Protagonisti inconsapevoli: animali nella letteratura per l’infanzia e per ragazzi

What is the relationship between nonhuman animals and children’s literature? And if animals survive in stories (as images, metaphors or myths), how does this happen? In this article, we aim to offer an overview of recent studies about this, focusing on the role of the animal as an element of transformation: a key to an ecological view for the child, as shown by the two case-studies presented