very much looking forward to that. >> host: talking to professor levinson talking about his book "constitutional faith." >> thank you >> we're here the university of texas with professors or

also authors and we're joined by 85 co-editor of this book "tales for little rascals" a collection of radical children's literature" a collection of children's literature. what are the use "tales for little rascals", julia mickenberg? mike co-editor and i tried to find a balance of pieces to represent works of literature created for children by representatives of radical movements throughout the 20th century so we have things of the socialist movement to the communist movement and represent taint the new left, feminism in a whole range henry could have started earlier those that were associated with the abolitionist movement you

often find there is an interest to get children to understand the movement. >>host: the socialist and communist each have a program to write children's literature? >> not exactly a program was less coordinated than you would think but in most cases those who have to be involved who got interested to start writing things, the communist party press is called the story of your coat published by international publishers and they're very interested and started day children series and librarians does not seem to know that it was the communist party press because they were sold to regular libraries in a couple of the best selling science writers got their

start writing stories for international publishers. would you like me to tell you about that story? >>host: angola had. >>guest: it is really a story of the different workers who made the coach starting from sharing the sheep to transporting to the factory dieing the wall the designer and all of the different steps to the extent it is political to talk about unionization and it probably has pictures of workers of different races which was very political to do an even stories talking about unionization and also a wave of the stories the on that was called the story of your bread that that

mechanism of how things work in the world meant to increase the children's critical thinking skills to understand how things are related and in fact, i interviewed my first book learning from the left i interviewed the person who started young world books who was a nursing home for old radicals. [laughter] what was i going to say about her? >>host: talk about children's books 81 sell many of those books were scions books so why all of these science books if you try to teach kids about politics? so she said to teach about materialism because she was

a hard-core marxist she had the 80 it was the only logical way to think if you taught children to think scientifically they would automatically become marxist and that is a 90 view but you would see we did include a number of scientific stories none of which turn you into a marxist by beating them and also the other thing is by choosing that theme at the beginning of marxist capital has a whole discussion of making of the:versus the price of leaded you would never pick up on that issue is trying to allude back to that. >>host: how popular word these stories? >> it totally depends on the story of the story of your coat, i don't know but we included the original version which obviously

became very popular later. dr. seuss i don't believe was affiliated with any political movement but strongly anti-fascist and entire racist in a story about anti-semitism of the really about respecting differences so it originally was then read books then became one of his popular stories. there is a piece called the practical princess restore race is the drama of ecology about the unintended consequences of ddt based on a true story where they

literally had to parachute katz onto the island of borneo to control the rats. i think some of these were quite popular and these authors are well known who have had other careers in the best example is the piece by sid hof and he wrote under the name of a redfield but it is written in a very silly town in he is better known for his work right teeing the i can read books like sammy this deal in the dna the dinosaur but

the art work is by johnson who was by a hero than the purple crayon. >>host: and you have the sign he was holding? >>guest: no. he was the art editor and most of the children's books authors the iraqi either directly active with radical movements over quite sympathetic to them. >>host: when you look at some of the examples of the bid 20th century, is a little 90 the way they are set up? is that fair? tried to include stuff that people would want to read. the nice thing is we had tons to choose from even

with 44 pieces we could selected down but we also wanted to high of historical accuracy to include what seemed like totally ridiculous things today because it is funny the best is abc for martin and it has things like k is for crum and where staal lives. and i do not want to share with my kids as an example of useful literature but as a historical example doing this as the act of historical recovery to say they think when people think of children's literature face vague it is absent but of children's literature is political.

son to recover this while some authors are well known most of the works will not be well known. >>host: professor, did commentators at the time of a different political persuasion the call out the literature to save the weird? >>guest: i found some examples in the first that focused on material written by radical writers but not necessarily radical calle it was a way to resist the blacklisting so many little golden books lourdes written by radicals many of those are by the left-wing and they may not notice them but

in that option from rican who was openly, and his stand the day scarier reading at them know what the library there was an outcry a and that was published by can inhofe but many pieces were published by the press that was obscure enough they would not have been found in other places. the most in ideological stuff would have such a small circulation of the time it did not generate much of an outcry that the counter intuitive idea that it would be an escape for mccarthyism we refit -- we think that as police but it is mostly controlled by

women and it has never been given that much attention and even today talking to a friend to this year in some of them are a great artist and great writers today are writing children's books but so that is not considered literature in the way that the adult is that creates problems also the openness in the field that may not exist in other fields where one author said you could say things in children's books you could not say for 20 years zinn edo books white kid down black kid who our best friends. there were definitely instances the biggest i found was three centrist -- censorship in the biggest instance related to raise so many publishers would but such books that showed interracial

friendships because they feared no southerners or book markets would buy the book. that is where you have more censorship. >>host: what do you teacher at the university of texas julia mickenberg? >> a survey of cultural history 1865 through present also a course of the 1960's. i teach a course on children's literature and american culture. currently teaching day corzine expatriate him political pilgrims living abroad and i am always inventing new course is because i want to learn things. >>host: your books tales from the left "tales for little rascals" to consider yourself for radical? >> i sympathize with those who were involved and i have their romantic sensibility but i don't really consider myself a radical. i hate to meetings and i

also think that people are too greedy for something like socialism to work. it is nice in theory but i do support the movement certain they for environmental or economic justice but i tend to be critical of any type of dog month or ideology. if you take one type of line it is more at a foreign to think critically but i think of my own kids in education. i consider myself a radical meaning the desire to get to the root of something and i think that is what all of us as professors should be doing to get our students at the root is something they should not think like m