Have We Moved Beyond Struwwelpeter?

Daniel Zalewski writes about children's picture books in this week's New Yorker. "The kids are in charge," he tells us, and today's picture books are full of anxious, apologetic parents who resort to canned psychobabble in an effort to get their kids to behave: "Use your words," "Hands are not for hitting," "Is there a nicer way to say that?"

We live in a "confrontation-averse age of parenting," he writes, but many picture books have a strong disciplinary edge, no doubt a legacy of all...