first textbook to introduce undergraduate students to a broader understanding of the medium and its communication potential.
Call Number: PN6710 .D86 2009
On the Shelves at CCBC Libraries
Watchmen by A new TV series based on Watchmen will debut on HBO in 2019 by the creator of Lost, Damon Lindelof A murder mystery-turned-nationwide conspiracy, WATCHMEN examines the lives of the eponymous superhero team as they seem to decay alongside the ever-darkening America around them. Rorschach, Nite Owl, the Silk Spectre, Dr. Manhattan and Ozymandias reunite to investigate who's behind a teammate's murder, but find that the truth may be even more grim than the world they seek to protect. One of the most influential graphic novels of all time and a perennial bestseller, WATCHMEN is considered a gateway title to the entire graphic storytelling medium. Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' seminal story is the benchmark against which all other graphic novels and comic books are judged with an incredible story that chronicles the fall from grace of a group of super-heroes plagued by all-too-human failings. This edition of WATCHMEN, the groundbreaking series from Alan Moore, the award-winning writer of V FOR VENDETTA and BATMAN: THE KILLING JOKE, and Dave Gibbons, the artist of GREEN LANTERN, features the high-quality, recolored pages found in WATCHMEN: THE ABSOLUTE EDITION with sketches, never-before-seen extra bonus materials and a new introduction by Dave Gibbons.
Call Number: PN6737.M66 W39 2013
V for Vendetta by "A new trade paperback edition of the graphic novel that inspired the hit movie! A powerful story about loss of freedom and individuality, V FOR VENDETTA takes place in a totalitarian England following a devastating war that changed the face of the planet. In a world without political freedom, personal freedom and precious little faith in anything comes a mysterious man in a white porcelain mask who fights political oppressors through terrorism and seemingly absurd acts. It's a gripping tale of the blurred lines between ideological good and evil. This new trade paperbackedition features the improved production values and coloring from the 2005 hardcover."
Call Number: PN6737.M66 V2 2012
The Killing Joke by "Presented for the first time with stark, stunning new coloring by Bolland, BATMAN- THE KILLING JOKE is Alan Moore's unforgettable meditation on the razor-thin line between sanity and insanity, heroism and villainy, comedy and tragedy. According to the grinning engine of madness and mayhem known as The Joker, that's all that separates the sane from the psychotic. Freed once again from the confines of Arkham Asylum, he's out to prove his deranged point. And he s going to use Gotham City's top cop, Commissioner Jim Gordon, and his brilliant and beautiful daughter Barbara to do it. Now Batman must race to stop his archnemesis before his reign of terror claims two of the Dark Knight's closest friends. Can he finally put an end to the cycle of bloodlust and lunacy that links these two iconic foes before it leads to its fatal conclusion? And as the horrifying origin of the Clown Prince of Crime is finally revealed, will the thin line that separates Batman's nobility and The Joker's insanity snap once and for all? Legendary writer Alan Moore redefined the super-hero with WATCHMEN and V FOR VENDETTA. In BATMAN- THE KILLING JOKE, he takes on the origin of comics' greatest super-villain,
Call Number: PN6728.B36 M663 2008
Sandman Preludes and Nocturnes by New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman's transcendent series SANDMAN is often hailed as the definitive Vertigo title and one of the finest achievements in graphic storytelling. Gaiman created an unforgettable tale of the forces that exist beyond life and death by weaving ancient mythology, folklore and fairy tales with his own distinct narrative vision. In PRELUDES & NOCTURNES, an occultist attempting to capture Death to bargain for eternal life traps her younger brother Dream instead. After his 70 year imprisonment and eventual escape, Dream, also known as Morpheus, goes on a quest for his lost objects of power. On his arduous journey Morpheus encounters Lucifer, John Constantine, and an all-powerful madman. This book also includes the story "The Sound of Her Wings," which introduces us to the pragmatic and perky goth girl Death.Includes issues 1-8 of the original series with completely new coloring, approved by the author.
Call Number: PN6728.S26 G45 2010 v. 1
New Moon by In the first installment of New Moon, Bella and Edward find themselves facing new obstacles, including a devastating separation, the mysterious appearance of dangerous wolves roaming the forest in Forks, a terrifying threat of revenge from a female vampire and a deliciously sinister encounter with Italy's reigning royal family of vampires: the Volturi.
Call Number: PS3613.E979 N41 2013 v. 1
Exquisite Corpse by Zoe isn't exactly the intellectual type, which is why she doesn't recognize world-famous author Thomas Rocher when she stumbles into his apartment . . . and into his life. Zoe doesn't know Balzac from Batman, but she's going to have to wise up fast . . . because Rocher has a terrible secret, and now Zoe is sitting on the literary scandal of the century.
