The Stories for Free Children at Sarah Doyle collection is named in recognition of these efforts to diversify the children’s literary canon. Here, Brown community parents will be able to borrow anti-racist, gender-inclusive, feminist children’s books that encourage kids to be brave, kind, and committed to social justice, peace, and the environment.

At their best, Stories for Free Children do something more than simply flip the script when culturally dominant values are exposed as unjust. As Margaret McDowell wrote of the original Stories For Free Children, “Social commentators and political theorists [. . .] have always assumed literature for children should reinforce conservative positions held by adults” [1]. A story for a free child is no less instructive but because it “encourages children to question the teachings of church, school, and law, as well as the personal relationships within their home, the aims of the writers of this new fiction are decidedly different from those of didactic writers for children throughout the centuries.” In short, a story presents not just an idea, but a way of approaching the world, so that “Children who would be ‘free,’ that is, open and empiric in mental outlook, will be encouraged to move from this simplified world in fiction to the more complex world of the society that has molded them and which they may in turn help to mold.” When an literary experience is truly new, McDowell continues, even the youngest readers, “can hardly help thinking about it.”

We hope this collection will give your child something to think about. As we collectively strive to raise children who not merely tolerant, but compassionate, who live not just without fear but in courage, we hope these stories help and that some of the words and images contained herein inspire your child to feel and be free. 

-Sarah Brown, Ph.D. '19

1.  McDowell, Margaret B. “New Didacticism: Stories for Free Children.” Language Arts, vol. 54, no. 1, 1977, pp. 41–85.