ABSTRACT
In the latency period, reading acquires a major significance, since—as Freud wrote in 1911—children use fantasy as a defence against libidinous desires. This chapter examines a psychoanalytic perspective on children's literature, showing the themes from unconscious fantasies, desires, and emotional needs it expresses. Hogwarts is a boarding school promoting imagination and understanding as central values—like an alternative culture to the boring, grey world of normal people. This boarding school binds tradition to progressive elements: on the one hand, teachers emphasise tradition and historical rituals, but on the other hand it is co-educational and ethnically mixed. The chapter discusses C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia, which were also adapted for film and have attained great international importance. Both Harry Potter and the Narnia books have been filmed, and represent an important enrichment in children's literature.
