Table Of ContentChildhood in the Contemporary
English Novel
Since the 1980s, novels about childhood for adults have been a booming
genre within the contemporary British literary market. C hildhood in the
Contemporary English Novel offers the first comprehensive study of this
literary trend. Assembling analyses of key works by Ian McEwan, Doris
Lessing, P. D. James, Nick Hornby, Sarah Moss and Stephen Kelman
and situating them in their cultural and political contexts, Sandra Dinter
uncovers both the reasons for the current popularity of such fiction and
the theoretical shift that distinguishes it from earlier literary epochs. The
book’s central argument is that the contemporary English novel draws on
the constructivist paradigm shift that revolutionised the academic study
of childhood several decades ago. Contemporary works of fiction, Dinter
argues, depart from the notion of childhood as a naturally given phase of
life and examine the agents, interests and conflicts involved in its cultural
production. Dinter also considers the limits of this new theoretical impetus,
observing that authors and scholars alike, even when they claim to conceive
of childhood as a construct, do not always give up on the idea of its
‘natural’ core. Accordingly, this book reconstructs how the English novel
between the 1980s and the 2010s oscillates between an acknowledgement
of constructivism and an endorsement of childhood as the last irrevocable
quintessence of humanity. In doing so, it successfully extends the literary
and cultural history of childhood to the immediate present.
“A valuable contribution to the vibrant topic of childhood in fiction,
Sandra Dinter’s C hildhood in the Contemporary English Novel challenges
traditional concepts of childhood and offers insightful readings of English
fiction from the 1980s to the 2010s. Neatly considered in its theorizing of
childhood in contemporary fiction, the study includes astute readings of
texts ranging from Ian McEwan’s T he Child in Time to Stephen Kelman’s
Pigeon English . Dinter’s monograph is a polished, thought-provoking,
and very welcome addition to scholarship in the field.”
– Adrienne E. Gavin, Canterbury Christ Church University, editor
of The Child in British Literature: Literary Constructions
of Childhood, Medieval to Contemporary
“In addition to providing insightful readings of how cultural constructions
of childhood are represented in contemporary novels, Sandra Dinter’s
monograph also invites its readers to engage with the strategies and
processes of the cultural production of childhood in literature. Convincing
analyses of novels by Doris Lessing, Ian McEwan, P. D. James, Nick
Hornby, Sarah Moss and Stephen Kelman successfully corroborate Dinter’s
provoking thesis that both contemporary novels and childhood studies,
although foregrounding the construct character of childhood, nevertheless
betray latent essentialisms. Lucidly written and thoroughly readable, this
excellent study makes an important contribution to childhood studies.”
– Anja Müller, University of Siegen, author of Framing
Childhood in Eighteenth-Century English
Periodicals and Satirical Prints, 1689–1789
Sandra Dinter is lecturer in English Literature and Culture at Friedrich-
Alexander University Erlangen-Nuermberg in Germany. Her specialisms
include contemporary British fiction, constructions of childhood, neo-
Victorian studies and representations of space and mobility in nineteenth-
century literature. Sandra Dinter is co-editor of T ransdisciplinary Perspectives
on Childhood in Contemporary Britain: Literature, Media and Society
(Routledge, 2017). Her work has appeared in the peer-reviewed journals
Children’s Literature Association Quarterly, N eo-Victorian Studies and
Anglia: Journal of English Philology .
Studies in Childhood, 1700 to the Present
This series recognizes and supports innovative work on the child and on
literature for children and adolescents that informs teaching and engages
with current and emerging debates in the field. Proposals are welcome for
interdisciplinary and comparative studies by humanities scholars working
in a variety of fields, including literature; book history, periodicals history,
and print culture and the sociology of texts; theater, film, musicology, and
performance studies; history, including the history of education; gender
studies; art history and visual culture; cultural studies; and religion.
Recent titles in this series:
Nineteenth-Century Fictions of Childhood and the Politics of Play
Michelle Beissel Heath
Aesthetics of Children’s Poetry
Katherine Wakely-Mulroney and Louise Joy
Transdisciplinary Perspectives on Childhood in Contemporary Britain
Edited by Ralf Schneider and Sandra Dinter
Children’s Play in Literature
Investigating the Strengths and the Subversions of the Playing Child
Edited by Joyce Kelley
Gaming Empire in Children’s British Board Games, 1836–1860
Megan A. Norcia
Childhood in the Contemporary English Novel
Sandra Dinter
For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.
