ABSTRACT
This chapter considers how the process of transforming Victorian novels into board books results in a set of consequences tied explicitly and implicitly to material culture: in both form and content, these primers draw attention to the role of objects and fashion. It highlights the particular ways in which materiality and commodity work to define both Victorian and children's literature and, in the process, participate in the creation and maintenance of the canon. The intersections of literature and material culture that are common to Victorian and children's literature is informed by contemporary understandings of the Victorian past. The relationship between Victorian literature and materiality can also be seen in the wide array of products that "sell" classic novels to contemporary audiences. In the process, these works participate in the construction of a canon that begins at the cradle made up of texts that are valuable for their cultural cache rather than close interrogation of their contents—reducing the classics to cardboard.
