Contents -- Chapter One. Toward a Theory of Narrative Discourse -- Terms of the Pentad -- Relationship Among Terms -- The Pentad and Childhood Literature -- Chapter Two. Act: Plot -- Plot -- Plot Patterns in Childhood Literature -- Conclusions -- Chapter Three. Act: Characterization -- Characterization -- Character in Childhood Literature -- Conclusions -- Chapter Four. Act: Narration -- Narration -- Narration in Children's Novels -- Conclusions -- Chapter Five. Agents: Author and Reader -- The Author Agent -- The Reader -- Conclusions -- Chapter Six. Agency: Visual-Verbal Narrative -- Narrative Elements -- Relationship between Text and Pictures -- Conclusions -- Chapter Seven. Agency: Oral Performance -- The Folktale Narrative -- Oral Language -- Performance: Text as Event -- Conclusions -- Chapter Eight. Agency: Film -- Narrative Elements -- A Film Adaptation of a Book -- Two Film Versions of the Same Narrative -- Animated Films -- Conclusions -- Chapter Nine. Scene: Home and Community -- Book Reading Events in the Home -- Transition from Home to School -- Narrative in a Cultural Context -- Conclusions -- Chapter Ten. Scene: Classroom -- The Classroom as a Communicative Setting -- Book Reading Events in the Classroom -- Conclusions -- Chapter Eleven. Purpose: The Ends of the Narrative -- Kinds of Purposes -- Books for Instructional Purposes -- Instructional Purposes Disguised -- The Case of the Folktale -- The Reader's Purposes -- Alteration of Children's Favorite Texts -- Conclusions -- Chapter Twelve. The Pentad and a Narrative Event -- Scene -- Purpose -- Act -- Agency -- Co-Agents: Teachers and Students -- Conclusions -- Chapter Thirteen. Conclusions -- The Pentad and the Narrative Text -- The Pentad and Narrative Discourse -- Merging the Intrinsic and Extrinsic -- The Present Study in a Broader Perspective -- References.

Children's Picture Books -- Children's Novels and Other Narratives -- Non-Print Narratives -- Index.