Call Number: PN6747.B34 C3313 2015
Bone by BONE - The Complete Cartoon Epic in One Volume Winner of 41 National and International Awards including 10 Eisner Awards and 11 Harvey Awards! Meet the Bone cousins, Fone Bone, Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone, three misfits who are run out of Boneville and find themselves lost in a vast uncharted desert. They make their way into a deep, forested valley filled with wonderful and terrifying creatures. With the help of the mysterious Thorn, her tough-as-nails Gran'ma Ben and the Great Red Dragon, the boys do their best to survive in the middle of brewing trouble between the valley's denizens. It will be the longest - but funniest- year of their lives! Originally serialized in black & white comic books and graphic novels, the award-winning novel was presented complete and unabridged for the first time in this impressive 1300 page tome preserving the original black & white artwork.
Call Number: PN6727.S546 B66 2004
Signature Wound by Signature Wound: Rocking TBI is Pulitzer Prize-winner Garry Trudeau's third collection of Doonesbury comics examining the effects of combat on soldiers in Iraq. Signature Wound: Rocking TBI completes a trilogy of Doonesbury books that examines the impact of combat on American soldiers in Iraq. A twist of fate brings B. D. to the bedside of SFC Leo Deluca (a.k.a. Toggle), a young HUMV driver and headbanger whose love of ear-bleed battle music had sonically distracted him enough to get his vehicle blown up. Missing an eye and suffering from aphasia, Toggle fights to recover from traumatic brain injury (TBI), a journey of recovery that brings out the best in B. D., his former commander. Toggle's tattooed, metalhead mom initially has reservations about his improbable Facebook romance with an MIT tech-head named Alex, but love blooms. As this engaging story unfolds, Toggle finds himself drawn toward a career in the recording industry, undaunted by the limitations of the New Normal that now defines his life. Crafted with the same kind of insight, humor, and respect that prompted the Pentagon and the VA to host signings of the two previous books in the trilogy, Signature Wound is a perceptive and timely look at the contemporary soldier's experience.
Call Number: PN6728.D65 T756 2010
Snowden by As many as 1.4 million citizens with security clearance saw the documents revealed by Edward Snowden. Why did he, and no one else, decide to step forward and take on the risks associated with becoming a whistleblower and then a fugitive? In the graphic biography, Snowden, Rall delves into his life, work experience and personality and the larger issues of privacy, new surveillance technologies and the recent history of government intrusion. It's a portrait of a brave young man standing up to the most powerful government in the world.
Call Number: JF1525.W45 R35 2015
The Imitation Game by Award winning authors Jim Ottaviani and Leland Purvis present a historically accurate graphic novel biography of English mathematician and scientist Alan Turing in The Imitation Game. English mathematician and scientist Alan Turing (1912-1954) is credited with many of the foundational principles of contemporary computer science. The Imitation Game presents a historically accurate graphic novel biography of Turing's life, including his groundbreaking work on the fundamentals of cryptography and artificial intelligence. His code breaking efforts led to the cracking of the German Enigma during World War II, work that saved countless lives and accelerated the Allied defeat of the Nazis. While Turing's achievements remain relevant decades after his death, the story of his life in post-war Europe continues to fascinate audiences today. Award-winning duo Jim Ottaviani (the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Feynman and Primates) and artist Leland Purvis (an Eisner and Ignatz Award nominee and occasional reviewer for the Comics Journal) present a factually detailed account of Turing's life and groundbreaking research--as an unconventional genius who was arrested, tried, convicted, and punished for being openly gay, and whose innovative work still fuels the computing and communication systems that define our modern world. Computer science buffs, comics fans, and history aficionados will be captivated by this riveting and tragic story of one of the 20th century's most unsung heroes.
