IT is simply profound how as adults we tend to forget the stories that we heard and read as children. I am guilty of the same, and it is for this reason that I write about it in an attempt to bring some awareness to not only children’s literature, but the importance of children’s literature to the future adults that our Guyanese children will become.

Literature in my own childhood developed in three main strands, of which I have distinct memories . First, there was an old lady (called Ole-Lady) in the village where I grew up, and, sometimes, on moonlit nights, she would gather the entire village on a grassy mound and she would tell everyone stories. She had tales of children lost in forests, of creatures clambering through the night, of murder and madness, of hauntings and magic. From this woman’s tales, I think I learnt that stories can induce wonder, amazement, and terror.

Stories can represent the unreal. Second, I have memories of my mother telling my sisters and I stories. A lot of the times her stories were funny and made us laugh. Sometimes her stories were sad and dark. I only recently realised that a story she told me when I was in Nursery School is actually a version of one of the Brothers Grimm’s older, more unknown tales: “The Juniper Tree.” Anyone who has read “The Juniper Tree” will know how depressing it is, and so, I think my mother’s tales taught me that stories can make you happy and sad. Stories can control emotions. Last, I was introduced to the library and, therefore, to books and global children’s literature, by my grandfather. As I grew older I lapped up the Harry Potter books, Goosebumps and Fear Street, Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew, and anything else that came my way. Through these and other books, I learnt that stories came from all over the world and each one thought me about the experiences of people from the places, and sometimes whole new worlds, to which I had been transported through reading.

So my experience growing up in the 90s may be similar to people from my generation and those who came before, but what about today’s children? Is oral literature being represented in the same way as it was to me? Do parents still tell stories to their children? Do kids still enjoy going to the library? If the answer to these questions is no, then what is being lost ? The growth of the imagination, awareness of emotions, and the appreciation for world literature that I got as a child? I would not go so far as to fully agree with that statement since, in many ways, technology and the internet have helped to serve some of these functions to today’s children.

Content is available, even if the content is now on a screen. The more important question that adults should be asking, when they question the existence and importance of children’s literature in Guyana, is whether the content available online or in other formats are actually works that have depth – whether there exists within the work lessons that can benefit the child reader, aspects of the story that can teach the child something, and elements that can contribute to the child’s understanding of the world. After all, whether they were aware of it or not, all three of the persons who introduced me to stories ensured that whatever I was told or read, was not simply for entertainment purposes.

And this brings me to Guyanese writer, Imam Baksh, and his short story, “Clara in the New World, 2492 A.D.” which contains elements that children will love and adults will also love, and approve of. It is an example of a good children’s story for the modern Guyanese child. It has been published online in Anansesem – an online journal that focuses on writing that caters mostly to Caribbean children.

“Clara in the New World, 2492 A.D.” is set on a habitable planet, where Clara and her family (her brother, Eustace, and their parents) have left Earth for the new planet on what appears to be part scouting mission and part exploration and colonisation of the planet that Clara’s father has named Rodney (after Walter Rodney, of course). However, they are not the planet’s only inhabitants nor, indeed, the planet’s first inhabitants, as there are many furry aliens whose means of communication Clara and her family have yet to uncover.

Based on that premise alone, we can see why the story would a), appeal to Guyanese children and b), offer something more than entertainment value. A child reader who reads this particular story would be exposed to the concept of a Guyanese in space, which is not only a novel, mind-bending idea, but it is also the kind of thing that is sure to be a contributory factor towards the broadening of a child’s imagination – a goal that good children’s literature should achieve. Furthermore, the world that Baksh has built in his story is interesting enough to keep a child (and even adults) interested and the characters are children and so, can be easily identified with if the reader is a child.

However, and perhaps, more importantly, the other worthy things about the story are its messages. The subtle nod to Rodney is an important conversation starter that a child can have with his/her parent or guardian and this would open more doors to talk an iconic Guyanese and his values and teachings that are relevant to that child and his/her society. The child who reads the story would know that Rodney is important enough to have a planet named after him. When the child asks “why” he was so important, then the story would have achieved one of its goals.

Another important element to the story is its parallel with history. Clara and her family are, in a sense, colonisers. They have happened upon a planet belonging to a different race of beings – creatures who are not only physically different, but use an unknown method of communication – and the major parallel here, of course, is Columbus becoming lost and happening to come across the West Indies, and then going on to colonise the lands that are populated by the Indigenous Peoples, who were physically different from the Europeans and spoke different languages. Clara is attacked by the aliens in the story, and this is a conflict that can only be resolved once she learns to communicate with them. In this is an important lesson on language and on communication, and, further, on how communication is the ideal tool that is necessary for peace.

To a child, the history of the Caribbean can appear as a messy turmoil of people and places. Baksh’s story presents a narrative that can be used to explain the beginning of our post-colonial society in a way that children can understand and appreciate. This, in my opinion, is what makes “Clara in the New World, 2492 A.D.” a good children’s story – not only because of the action or the interesting world and the strange beings, but also because it contains analytical value and depth. It does not feel like it needs to be less of itself, because it is written for children and not adults, and this is the lesson that all modern children’s authors should take away from Baksh’s story. Children’s literature is important and worthy of analysis too.