Pinocchio: An Analysis of Childhood Studies and Literature

This essay provides a comprehensive analysis of Carlo Collodi's 'Pinocchio' from a childhood studies perspective. It delves into the story's plot, characters, and moral lessons, examining Pinocchio's transformation from a wooden puppet to a real boy. The essay explores the significance of key characters like Geppetto, the Talking Cricket, and the Blue Fairy, while also addressing the roles of tricksters and antagonists. Furthermore, it integrates theoretical concepts from childhood development, including Jean Piaget's cognitive theory and Erikson's psychosocial stages, to understand the story's relevance to children's cognitive and emotional growth. The analysis also considers the story's impact on children's literature and its enduring appeal to both young readers and adults, highlighting the themes of honesty, kindness, and the journey to maturity. The essay references various scholarly sources to support its arguments, offering a detailed exploration of 'Pinocchio' within the context of childhood studies.

Running head: CHILDHOOD STUDIES
CHILDHOOD STUDIES
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

CHILDHOOD STUDIES
Pinocchio - The Story
According to Sharma & Chaudry (2011), subjects in books are frequently imaginary and the
themes are presented in a fantasy or dream-like quality. The story of Pinocchio is set in a
magical version of Italy in an unidentified past. Collodi (1883) tells the story of Pinocchio's
journey to earn the love of his father. The story centres around the transformation Pinocchio
from a mischievous wooden puppet to a good boy. He spends his childhood wanting to
become a human, Pinocchio is misguided by people he encounters and runs away from
home. Through his misadventures, he learns how defiant and naïve he had been. Finally, his
compassion and gratefulness help him to overcome his misguided decisions.
The structure of the story precedes that of the folk tales of the peasants who
endeavour out in the world unaware of the ridiculous situation of the Industrialisation of Italy
(Bettella 2004). The book is considered to be the canonical piece of children literature and
poses a great impact of the culture of the world (Collodi and Huertas, 1959).
The story of Pinocchio begins with an old woodcarver Geppetto who had carved a
puppet and had named it Pinocchio, but the doll did not behave very well. He would take of
his wig, rush through the house, due to which the old Geppetto threatened him and grabbed
his nose. As a result Geppetto ended up in prison due to mistreating a child. But Geppetto
wished that if the has to be a real boy, and then he has to be good. Pinocchio was famous of
telling a lie due to which his nose grew longer. Because of his offensive character of lying
every now and then, he often gets in to trouble (Collodi and Huertas, 1959). However
Pinocchio undergoes metamorphosis in to a good human being as he had promised the Fairy
with the Turquoise hair, to become a real boy. He flees to the land of toys with Candlewick,
becomes donkey, joins a circus and becomes a puppet again. Finally, Pinocchio stops being a
puppet and turns in to a real boy owing to the good deeds done by him and the due to the
telling of truth (Collodi and Huertas, 1959).
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CHILDHOOD STUDIES
Mischievous, naughty , and full of tricks, the puppet Pinocchio caused trouble for his
creator, Geppetto, almost as soon as he comes to life. Yet, more than anything, The
wooden puppet wants to become a real boy. To make his dreams come true, he
must prove himself worthy. Come along on Pinocchio's adventurous journey as he
learned—the hard way—what it means to be kind, honest, and most of all, human.
One of the negative view of the classic literature is that some of writing style are
not suitable for younger children readers ( Pinset 2014) it is important to match
the needs of the children to the level of the book (ibid) . The writing style are
easy to read, and it is especially designed for level- two readers ( USborne
English Readers) Young readers are attracted to the simplicity of the vocabulary
of the book ( Pinset, 2014).
Pinocchio present important moral lessons for children; for example: telling lies is not
prudent.
Pinocchio - The Characters
The main character in this story is Pinocchio, a puppet made of wood by Gepetto.
When he was made, Geppetto had problems with him. His nose grew more and
more, no matter how many times Geppetto shortened it. He ran from home, but
before that he killed the cricket who only wanted to give him well-meaning advice.
When he found himself without his father Geppetto, he realized hunger was. At first,
he is selfish, thinking only of himself. He saw what it means to be generous when his
father sold his coat in the dead of winter just to buy him his school book. He learns
something good from every accident, instead of listening to the elder. However, in
the end, he changes and becomes a good and noble boy who treats his family
members with respect.
A Talking Cricket
He is over 100 years old, and is very wise. When he tries to teach Pinocchio the
value of being a good son and that he reminds Pinocchio that good boy means have
to study and hard work patience, and respect, Pinocchio doesn't want to listen, so he
throw the cricket with a piece a wood. The Talking Cricket comes back at the end of
the tale, so that he can reinforce the importance of kindness and courtesy to
Pinocchio, who is at the end of the story is regretful of his previous actions.
The Blue Fairy

