The anti-children's books children's books: A case study of how authors and translators view children's literature

In this paper, I analyze what a “typical” children’s book might be considered to be and how some authors deliberately work against this, seemingly expecting more from their readers. Then I give examples from English children’s books and from their translations to Swedish in order to discuss how the way the authors view children’s literature can change in translation. Subversive or stylistically challenging texts might become less so in translation, which also suggests that books that have cross-over appeal in the original might not do so in translation.