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Collection Policy Statement Index

Contents

I. Introduction
II. Scope
III. Research strengths
IV. Comparison with other major research collections
V. General policy

I. Introduction

"Children's Literature" is defined as material written or produced for the information or entertainment of children and young adults. It includes all literary, artistic genres and physical formats.

II. Scope

In the early days of the Library of Congress children's materials arrived in an unsystematic fashion. This situation changed with the Copyright Law of 1870, when the Library began to assemble what has become the most comprehensive collection in the country.

Since then, gifts and retrospective purchases have further augmented the collection. Exchange agreements enacted after World War II enabled the Library to supplement its holding with wide- ranging foreign-language acquisitions. There are an estimated 200,000 children's books in the Library's collections, including 15,000 housed in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division. These books and other materials represent all subjects and languages. They cover the mainstream as well as the special, unique, and rare, consisting of fiction, nonfiction, picture books, anthologies, folk and fairy tales, periodicals, school readers, moveable and toy books, mass market publications and films, audio-visual and electronic materials. These works are dispersed throughout the Library, from the various custodial division to the general collections.

For these related materials, consult the Collection Policy Statements for Comic Books, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Education, and Language and Literature.

III. Research Strengths

The Library's holdings of children's materials cover the mainstream as well as the special, unique, and rare. The strength of the Library's holdings, as compared to other collections of Americana in the United States, lies in their impressive scope, consistency over time and their supportive secondary materials. The collections afford a broad view of American attitudes toward the family, the governance of young citizens, popular and traditional culture. The foreign-language materials further enhance the study of U.S. and other national and regional cultures, to a degree not possible anywhere else in the country. The collections are catholic, not selective, another advantage over other special children's book collections.

According to noted collector and scholar, d'Alte Welch's A Bibliography of American Children's Books Printed Prior to 1821 (1972) the Library of Congress possesses approximately 100 extremely rare children's books, including The Child's New Play-Thing (Philadelphia, 1763) and The Children's Bible (Philadelphia, 1763).

The Library's children's book holdings also include a unique collection of Japanese-language children's books published prior to and during World War II, children's books published in Nazi Germany, and a small collection of rare children's books published in the USSR during the 1920 and 1930s. There is also a collection of contemporary moveable, toy, and tactile books.

IV. Comparison with other major research collections

Only the New York Public Library's collections rival the Library's in their universality. Special collections of note of children's books include the American Antiquarian Society's collection of American children's books published up to 1876; the Free Library of Philadelphia houses the A.S.W. Rosenbach Collection of Early American Children's Books published from the late 17th- century to 1837; and Princeton University's Cotsen Children's Library. Many other libraries have collections of specific authors, publishers, or illustrators.

V. General policy

1. U.S. publications:

   The Library of Congress adds all juvenile materials, regardless of format, deposited for copyright, with the exceptions noted below. The Library acquires manuscripts and original illustrations relating to children's literature of prominent American writers and/or illustrators.

   • religious materials for students in vacation church schools, instructions in devotion, catechisms and question books, and textbooks in religion unless written by a well-known author or issued by an important trade publisher;
   • paperback reprints unless they contain important new material or are newly illustrated;
   • elementary and secondary textbooks except for important titles in American history, social and physical sciences, and other subjects in special reader demand, or if they demonstrate new teaching methods or approaches;
   • answer books, workbooks, tests, teachers' manuals; correspondence school lessons, syllabi and textbooks issued for use by a particular teacher's class;
   • coloring books, paper dolls.
2. Foreign Publications

   The Library annually acquires a representative sample from each country of the best new titles of literature for children of all ages, including all books that win prestigious awards, works by noted authors of books for adults, works that reflect current publishing trends, highlight the diversity of design and illustration, and reveal new interpretations of social and political themes. Special attention is given to collecting children's books published in countries with large emigre populations in the U.S.

   Foreign textbooks are collected when they demonstrate didactic or propagandistic teaching methods.

   The Library collects reprints or translations of English/American "classics" (e.g., Alice in Wonderland). However, normally the Library does not acquire reprints or translations from English unless they are newly illustrated or textually important.

April, 1998

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