Storybooks

Insight into how dying and death were portrayed in the nineteenth century can be found in the still widely read storybook Little Women, written in 1869 by Louisa May Alcott. Alcott described the death of young Beth in a straightforward manner uncommon for her day. Recognizing that her depiction was at odds with the melodramatic scenes current in more romantic literature, Alcott added in the paragraph following Beth's death: "Seldom, except in books, do the dying utter memorable words, see visions, or depart with beatified countenance. " (Alcott 1947, p. 464).

Between 1940 and 1970 few children's books contained references to death. Two that have become classics are Margaret Wise Brown's The Dead Bird (1965) and Charlotte's Web. White's publisher initially refused to publish Charlotte's Web unless the ending was modified allowing Charlotte to live, which White refused. Critical reviewers of the era found death not "an appropriate subject for children" (Guth 1976, p. 531).

Separating children from an awareness of dying and death has diminished since the 1970s. Although Robert Fulton and Herman Feifel taught and wrote about dying and death before the 1960s, it was the early work of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in 1969 that helped make death a subject for discussion and study. During the 1970s and 1980s over 200 fiction books for children contained death as a major theme. Few measured up to the standard set by Charlotte's Web, Little Women, The Yearling (1938), or The Dead Bird. During this same period some very well-written nonfiction books about death were published for children of various ages, making it a more acceptable subject. These included About Dying by Sara Bonnett Stein (1974), When People Die (1977) by Joanne Bernstein and Stephen J. Gullo, Learning to Say Good-by: When a Parent Dies by Eda J. LeShan (1976), The Kids' Book about Death and Dying and The Unit at Fayerweather Street School (1985) both by Eric E. Rofes, and Living with Death (1976) by Osborn Segerberg Jr.