Research Ideas for Jonah

I found too many things, really. Picking the things that would be most interesting and relevant was a little bit difficult. Because your paper focused on The Runaway Bunny, most of my ideas revolved around that.


Margaret Brown Wise
The Runaway Bunny
Kindness
Psychological needs

1)

KINDNESS-THE TELEOLOGICAL CREED OF HUMAN CONDITION.

Article / Pohoaţă, Gabriela1, gabrielapohoata@yahoo.com

2015, Cogito (2066-7094), volume 7, issue 2, starting on page 18, English

Online →

Humanities Source

This is a very long article, so I didn't read all of it. Since, however, Vivian ends up being converted to the idea that kindness is important and craves it for herself, this might be an appropriate article. Everyone needs kindness. But why? What does it do for people? Why are people sometimes not kind or won't accept it?

If we want kindness we need cooperation, not competitionPeriodical / Bethune, Rob2011, BMJ: British Medical Journal, volume 343, issue 7834, starting on page 1148Online →JSTOR Journals
This was interesting, especially because it was an article in a medical journal. It didn't seem particularly applicable, however.

 2)

'Goodnight Nobody': Comfort and the Vast Dark in the Picture-Poems of Margaret Wise Brown and Her Collaborators. Joseph Stanton. Lion and the Unicorn 14.2 (Dec. 1990): p66-76. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review Ed. Tom Burns. Vol. 107.  Detroit: Gale, 2005.  Word Count: 4914. From Literature Resource Center.[(essay date December 1990) 

This article addresses the idea of running away, especially within the context of the story The Runaway Bunny and other stories by Margaret Wise Brown including Goodnight Moon. It explores these ideas and pushes the boundary of what it means to run away. You could expand on your ideas of Vivian running away from kindness and emotional support. This could even cross again with psychological needs of people and why sometimes they choose to distance themselves.

3)

Religion in Children's Literature, An Introduction to

Children's Literature Review. Vol. 121. 2007.  Word Count: 1722.

Religious themes have long been found in children's literature. This article is a very general source and mentions things like The Chronicles of Narnia and Lord of the Rings. Professor Ashford specifically poses The Runaway Bunny as a religious Allegory. Anything, in a story that stands in for something else can be part of an allegory. Your idea that Cancer is stepping into the mother's role is a good one. It would be interesting to cross this with themes of childlike running away, as discussed in the article under #2.

4)

Gardens of stone: Searching for evidence of secularization and acceptance of death in grave inscriptions from 1900-2009. Article / Anderson, Keith A., Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, US, anderson.1630@osu.eduSielski, Christine L., Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USMiles, Elizabeth A., Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USDunfee, Alexis V., Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, US

2011, Gardens of stone: Searching for evidence of secularization and acceptance of death in grave inscriptions from 1900-2009., volume 63, issue 4, starting on page 359

Online →

Interesting perspective on attitudes toward death. Mostly I like that they did a study from gravestone inscriptions. You could explore the ideas between Cancer as a mother figure, and perhaps even that death provides both danger and safety.

5)

Remembering Margaret Wise Brown.

Clement Hurd. Horn Book Magazine 59.5 (Oct. 1983): p553-560. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review. Ed. Tom Burns. Vol. 107.  Detroit: Gale, 2005.  Word Count: 2408. From Literature Resource Center.[(essay date October 1983) 

This article was largely about Margaret herself. (The author of The Runaway Bunny). If you decide to go along the lines of talking about children's books, talking about the author is good background information. It could even inform or give inside about the book to learn more about her.

Cat-Quest: A Symbolic Animal in Margaret Wise Brown.Suzanne Rahn. Children's Literature 22 (1994): p149-161. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review. Ed. Tom Burns. Vol. 107.  Detroit: Gale, 2005.  Word Count: 4181. From Literature Resource Center.[(essay date 1994)  The role animals play in the storytelling. It even talks a little bit about what they stand in for.

6)

Stage partners: the varieties of theatrical mentoring; Experienced mentors share notes--and spark a spate of provocative questions.

Chip R. Bell. American Theatre. (Jan. 2006)

23.1 (Jan. 2006) p30. Word Count: 3689. From Literature Resource Center.

Though not necessarily directly connected, this article has at least two possible connections to your subject topic, that is mentoring and the role of that (as Professor Ashford is Vivian's mentor) and the theatrical side of it, since Wit is a production.