Murray Knowles and Kristen Malmkjaer examine the work of some of our most popular 19th and 20th century children's writers in order to expose the persuasive power of language. At the heart of Language and Control in Children's Literature lie two surveys of children's favorite readings, the first carried out in 1888, the other a hundred years later by the authors themselves. Using a computer analysis of the vocabulary and grammar patterns in the most popular children's texts of each period, the authors examine the ways in which children's writers use language to inculcate a particular world view in the minds of their readers. For example, by examining the work of nineteenth century English writers of juvenile fiction, the authors expose the colonial and class assumptions on which the books were predicated.