Introduction 7 // Concepts and Experiences of Childhood - Šárka Bubíková 11 // “My Heart Is Heavy with the Things That I Do Not Understand”: Initiation and Identity in Kipling’s Mowgli Stories - Patricia Ráčková 27 // Growing Up in Jane Gardam’s Novels - Milada Franková 41 // Freedom, Spontainety, Imagination and the Loss of Innocence - the Theme of Childhood in Ian McEwan’s Fiction - Petr Chalupský 51 // The Magic of the Real / The Real of the Magic in Harry Potter - Libora Oates-Indruchová 67 // Becoming Little Women - Hana Štráchalová, Šárka Bubíková 81 // Growing up and the Quest for Identity - Šárka Bubíková 97 // Killing of the (Inner) Child, Auto-American-Biography and American Sublime in Joseph Heller’s Something Happened - Zofia Kolbuszewska 115 // Growing Up Postmodern - Šárka Bubíková 131 // Motifs of Childhood in the “9/11” Genre - Ewa Kоwal 145 // Resumé 167 // Notes on Contributors 171