Nursery rhymes and society - what do they have in common? Many societies in history have generally considered children to be miniature adults who were often times treated as such, including societies of recent history. In our Eurocentric western world, in a supposedly more enlightened era, society has begun to view children as children and not small adults. Many have taken to exploring the minds of the young, only to find themselves struggling to understand through their own eyes instead of those of a child's. G. K. Chesterton, in light of new "understandings" by these psychologists and child-lovers, has denounced the nonsense marketed as children's art and literature for being directed at and produced for every person not a child in his essay "Child Psychology and Nonsense." Chesterton draws a distinct and rather colorful line between children's poetry that is and is not appropriate for a developing youth.

Chesterton, armed with a seemingly ample understanding of child psychology, has tackled the hypocrisy of those claiming to be aware of the amusements of children. He

Chesterton, G. K. "Child Psychology and Nonsense." 27 April 1999. Online. states the seemingly obvious when he says that the purpose of composing for children is to give them "pleasure," but insists that instead, society is simply "amusing [itself] with children." He said of certain children's poems that, while they may be enjoyed by the "child-lover" and "grown-up people[,] the point of many of them is not only such that a child should not see it, it is such that a child ought not be allowed to see it." By this, Chesterton refers to poetry that, while simplistic and with rhyme and rhythm a child could enjoy alone, the context of intended meaning is not appropriate. Such is the case in the following passage Chesterton quoted from Stevenson's Child's Garden of Verses -

With lots of toys and things to eat,

In writing of the misuse of "nonsense" in nursery literature, Chesterton approaches the matter with a bit of absurdity all his own. Chesterton then has the audacity to discredit his entire argument in his last lines, ultimately calling his own essay "the wrong place" fo

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Approximate Word count = 763
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)