Children's Games in Street and Playground: Chasing, Catching, Seeking, Hunting, Racing, Dueling, Exerting, Daring, Guessing, Acting, and Pretending. - Hardcover

Opie, Iona; Opie, The Late Peter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0198272103 ISBN 13: 9780198272106

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1969

Synopsis

This record of children's outdoor games played in the street, park, playground, or wasteland is drawn from the contributions of 10,000 children in England, Scotland and Wales. It reveals that the games children take pleasure in when out on their own are usually those learnt from each other - not from adults. They are games in which children may deliberately scare each other, ritually hurt each other, take foolish risks, play ten against one, and yet in which they consistenly observe their own sense of fair play. This volume explains in detail how a large number of street games are played, and gives the rhymes and sayings children repeat while playing them, together with their different regional names. It also contains notes on their individual histories, and compares apparently recently invented games with amusements in Elizabethan, medieval and even classical times, while numerous analogues from other countries indicate the extent of their distribution. Iona and Peter Opie have also written "The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes", "The Oxford Nursery Rhyme Book", "The Oxford Book of Children's Verse", "The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren", "Classic Fairy Tales", "A Nursery Companion" and "The Oxford Book of Narrative Verse". Iona Opie is also the author of "The Singing Game" and "People in the Playground".

About this title

About the Author

Iona Archibald Opie was born in 1923. During the Second World War, she met and married Peter Opie. Together they became a renowned husband-and-wife team of folklorists with a particular interest in children's toys, games and literature, working from their home in Hampshire and conducting primary fieldwork all over the United Kingdom. Their remarkable collection of children's books and ephemera was purchased by the Bodleian Library in Oxford in 1988. They were the authors of over 30 books including The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (1952) and The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren (1959). Iona Opie lives in Hampshire. Peter Mason Opie (1918-1982) was a specialist in children's literature. He met and married Iona Archibold during the Second World War, and together they became a renowned husband-and-wife team of folklorists with a particular interest in children's toys, games and literature, working from their home in Hampshire and conducting primary fieldwork all over the United Kingdom. Their remarkable collection of children's books and ephemera was purchased by the Bodleian Library in Oxford in 1988. They were the authors of over 30 books including The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (1952) and The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren (1959).

Review

'The Opies have compiled the most complete and the most sympathetic, also the most sensible account of what children prefer to do on their own.' -- Country Life 'It is a work of serious anthropology and sociology ... but unlike most works concerned with these disciplines, it is consistently readable, always humane, and sometimes very funny.' -- New Statesman 'A fascinating book, the product of many years' immensely detailed and original research, which is bound to become the standard work upon the history and modern practice of street games.' -- New Society 'Fascinating research ... I hope that the publication of this book will revive the debate about the kinds of games our children play.' -- David Lorimer, Scientific and Medical Network Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1969
• ISBN 10: 0198272103
• ISBN 13: 9780198272106
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400