Call Number: QA29.T8 O772 2016
Black Panther by A new era begins for the Black Panther! MacArthur Genius and National Book Award-winning writer T-Nehisi Coates (BETWEEN THE WORLD AND ME) takes the helm, confronting T'Challa with a dramatic upheaval in Wakanda that will make leading the African nation tougher than ever before. When a superhuman terrorist group that calls itself The People sparks a violent uprising, the land famed for its incredible technology and proud warrior traditions will be thrown into turmoil. If Wakanda is to survive, it must adapt--but can its monarch, one in a long line of Black Panthers, survive the necessary change? Heavy lies the head that wears the cowl! COLLECTING: Black Panther 1-4, Fantastic Four (1961) 52
Call Number: PN6728.B523 C63
Black Panther and the Crew by Black Panther, Storm, Luke Cage, Misty Knight and Manifold band together to take on a dangerous wave of street-level threats in a new series by co-writers Ta-Nehisi Coates (New York Times best-selling author of Between the World and Me and Marvel's Black Panther) and Yona Harvey (Black Panther: World of Wakanda), and legendary artist Butch Guice! The death of a Harlem activist kicks off a mystery that will reveal surprising new secrets about the Marvel Universe's past - and set the stage for a huge story in the near future! Fear, hate and violence loom, but don't worry, The Crew's got this: They are the streets. COLLECTING: BLACK PANTHER AND THE CREW 1-6
Call Number: PN6728.B523 C64 2017
Cousin Joseph by With the New York Times bestseller Kill My Mother, legendary cartoonist Jules Feiffer began an epic saga of American noir fiction. With Cousin Joseph, a prequel that introduces us to bare-knuckled Detective Sam Hannigan, head of the Bay City's Red Squad and patriarch of the Hannigan family featured in Kill My Mother, Feiffer brings us the second installment in this highly anticipated graphic trilogy.Our story opens in Bay City in 1931 in the midst of the Great Depression. Big Sam sees himself as a righteous, truth-seeking patriot, defending the American way, as his Irish immigrant father would have wanted, against a rising tide of left-wing unionism, strikes, and disruption that plague his home town. At the same time he makes monthly, secret overnight trips on behalf of Cousin Joseph, a mysterious man on the phone he has never laid eyes on, to pay off Hollywood producers to ensure that they will film only upbeat films that idealize a mythic America: no warts, no injustice uncorrected, only happy endings.But Sam, himself, is not in for a happy ending, as step by step the secret of his unseen mentor's duplicity is revealed to him. Fast-moving action, violence, and murder in the noir style of pulps and forties films are melded in the satiric, sociopolitical Feifferian style to dig up the buried fearmongering of the past and expose how closely it matches the headlines, happenings, and violence of today.With Cousin Joseph, Feiffer builds on his late-life conversion to cinematic noir, bowing, as ever, to youthful heroes Will Eisner and Milton Caniff, but ultimately creating a masterpiece that through his unique perspective and comic-strip noir style illuminates the very origins of Hollywood and its role in creating the bipolar nation we've become.
Call Number: PN6727.F4 C68 2016
Patience by Patience is a psychedelic science-fiction love story, veering with uncanny precision from violent destruction to deeply personal tenderness in a way that is both quintessentially âeoeClowesianâe and utterly unique in the authorâe(tm)s body of work. This 180-page, full-color original graphic novel affords Clowes the opportunity to draw some of the most exuberant and breathtaking pages of his life, and to tell his most suspenseful, surprising and affecting story yet.
Call Number: PN6727.C565 P38 2016
Blankets by "Quaint, meditative and sometimes dreamy, blankets will take you straight back to your first kiss." --The Guardian Blankets is the story of a young man coming of age and finding the confidence to express his creative voice. Craig Thompson's poignant graphic memoir plays out against the backdrop of a Midwestern winterscape: finely-hewn linework draws together a portrait of small town life, a rigorously fundamentalist Christian childhood, and a lonely, emotionally mixed-up adolescence. Under an engulfing blanket of snow, Craig and Raina fall in love at winter church camp, revealing to one another their struggles with faith and their dreams of escape. Over time though, their personal demons resurface and their relationship falls apart. It's a universal story, and Thompson's vibrant brushstrokes and unique page designs make the familiar heartbreaking all over again. This groundbreaking graphic novel, winner of two Eisner and three Harvey Awards, is an eloquent portrait of adolescent yearning; first love (and first heartache); faith in crisis; and the process of moving beyond all of that. Beautifully rendered in pen and ink, Thompson has created a love story that lasts.
Call Number: PN6727.T48 B63 2016


Welcome to Writing Tips Oasis’ newest guide, dedicated on how to write middle grade fiction. Writing for children, regardless of their age, can be more difficult than writing for adults – in any genre, mostly because it’s very easy for us to forget what it’s like to be children.
Hence, we end up with stories that no child would want to read. Moreover, children between the ages of 8 and 13 are very different. An 8-year-old is more viable to enjoy a novel targeted towards children, but a 13-year-old will be more interested in young adult fiction, for example. Trying to write a middle grade fiction novel means understanding the fact that if you become “too childish’’ in your novel, half of your intended audience will not enjoy it. However, go for a bit more mature and a bit more dramatic, and you get very close to young adult fiction.
