published between 1693 and 1772 and provided a focus for writers and publishers in
their provision of a literature to feed the demand from schools and parents (Pickering
1981: passim).
His emphasis on a carefully judged and rational approach to writing for children was
echoed in one of the first books to expound upon schooling for girls: Sarah Fielding’s
The Governess: or Little Female Academy (1749), in which her aim was ‘to endeavour to
cultivate an early inclination to benevolence and a love of virtue in the minds of young
women’. Ellenor Fenn, writing towards the end of the century, was also intent on
controlling and containing the natural behaviour of children and impressing virtues
upon them, although a lightness of touch was also evident in her work. In Cobwebs to
Catch Flies (c.1783) she appealed to parents as much as to children: ‘if the human mind
be a tabula rasa—you to whom it is entrusted should be cautious what is written upon
it’. Lady Fenn also produced books and ‘schemes for teaching under the idea of
amusement’. One of these, The Infant’s Delight, was sold with ‘a specimen of cuts in a
superior stile for children: with a book containing their names, as easy reading lessons
[sic]’.
Sarah Trimmer, hugely influential as a critic as well as a writer of children’s books
and who credited Locke with inspiring the increase in books published for children at
the end of the eighteenth century, was especially concerned with the moral impact of
writing for children. Her Fabulous Histories. Designed for the Instruction of Children,
respecting their Treatment of Animals (1786), later better known as The History of the
Robins, aimed to teach children their duty towards brute creation. In Prints of Scripture
History (1786), and numerous other pious works, she provided children with a
grounding in sound religious teaching. Her Little Spelling Book for Young Children (2nd
edn, 1786) and Easy Lessons for Young Children (1787) were also popular and went into
several editions.
The relationship between religious principles, morality and a child-centred literature,
which had begun with the Puritan writers, continued in the eighteenth century through
the impact of a number of female authors. Like Sarah Trimmer, they considered that
reading matter should improve young minds while making the reading light and easy:
another of Locke’s dictums. Anna Barbauld, whose Lessons for Children from Two to
Three Years Old (1778) and Hymns in Prose for Children (1781) expressed a sensitivity
for her readers which was quite remarkable, nevertheless aimed mainly to ‘inspire
devotional feeling early in life’. Evenings at Home (1792–1796), a collection of amusing
tales, moral pieces and verse, compiled in collaboration with her brother, John Aikin,
similarly mixed morality with amusement. In common with many of the writers of this
period she was herself deeply involved in educating children; following her husband’s
untimely death she ran a small school.
Mary Pilkington, who worked as a governess and wrote around fifty books for
children, also combined a firm didactic line in her work with more amusing and
adventurous material. Her Biography for Girls and Biography for Boys, both published in
1799, contained cautionary tales of children whose later lives were fixed through their
youthful misdeeds, while New Tales of the Castle (1800), modelled on Madame de
Genlis’s Tales of the Castle (1785), featured a French noble family fleeing the Revolution
—altogether a more thrilling story line.
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