Xerxes the great did die\/And so must you and I! <\/a><\/p>\n(I don\u2019t hold the same views of children\u2019s moral responsibility as these authors\u2013though I think kids understand more than we expect, and I know I intentionally chose to do wrong before I reached the \u201cage of reason.\u201d But awareness of the reality and unpredictability of death strikes me as important for a child. You and your family will not be spared, so accept that there\u2019s an extraordinary amount of suffering in life and don\u2019t feel ashamed or betrayed when it falls to your lot. Also, the idea that death opens the gate to paradise and makes possible the correction of this world\u2019s injustice is part of what makes the ending of \u201cThe Little Match Girl\u201d so powerful, so I definitely think those are concepts children can handle.)<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
from the Smithsonian: Do you remember the books that helped you learn to read\u2014maybe Dick and Jane, Dr. Seuss, or\u00a0Clifford the Big Red Dog? No matter the answer, odds are your experience was very different from most Protestant children living in early America because your books probably did not contain a discussion of your imminent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1071,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[101,17,21,79,122],"class_list":["post-10889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mackerel-snapping","tag-america","tag-children-will-listen","tag-childrens-books","tag-moral-memories-of-the-past","tag-totentanz"],"yoast_head":"\n
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