However, that doesn’t mean that you cannot find a balance. For example, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, falls into middle grade fiction. Even so, children and adults of all ages have come to enjoy it.
Knowing beforehand how middle grade fiction distinguishes itself in comparison to children’s fiction and young adult fiction will enable you to guide your novel in the right direction.
This guide is divided in three parts, all three of which is dedicated to understanding and deconstructing of all the elements that make middle grade fiction.
Table of Contents
- Part One: Defining the Middle Grade Genre
- 1) Age in Middle Grade fiction
- 2) Middle Grade fiction: early ages 8-10
- 3) Middle Grade fiction: late ages 11-13
- 4) Finding the kid voice
- 5) Getting inside the protagonist’s head
- 6) Mixing in other genres
- Part Two: Plotting, characterization, and narrative
- 1) Defining a protagonist
- 2) Creating the plot
- 3) Defining the cast of characters
- 4) Narrative
- 5) Themes and ideas
- 6) Impact of the modern age on Middle Grade fiction
- Part Three: Illustrations and other extras in Middle Grade fiction
- 1) Illustrations: yes or no?
- 2) Mixing other genres
- 3) Writing style
- 4) On preaching vs. teaching
- 5) Creating impact and grabbing attention
- 6) Importance of word count
Part One: Defining the Middle Grade Genre
One of the best things about the middle age genre is this: it’s an age demographic. People only recently began to consider it a separate genre belonging to children’s fiction. However, that doesn’t mean that writing for the specific age demographic of 8 until 12 is somehow more difficult than writing for children or young adults. The elements of a good story remain the same in every genre. The difference here is in the themes you choose to tackle in your stories, and what your target audience will be. For that reason, it’s impossible to not further divide middle grade fiction into two age categories: early and late, early covering ages 8-10, and late covering ages 11-13.
However, another way of looking at middle grade fiction is through themes, writing style and tone. Younger children, belonging in the early group, will be interested in lighter topics, while older children might be more interested in crushing and very light romance. And while all children’s stories are essentially coming of age, middle grade is the time when we first discover the big bad world. Themes like being self-conscious, friendship, and even bullying in modern times, are interesting to the children who like to read about discovering oneself. On the other hand, humor, adventure, and fantasy will interest other children.
That’s what makes age so important in middle grade fiction.
1) Age in Middle Grade fiction
Your protagonist can be a little older or younger than your targeted audience, however, an 8-year-old might not pick up a book about a 7-year-old protagonist, but they will definitely pick it up even if the protagonist was aged 9 or 10. So, ideally, the age of the protagonist will be the same or older than your intended readers. For example, a late middle grade fiction protagonist can be aged 13 or even 14. 14 can be too young for young adult (depending on the story), but it can fit in late middle grade fiction. Children like to read about characters that are a little older than themselves – but not too much.
2) Middle Grade fiction: early ages 8-10
The second difference between early and late middle grade fiction stems from the themes, situations, and aims of your novel. If your novel is aimed at the younger crowd of eight to ten-year-olds, then your themes should revolve around friendship, family, humor. In other words, lighter themes that would engage the mind of the children. Many kids turn into lifelong readers at this age, which makes your novel really important. It’s one thing to write a great novel that all adults can enjoy, but writing the kind of novel that will make an 8-year-old say “I want to read more stories like this” is a completely different thing. The early middle grade novels focus more on lighthearted stories, like child superheroes and their friends. Some of them maybe even have juvenile humor (think fart jokes), because that’s what some middle graders want to read. You’re not writing a school textbook; you’re providing entertainment for children. And while it’s okay to dab into serious themes and topics, you have to do it while using the right perspective and voice. When you’re writing novels aimed for the early middle grade age, think more like a child and less like a young adult.
3) Middle Grade fiction: late ages 11-13
The latter ages, from 11 to 13 are a very special time in a child’s life. Children slowly leave more and more of their childhood behind, and they get closer and closer to being teenagers. An 11-year-old might be interested in reading about the adventures of an 8-year-old child, but chances are they would be more interested in a protagonist who is 12 or 13. The themes in this age range from friendship and family to first crush and romance. These are the times when the child begins to really see the world around them. The children that sit alone at lunch have different views of the world than those who walk around in a clique of friends. Belonging and fitting in become important themes that continue into the young adult (teenage) age, and while birthday parties and sleepovers are the highlight of a child’s social life, when they do not happen, there is a reason for it.