com/Studies-in-Childhood-1700-to-the-Present/book-series/ASHSER2084
Childhood in the
Contemporary English Novel
Sandra Dinter
First published 2020
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2020 Taylor & Francis
The right of Sandra Dinter to be identified as authors of this work
has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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ISBN: 978-0-367-36193-8 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-34449-7 (ebk)
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Contents
Acknowledgements viii
1 The Rise of the Contemporary Childhood Novel:
Introduction 1
2 Dismantling Constructivisms of Childhood 22
3 Constructions of Childhood in Late Modern England,
1980s–2010s 42
4 Approaching Childhood as a Construct: Ian McEwan’s
The Child in Time (1987) 66
5 Radical Constructivism in Doris Lessing’s The Fifth
Child (1988) 87
6 The Constructed Child as a Counter Model: P. D.
James’s The Children of Men (1992) 105
7 Performing Childhood in Nick Hornby’s A bout
a Boy (1998) 126
8 Historiographical Reflections on Childhood in Sarah
Moss’s N ight Waking (2011) 146
9 The Limits of Constructivism in Stephen Kelman’s
Pigeon English (2011) 166
10 Epilogue 187
Bibliography 191
Appendix: A Chronology of Anglophone Childhood
Novels Since 1979 214
Index 218
Acknowledgements
The writing of this book took place in various libraries, offices, studies
and trains across Germany and the UK. What began as a vague idea in
Hanover turned into a doctoral thesis at Bielefeld University and took
me in turn to Reading, Berlin, Aachen and Mainz. The book was given
its finishing touches at the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-
Nuermberg. I am delighted to have met and worked with so many won-
derful and welcoming people at each of these locations. I couldn’t have
wished for better supervisors: Ralf Schneider and Rainer Emig gave me
valuable feedback with just the right balance of encouragement, criti-
cism and pragmatism. After the PhD, they pointed me in the direction of
unforeseen opportunities, without which I may not have taken my chance
in academia. Ruth Mayer was a great mentor in the early stages of this
project, as was Anja Müller, who took the time to discuss my proposal
with me one evening in 2012. Many years later, Anja’s clever annota-
tions helped me in the process of turning the thesis into a book more
than she could have ever known. Over the course of six months abroad,
Karín Lesnik-Oberstein, Neil Cocks, Sue Walsh and the PhD students
at the Graduate Centre for International Research in Childhood at the
University of Reading encouraged me to think outside the box and to
question what I had hitherto taken for granted. Furthermore, I profited
greatly from Katharina Pietsch’s and Tyll Zybura’s exceptional enthusi-
asm for childhood in literature. Their attentive responses to my work put
me back on track more than once, and I hope that I will be able to return
the favour one day. Stefanie John and Anneke Lubkowitz, my library pals
over the past five years, continue to be two of my dearest friends and
most rigorous readers. I cherish every moment of our time together, be it
in stoic silence, in witty conversation or in wild laughter. I am indebted
to Annie Rutherford for a meticulous reading of my final manuscript. I
would also like to thank Laura Eglington, Svenja Holme, Jessica Med-
hurst, Hannah Muehlnickel and Elizabeth Stewart for reading sections
of earlier versions of this book. Many thanks go too to my former col-
leagues from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz for preparing me for
my viva in the summer of 2017.
Acknowledgements ix
One previously published paper of mine has found its way into this
book with kind permission from the publisher: substantial parts of “The
Child Narrator in Contemporary British Fiction and Literary Criticism:
The Case of Stephen Kelman’s P igeon English ”, my contribution to Trans-
disciplinary Perspectives on Childhood in Contemporary Britain: Litera-
ture, Media and Society (Routledge, 2018), a collection of essays that I
co-edited with Ralf Schneider, can be found in Chapter 9 of this book.
My research and travels would have been impossible without the gen-
erous financial support I received from the Bielefeld Graduate School in
Linguistics and Literary Studies, the German Academic Exchange Service
(DAAD) and the Bielefeld Young Researchers’ Fund. I am very grateful to
the Center for Interdisciplinary Research at Bielefeld University for fund-
ing our workshop on childhood in contemporary Britain in 2014, from
which I learned so much, and to the German Association for the Study of
English for awarding me the Helene Richter Prize in 2017.
Matthias has been my ‘partner in crime’ beyond the world of academia.
His kindness, humour and serenity have made these past years incredibly
joyful for me and were indispensable in the final stages of writing this
book. My mother, Michaela, always believed in my path and supported
me during the most difficult times of my life. My father, Thomas, passed
away during my second year at university, but he accompanied me in
spirit to all the places named above. In loving memory, I dedicate this
book to him.
