Ä is for äldre
which means ”older”, and it is used in Swedish in the phrase
äldre barnlitteratur, older children's literature. But what
is older? Older than what? I must admit that it took me a long time
to get interested in older children's literature, and I still tend to
be more involved with ”new” or ”contemporary” which doesn't
make much sense either because my contemporary begins in the 1970s
and '80s which for most of my students is ancient. I believe that for
many children's litrature colleagues older means 17th and
18th century, but I don't know much about it, and it's too
late for me to start learning more. The subject here in Cambridge
that fascinates me is Medieval and Modern Languages, which, from a
children's literature perspective is unfathomable. Which just shows
how complex such simple labels as “old” and “new” can be.
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