However, this doesn’t mean that just because you decided to make your protagonist 12 years old, that you need to shy away from lighter topics and adventure (and even fart jokes). Kids are different, and some kids want to read about self-discovery, but others just want the fun a story can bring.
4) Finding the kid voice
The voice of your protagonist is, obviously, the most important, regardless of whether you’re writing in first person point of view or third. First, you need to decide how eloquent the protagonist will be. A child up to 13 years old will not use words that are too long or too obscure. An even younger child might still have problems saying some words. For example, the word repercussions might become ripper cushions.
There are three ways for you to try to capture the voice of your protagonist (and other children in your novel). First, you can (and must!) read other books in your intended genre. Not to copy, but to see how it’s done, and to determine whether it’s good or not. The second way is by delving deep into your own childhood memories and remembering what it was like to be in that age. The third way to do this is by talking, conversing, and communicating with children of the same age.
Because here is the kicker: you might have loved Anne of Green Gables as a child, especially if you grew up before the digital age came with all its smartphones and tablets and even hoverboards (even though they don’t hover). An 8-year-old today is much more viable to have a hoverboard rather than a skateboard. Your memories serve to put you in the child’s state of mind, but unless you spend time with children who are middle grade in 2018, you will not know how a child views a smartphone, a tablet, or a computer.
5) Getting inside the protagonist’s head
Since we’re talking about children, getting inside their heads (or, your protagonist’s head), is both easy in one aspect and difficult in another.
The reason why it’s easy: your protagonist has only lived for less than a decade. You do not need to craft an extensive backstory that includes everything the protagonist has been through up until the moment your novel starts.
The difficulty stems from the fact that you’re still an adult, and middle grade was a long time ago for you. Add in the fact that the world changes drastically in the last 20 years, this makes your job even more difficult. In addition, think about the message you’re sending. If you show a 10-year-old girl whose goal in the day is to make a cute Facebook selfie, what kind of a message are you sending to other 10-year-old girls?
However, this is where backstory comes to help, in addition with the three ways of finding the voice of a child we mentioned in the previous section.
How did your protagonist grow up? Does he or she live with both her parents, or is he or she the child of a single parent? Where are the grandparents? Are they in the picture or not, and if not, what happened to them? Moreover, how does the child feel about the presence (or lack thereof) of parents or grandparents?
Then, we move on to school. Did the child go to pre-school or not? If he or she did not go to pre-school, did he or she have problems socializing in elementary school? Then, move on to middle grade before the novel starts. How many friends? How good of a friends? What is their daily routine? Do they care about school and learning, or do they prefer to go out and play? Add in the modern technology – is the child more comfortable sitting at home playing Nintendo Wii or PlayStation, or they prefer to go out and play football?
Create one normal day in the life of your protagonist, follow his or her thoughts and goals during that day, and figure out the right moment when his or her adventure begins.
6) Mixing in other genres
Adventure is prevalent in middle grade fiction, as well as children’s fiction, not because the characters go on a literal adventure (although, most often they do), but because the events of the novel are presented as such.
But, you can target any kind of genre towards children, within some limits, of course. Science fiction and fantasy, for example, but also mystery and slice-of-life become adventures when one constant in a child’s life is changed (visiting Grandma in the countryside, for example, can be a great slice-of-life adventure).
We already covered romance – it should be light, and you might add in a first kiss if the protagonist is of the older, late category. Mystery revolves around a missing item or a pet that has accidentally escaped.
You can cover tougher themes, because God knows that not every child has a happy childhood, but it goes without saying that if you choose to put a child in a thriller, then you’re not writing a book for children, regardless of their age. Unfortunately, children do not buy novels for themselves – their parents do, and if their parents decide that your novel has the potential to psychologically scar their children, your novel will remain on the shelf for years, waiting to be bought. This doesn’t mean that tougher themes cannot prevail in middle grade fiction – A Series of Unfortunate Events is prime example of how you can write books with difficult themes aimed at children. It’s all in the interpretation, perspective, and tone.
Part Two: Plotting, characterization, and narrative
For some writers, the most difficult thing is to know what to write. Other writers sit down and write a story in one sitting, no previous planning needed. Regardless of which group you belong to, knowing how to build a plot, how to show your characters within it, and to wrap it up in a narrative suitable and attractive to children, is imperative to telling a story. You might want to rely on instinct, and some writers are able to instinctively feel their way when telling a story, however, in most cases, something ends up missing.
For that reason, in this section, we’ll talk about plotting, characterization and narrative in middle grade fiction, and what makes middle grade fiction stand out.
1) Defining a protagonist
Defining the protagonist is a task that every writer takes on differently. Some writers prefer to discover more about their characters as they write the story, while others define their protagonists from the start.
