Talk: A for Allegiance: Propaganda in Children's Literature and Textbooks

Monday 10th November 2025 at 4pm.  Free.  No Booking required.  University of Leeds Campus, Parkinson Building SR B.09.

From fairy tales to school primers, children's literature has long been a battleground for shaping young minds. Delve into the British Library's collections to discover how seemingly innocent texts have been engineered as powerful tools of propaganda, both historically and in the present day.

Susan Reed, Lead Curator of Germanic Collections at the British Library's, will look at the materials used in Nazi Germany, revealing how the entire school curriculum was weaponised to instil ideology and virulent antisemitism in children from their earliest years.

Drawing on examples from classic Soviet children's literature and textbooks published in Eastern Europe by both Nazi and Soviet regimes, Hanna Dettlaff-Kuznicka, Curator of Slavonic and East European Collections, will then deconstruct the contemporary Russian state narrative surrounding the war in Ukraine.

In partnership with the British Library.

Discover event details here.