How were Ronald Reagan’s political views shaped by his favorite childhood books? What does Margaret Hamilton (the Wicked Witch of the West) say is the very heart of The Wizard of Oz ? And what explains the preponderance of bears in children’s books and flying in African-American stories? In this amusing and insightful collection of essays, Jerry Griswold reveals the backstories to beloved children’s books. Drawing upon his hundreds of publications (in the New York Times , Los Angeles Times , and elsewhere) and combining these with new work, he considers such authors as Hans Christian Andersen, Maurice Sendak, Beatrix Potter, and Roald Dahl and shows how their personal lives lie behind their work for the young. Examining both classic and contemporary children’s literature, Behind Children’s Books explains the real usefulness of nonsense, how the Land of Oz is actually California, and more. Author of seven books and the former Director of the National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature, Griswold is a lively critic and public intellectual. "He manages that difficult thing in writing about children’s literature: to provide the reader with an interesting new intellectual angle on these books, without condescending to his material or diminishing its elusive and potent magic.” (Michiko Kakutani, New York Times) "You can say Jerry Griswold knows a thing or two about children's literature. The San Diego State University emeritus professor has written seven books on the subject and is the former director of the National Center for the Study of Children's Literature. Now, in the new book titled "Behind Children's Books: Backstories & Revelations" he dives into a variety of topics tied to children's literature--everything from how his favorite children's books shaped Ronald Reagan's political views to 'the preponderance of bears in children's books.' A collection of 60 essays, Griswold's 148-page book touches on classic and contemporary children's literature, from Hans Christian Andersen to Beatrix Potter and Roald Dahl." -Michael James Rocha, San Diego Union Tribune (Sunday, May 24, 2020) Jerry Griswold is a leading authority on children's literature and a former professor (San Diego State University, UCLA, UCSD, the University of Connecticut, the National University of Ireland); for more than a decade, he was also Director of the National Center for the Study of Children's Literature. Griswold has published seven books-including  Feeling Like a Kid: Childhood and Children's Literature  (Johns Hopkins) and the prize-winning  Audacious Kids: The Classic American Children's Story  (Oxford, Penguin, Johns Hopkins). A frequent contributor to the  New York Times  and  Los Angeles Times , he has also written for  Paris Review ,  Nation ,  New Republic ,  Boston Globe  and other publications.