Here, we will talk about defining the protagonist in the simplest sense. Besides age and appearance, you need to answer the following questions:
– What kind of traits does the protagonist possess?
– What kind of a lesson will the protagonist learn at the end?
– What changes in the protagonist from start to finish.
Your characters should not be perfect, even though they are children. Children can be just as ‘flawed’ as adults. By flawed, we do not mean ‘defect’ in any kind of way, we’re referring to traits that are and should be subjected to change. A child that doesn’t know how to share might be told that they are about receive a baby brother or a sister. The story revolves around the child learning how to share with friends, cousins and relatives. A spoiled child, for example, might learn that just because they want that new shiny expensive object, it doesn’t mean that they need it.
Sure, you might tell yourself, “I want to write a story about an orphaned child,” but unless you define that orphan, his or her surroundings, the things that he or she will learn along the way, you will have a series of events that might be loosely connected via cause and effect, but at the end, the readers will ask themselves, “so, what was the point of this story?”
And, you don’t really want that, do you?
2) Creating the plot
In a good novel, there are always two things: a plot and a character’s arc for the protagonist. When you have a well-defined protagonist, when you know which traits the protagonist will change, you can create a plot that will help you bring these things to life. The plot is easy to define: in all novels, the protagonist is presented with a problem that they have to solve. The protagonist always goes for the easiest solution, which leads us to the first plot point. However, the easiest solution doesn’t work, and it is only when the protagonist learns his or her lesson, when they change for the better, that we get the second plot point – the correct solution to the problem, and from there, move on to the resolution of the overall conflict.
In middle grade fiction, these problems do not have to be worldly problems where the child has to save the world (although, there are great novels out there where children do save the world). Saving the world can mean anything for a child. Saving the world can mean defeating the neighborhood bully for good just so that the protagonist and his or her friends can play outside again in peace without the bully bothering them.
Once the protagonist has a single goal in mind, you can begin to build your novel in three acts.
Act 1: The first act in any novel is always the same: you introduce your characters, the protagonist, and the normal world where they live and interact. Even if you’re writing science fiction or fantasy, you need to define the “normal world” and present it to the readers. Act 1 also introduces the problem that the protagonist has to solve, and the inciting incident that causes the problem or makes the protagonist aware of it. When the protagonist makes the easiest (wrong) decision to solve the problem (or even deny it), you end the first act and begin with the second.
Act 2: At the beginning of act 2, it appears as if the protagonist has made the right decision. Things might even go really well for a while. However, since the problem hasn’t really been solved, this leads to small disasters, then bigger ones, until finally, the protagonist has to really face the problem and make the right decision. This moment is known as the second plot point, and this is when the second act ends.
In the third act, or, the resolution, the protagonist, now changed for the better, has made the right decision, and the time has come to either defeat the enemy, or fight a final battle, or do something that previously they did not want to even consider doing. This leads to the ending.
Now, the above is only a blueprint. You need to build up the plot as such following the line of cause and effect. You need to get from the inciting incident to the first plot point, and then to the second.
Another thing you must remember is that the first and second plot points are not connected by cause and effect directly. As such, with the help of your cast of characters and the protagonist’s traits, you can add subplots – small mini stories that include the other characters and that help you show your protagonist’s character better, or a bigger subplot that will take more page time and run almost parallel to the main one. Whichever way you decide to go, remember that every scene needs to be either plot related, subplot related via cause and effect, and serve to portray your characters better. If it’s just slice of life without any real plot-related substance, that scene will have to go.
3) Defining the cast of characters
There are two reasons why you need a cast of characters in your novel. The first is because your protagonist will never be all-knowing and able to do everything by themselves. Another reason is connected to the protagonist. The easiest way to show a character’s personality traits is in contrast with other characters. Adult characters help you show better the mind of a child – especially through the relationship between the child and the adult character.
Besides, the world of children can be full of people: friends, family members, extended family members, teachers, school mates, and more. Defining the cast of characters means choosing the role of each character. Once you’ve defined the role, you will have to create extensive backstories for the characters. The backstories will help you give each character a distinct voice, which is highly important, especially in scenes with dialogue.
What you need to remember, at all times, is who is telling the story. Writing in omnipresent point of view gives you the opportunity to get into many characters’ head and reveal things to the reader that the protagonist doesn’t know. On the other hand, writing in first or third person limited point of view means telling a story as the protagonist – no jumping around in other people’s heads. What the protagonist knows is the same thing that the readers know.