CHILDHOOD STUDIES
The Blue Fairy, also called 'the Lovely Maiden with Azure Hair', is Pinocchio's savior
In either case, she is a beautiful, ethereal creature who is kind. She changes her
form throughout the story in order to test Pinocchio. For example, The Blue Fairy has
magical powers with which she can grant wishes and make animals follows her
order.
Some of the situations and the concepts that have been addressed in this story- are the
long nose that is commonly attributed to those individuals who tells lies (Collodi and
Huertas, 1959).
Tricksters
There are many antagonists in Pinocchio's tale. The first scoundrels Pinocchio
encounters are Fox and Cat. The fox and the cat are greedy animals who pretend to be lame
and blindly respectively. They eventually rob Pinocchio and tried to hand him. The falcon is
the one that helps the fairy with blue hair rescue Pinocchio. The green fisherman-who had
caught hold of Pinocchio and had tried to eat him up (Book reports, 2017).
It has to be remembered that one cannot pour knowledge in to the children. For the
young children, they should construct it themselves; hence it is the book cover that arouses
the motivation in the children to read the book (Zipes 2013). Although all the fictious
characters in the story book is far from the reality, yet the main imperatives of the story is to
work, good and study (Bettella 2004).
In this story the character transformations are accompanied by parallel events in the
story. The transformations in the characters in the story affect the adult and the child reader
due to separate model of competence (Batra 2013). The transformations in the story help to
provide information about the truths in the story without any imperious delivery (Mana et al.
2014).

CHILDHOOD STUDIES
In this context Pinocchio’s offensive behaviour is meant to be seen as a protagonist
character and serves as a warning for the children (Book reports, 2017). One of the important
aspects of this book is that Collodi uses a sequence of transformation events as cues to make
the children get an idea about the climax, before the child directly explores the truth (Mana et
al. 2014). For example the transformation of the ‘ Blue fairy’, where she was described to be
the kindest of fairies (Stangl et al. 2013) . Hence, in this description the narrator easily
transforms the lifeless ghost in to fantastic characters, where she could command the
magnificent characters to save Pinocchio (Book reports, 2017). At last when the blue fairy
dies, Pinocchio transforms in to a child due to his original grief and the “good heart” (Stangl
et al. 2013).
In order to attract the young readers, Collodi used cues language as tools such that
young readers are able to draw conclusion before the truth is revealed. Children could
identify the language of the characters for recognising the villains in the disguise of the well
intentioned characters (Bettella 2004). It should be remembered that the adults look for
different truths in this book than those they would anticipate the children would notice, hence
the message of the temperance that is appeared to be addressed to the children is also directed
towards the adults (Zipes 2013).
Pinocchio can be chosen as an effective story for instructing the children as it employs
the transformation of the characters as a rhetorical device for encouraging the children to
come up with their own conclusions (Bettella 2004). Adults who would go deeper inside the
text would understand that Collodi had criticised the adults for their child like qualities like
lack of temperance. Collodi had introduced some character transformation such that the
adults can find identifying more unreal characters like talking cricket. The story asserts that
adults in the real world need to mature and grow up just as their children (Bettella 2004).

CHILDHOOD STUDIES
Theoretical concept from the literature
It has to be remembered that children books provides a magnificent mixture of the
magic and reality. This story can also be used for analysing the development of a child. Jean
Piaget developed the model of the cognitive theory of the development. During this first stage
, the children literature offers a pleasant experience with the books (Mana et al. 2013). Tactile
books having rhythmic sounds can be entertaining to the children of this age. As per the next
step; the preoperational stage, the children starts developing the logic. Pinocchio is
appropriate for the people of this age as books containing talking animals and the animated
machines (Saxe 2015).
One of the stages Erikson’s Psychosocial Development is the initiative versus guilt
and occurs when a child starts to explore her /his own independence and overcome the
doubts. Imaginative books with stories help the children to understand the roles and the
emotions, Stories that aid to develop a better understanding for this age group Industry Vs.
inferiority at age of seven to eleven (Shamir et al. 2013). In this age, stories help them to
develop a proper understanding of themselves. Hence, it can be said that Pinocchio is a very
good childhood story that involves real life scenarios in the lens of imaginative characters.

CHILDHOOD STUDIES
References
Batra, S., 2013. The psychosocial development of children: implications for education and
society—Erik Erikson in context. Contemporary Education Dialogue, 10(2), pp.249-278.
Bettella, P., 2004. Pinocchio and Children Literature. Quaderni d’italianistica, 25, pp.3-8.
Collodi, C. and Huertas, A., 1959. The Adventures of Pinocchio. Grosset & Dunlap.
Mana, N., Mich, O., De Angeli, A. and Druin, A., 2013, June. Interactive e-books for
children. In Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Interaction Design and
Children(pp. 593-595). ACM.
Saxe, G.B., 2015. Culture and cognitive development: Studies in mathematical
understanding. Psychology Press.
Shamir, A., Korat, O. and Fellah, R., 2012. Promoting vocabulary, phonological awareness
and concept about print among children at risk for learning disability: can e-books
help?. Reading and Writing, 25(1), pp.45-69.
Stangl, A., Kim, J. and Yeh, T., 2014, June. 3D printed tactile picture books for children with
visual impairments: a design probe. In Proceedings of the 2014 conference on Interaction
design and children (pp. 321-324). ACM
Zipes, J., 2013. Happily ever after: Fairy tales, children, and the culture industry.
Routledge.
Book reports, (2017).Pinocchio. Access date: 11.11.2018. Retrieved from:
https://www.bookreports.info/pinocchio-summary/