Remember that you’re writing a story about children meant to be read by children. Keep the narrative in the spirit of childhood, even if you’re showing themes that are difficult for a child to fully comprehend. Using words that children understand is imperative, keeping the violence to a minimum is preferable, and keeping the tone light and hopeful ideal for a middle grade story.
On the other hand, if your narrative is adult-like, how do you expect children to fully understand and enjoy your novel? Children can tell when the narrator is “adult” just by reading a couple of paragraphs. This makes them not want to finish reading and leave your novel aside in favor of novels with a lighter narrative that enables them to go on a ride, have an adventure, and still understand everything that’s happening.
5) Themes and ideas
Reading other middle grade books will give you a good idea on the themes and ideas that are prevalent in it. From love, friendship, family, to loyalty, courage, bravery, determination and perseverance. Including kindness, empathy, working in a team, and compassion. Conveying these ideas in writing is a different matter entirely. One of the best ways to show these themes is through the events of the plot.
Perseverance is shown through the protagonist taking on impossible odds and achieving his or her goal. The only difference between adult fiction and middle grade fiction, when it comes to themes, is the representation. For a child, perseverance can be shown by not giving up on even the simplest of goals. Kindness is shown through adversary, while true friendship, just like true love, can survive all sorts of trials.
What you should not do is try to cram too many themes into one novel. Choose one or two prevalent themes that the plot will revolve around, and let the other themes show themselves naturally in specific moments or events in the novel.
6) Impact of the modern age on Middle Grade fiction
As we previously said, a middle grader today will most probably ride a hoverboard rather than a skateboard. Kids from today barely even know what a landline telephone with a cord is, let alone a VHS. But, they do know how to use tablets, smartphones, and computers from a very young age.
Sure, you can omit technology in your novel, but that automatically transfers your novel back to the 90s when smartphones did not exist. But, today’s children might not find your novel believable. For example, a child running away from home and spending a day on their own in the city might have worked as a story in the 90s, but today? Today that kid will have their phone on them, so either have the kid discard the phone, or show the kid answering or ignoring its parents’ frantic phone calls. Point is, modern technology is a big part of children’s worlds today, and you should find a way to use it in your novel. Even social media is becoming more and more present in children’s world, as more and more kids have connections on Facebook and Instagram.
Adding modern technology in your novel does not encumber you in any way, especially since the use of technology by children opens up many opportunities for themes like childhood and what it means in the modern world, how fast do you grow up with technology at your fingertips, and what kind of dangers can come, not from the outside world, but from the world inside a child’s smartphone.
Part Three: Illustrations and other extras in Middle Grade fiction
It’s very uncommon for an adult novel to have illustrations and other extras, but even adults are happy when a book offers something more than just words and sentences. When it comes to children, these extras can make your novel even more attractive. If you’re writing a middle grade fiction novel, you need to consider which one of these extras you can and should include.
By default, this will depend on the story you’re telling, and on the impact you’re trying to achieve. In the last part of this guide, we’ll be focusing on illustrations, writing style – especially, writing style meant for children, and other extras that can help you boost your novel to great levels.
1) Illustrations: yes or no?
If you’re writing for the early middle graders, ages 8 to 10, you might want to consider adding illustrations to your novel. Now, there are a few things you need to know. Unless you’re a gifted illustrator, you will need to hire one to create these for you. That means commissioning art, which might be expensive, especially if you’re self-publishing. If a big publishing house stands behind you, on the other hand, illustrations might be included in your novel regardless of whether or not you want them in your novel or nor.
If you decide to go for it, know that early middle grade fiction allows for full page illustrations of places, characters, and events. But, this might make your book longer and more expensive to print. On the other hand, if you’re writing for ages 10 and up, you should remember that one illustration of an object or a character at the beginning of each chapter is enough.
2) Mixing other genres
Middle grade fiction, as we previously said, turns any kind of story into an adventure, due to the ages of the characters and the protagonist. However, here are a few things to keep in mind if you wish to mix in other genres.
Science fiction and fantasy: do not think that it’s easy to add science fiction and fantasy in a novel for middle graders, thinking that since these kids barely know the laws of science, no one can dispute your worldbuilding. But that’s not exactly true. Children know and understand rules, and if you deem to break your own worldbuilding rules in science fiction and fantasy, they will know what you’ve done. Many of them will scoff and say, “that’s not possible,” and they’ll be taken out of the story just like any adult would.
If you wish to mix in a mystery, treat your protagonist like a mini-detective with a keen mind, and do not offer the solution out of the blue. Have the protagonist solve the mystery by following clues and making the right deductions (and wrong ones from which he will learn). Do not believe that you get a shortcut just because you’re writing for children, working under the false belief that children will believe anything.
Of course, children have great imagination, and yes, if you present a planet that has no gravity in your story and everybody is flying around on the surface, then they will accept the possibility of such a planet existing. But, this doesn’t mean that you can also have that planet rain candy out of rainbow-colored clouds, wrappers and everything. Keep it real and imaginative, rather than throwing everything on the wall and see what sticks, even if it doesn’t make sense.
3) Writing style
One of the biggest mistakes you can make in writing for middle graders (and children in general) is to write down at them. They are children, but they are neither slow nor stupid. There is no need for you to repeat the same things over and over again, and there is no need for you to dumb down the language and writing style.
Remember, middle grade is the age when children begin to discover the world. They are curious and can be very sharp at times, and they will know when a writer is dumbing it down. There is no need for that.
However, a middle grade novel is also not the place for philosophical statements, recollections, and long paragraphs of inner reflection and thoughts. This has the opposite effect: the children read but do not understand much, which means, they are not enjoying reading your novel. And while some adults might overcome this problem and finish your novel, children will stop reading and never go back to it.
Your best bet is to have a child read your middle grade story (or a part of it). Gauge their reaction and then make changes accordingly.
4) On preaching vs. teaching
When it comes to talking down to children, another problem that arises is the difference between preaching and teaching. Teaching is guiding the child to understanding something about life. You do not tell them, you show them and you help them come to the right conclusion and learning the lesson.
Preaching, on the other hand, is telling the child over and over again that the sky is blue and can only be blue (even though it can be grey when it rains, white when it snows, black at night). Everyone has their own beliefs, but writers always face the problem of preaching – even when writing for adults. Do not preach your principles and opinions in your novel, especially not when it’s intended for children. With the theme of your novel in mind, find a way to include important life lessons in it – but through the eyes and perspective of your protagonist.
Guide your protagonist, let your protagonist learn on his own, and you will not have the problem of preaching in your novel. Yes, stealing is bad, for example, but instead of having five different characters say that in five different scenes, have the protagonist steal something, face the consequences, and then learn and understand why stealing is wrong.
5) Creating impact and grabbing attention
Here is the moment where your creativity shows itself to its full light. Alas, maybe you wanted to wind surf when you were a kid, and maybe you think that this will be so fun to depict in a novel, but unless that activity makes sense in the story, it might not really belong in there.
Your middle grade novel is not the place where you can live out your childhood wishes and things you never got to do.
On the other hand, having a middle grader attend school and only school in your novel is also not a good idea, even though school takes up most of a child’s day. Focus on action, and on change. Open your novel with the child going to school, then immediately have the action happen that jumpstarts the plot. Middle grade fiction novels are shorter, in general, than adult contemporary novels. This means that you need to exclude everything that’s not necessary to the story. Keep school only if the story happens at the school. And even then, in the name of entertainment, make the events that happen both fun and realistic.
6) Importance of word count
When it comes to word count, middle grade fiction ranges anywhere from 20K to 50-60K. This is because children have shorter attention spans than adults, and if they see that a book is ‘very big’ they might not even want to read it. And while that epic fantasy revolving around children will be awesome for you to write, the children meant to read it might not be interested in reading such a long novel, no matter how amazing it might actually be.
On the other hand, a shorter novel means a quicker plot (because you still need to get from plot point one to plot point two). You have less page time to show and develop and flesh out your characters, so make sure that every scene in your novel has an impact on the plot and it serves to show character. Otherwise, you will have to cut it out in the editing process.
All readers want to read a story that they enjoy. Some readers prefer to read a story that will take them on an adventure and make them think. Other readers prefer only the adventure. They read to escape, not to reflect on the real world or their own lives.
Children are the same. Your story might be an adventure that also teaches kids about love, friendship, loyalty, and more, or your story might be intended to make children laugh. Whichever way you go, if your characters are vivid enough, if your story is interesting, and if you do not write down to children and preach in your story, then children will love it. Writing a great novel for adults is easier because we are also adults, and we understand adults a lot more. Writing a great novel for children might be more difficult, but it can be done, and who knows when the next JK Rowling will come along?
Keep writing and practicing your craft, and you will write a novel that all kids would enjoy. Good luck!
Georgina Roy wants to live in a world filled with magic. As a screenwriting student, she is content to fill notebooks and sketchbooks with magical creatures and amazing new worlds. When she is not at school, watching a film or scribbling away in a notebook, you can usually find her curled up, reading a good urban fantasy novel, or writing on her own.