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It’s been a busy couple of weeks. Those around World Book Day always are. I’ve been at the Whatever It Takes Author Week in Leicester, the Aye Write Festival in Glasgow, and schools in Gloucestershire, Surrey, Essex & Nottinghamshire.
I’ve also been at the International School of Aberdeen, where in addition to some of my usual sessions they asked me to do a few sessions on poetry for older children.
I don’t normally work with groups above primary-age - simply because I don’t often visit schools that aren’t primaries -
The scene from my hotel window!
and the last time I did instructional work on poetry I was a teacher rather than a visiting author; but, well, I thought, why not? Because I’m really nervous about it, a voice in my head replied, but I ignored it and got thinking.
Planning has never been my forte - too much of it and I find it difficult to adapt on the spur of the moment - so I decided the best plan was to fling a few ideas into the cauldron of my cerebrum, stir them round, and leave them to stew.
One thing I knew I was going to need, though, was a practical sort of joining-in activity that would get some kind of response from the group without putting any pressure on the individual. I settled on bubbles.
The simple bubble-wand was one of my main props as a supply teacher. I got the idea from a former colleague, the lovely Mrs Pam Hotchkiss (hello, Pam, if you’re reading this!). It’s beautifully simple. You blow some bubbles, get the kids to describe them, ask them to elaborate on the description, and take it from there; and one of the lovely things about it is that it adapts for any age. I, er, hoped. I’d never tried it with secondary-school kids.
Well, I tried it with the first group - 8th-Graders: 12-14 years old, I suppose, though they looked bigger and older than that. They’d been great, but there had been a certain amount of Teenage Cool in the room. Until I took out the wand and blew.
“Ooooh! Bubbles!!!” Instantly, some of their reserve just, well, popped. It was great. We talked about them in general terms, got a few words to describe them - fragile, colourful, that sort of thing - and then we began to differentiate.
As the conversation developed, it became clear that these meant different things to different children. One said they reminded her of pink skies in the morning; another of unstable chemical compounds.
One girl said they reminded her of funerals. There was a bit of nervous giggling around her. I asked her why.
“Well,” she said, smiling, “at my friend’s funeral they blew bubbles over the coffin, and we’d been all sad, but suddenly it was happy again.”
That was a moment, I can tell you, and it wasn’t the only one. At another point during the session, the subject of the bubbles’ endings came up. We’d been talking about how they drift down.
“And what happens then?” I asked.
There was a pause, during which I waited for the usual reflections on mortality. And then one boy put his hand up.
“Yes,” I asked.
“It gets adopted by the floor.”
9 Comments on Perfect Spheres & Right Angles - John Dougherty, last added: 4/8/2013
Wonderful! What that whole story taught/reminded me is that older kids, who may exude "teenage cool" are actually just the same as all of us: we like to be children again, to do something fun and easy and different, something relaxing.
By and large, children's authors are a friendly bunch. We tend to be nice, and helpful, and whilst we come in various levels of forthrightness there are very few I have ever met and not liked, even when we have been in disagreement.
So I hope it will be understood how much it pains me to say that Horrible Histories author Terry Deary has lately been behaving like a great steaming prat.
For those of you who may have missed the row, it begins with Sunderland Council, like so many others, considering sweeping cuts to the library service - including closures - in order to save money. According to the Sunderland Echo, "Sunderland-born Terry Deary welcomed the plans". The Echo goes on to quote Deary as saying that libraries "have had their day... The book is old technology and we have to move on, so good luck to the council.” The following day Deary told the BBC that the closures were "long overdue".
Not unsurprisingly, a lot of authors got a bit cross about this. Now let me make one thing clear: I fully believe that Deary has the right to express his opinion. But that being so, others have the right to express their opinions of his opinion, and many did.
One such has been Alan Gibbons, tireless campaigner for libraries and the importance of the book. You can read Alan's statement here. I think it's pretty measured, all told, and addresses Deary's points, such as they are.
Deary's response? He rudely refers to Alan as "that Gibbon bloke", responds to his offer of a public debate with the offensively dismissive "in his dreams", misrepresents his comments, and with enormous irony accuses him of making "offensive personal remarks".
Oddly for someone with such sensitivity to "offensive personal remarks", Deary also claimed to the Independent that the authors who were criticising him were "the ones with small minds to match their small talents". Riiiiiiiiight. That would be authors like the small-minded and untalented Neil Gaiman,Terry Pratchett, Julia Donaldson, David Almond, Joanne Harris, Matt Haig...
I think that what distresses me most about all of this is that Deary seems to think he's being clever and radical, when in fact all he's doing is chucking about unsubstantiated and inflammatory assertions and then getting cross when people rise to the bait. But I get the feeling that this is his modus operandi.
Back in October 2011, I happened to hear Deary on Woman's Hour, debating with Susan Greenfield on the subject of traditional books and new technologies. Norwegian researcher Anna Mangan also contributed, citing empirical research that suggested that printed matter supports reading comprehension better than screen technology. Deary's response? He dismissed the research as "quite laughable" and "deeply flawed" and the researcher as "just another Luddite". The clip is worth a listen simply to hear Greenfield challenging Deary on his inconsistencies.
And inconsistent he is. The Independent article I linked to above has him saying both :
"It is for me to challenge the established, failing, unfair, irrelevant established order. It needs to be opened up for public debate,"
and:
"I haven’t the time to expend hot air on a meaningless discussion that would change nothing; nor have I the inclination to discuss a topic that no one really cares about."
And this seems to be the nub of the matter. Deary - one of the UK's most-borrowed authors - appears to believe that if libraries didn't exist then every borrowing would translate into a sale, and instead of £6,000 per year PLR, he'd be making an extra £180,000. Well, I can tell you, Terry - speaking as a not enormously high-earning author whose ten-year old reads even more than I do - that that's just not true. If libraries didn't exist, I'd have to read less. And so would my children. And so would all the other children who depend on libraries. Deary is attacking libraries, despite his protestations; and in doing so, whether or not he realises it, he's attacking literacy. And attacking them with arguments which are flimsy at best, and at worst simply unfounded.
Deary is already a fierce critic of schools - in one interview suggesting that children "should leave school at 11 and go to work" - and has previously called for schools to be banned from using his books, and there is for me a huge irony in his now adding libraries to his hit-list. Because I very strongly suspect that were it not for all the teachers and librarians who have championed his books, few of us would ever have heard of Terry Deary.
Two comments to finish with: firstly, I trust that Mr Deary - should he ever deign to read this post, written as it is by someone he would doubtless dismiss as having a small mind and a small talent - will not accuse me of having called him a great steaming prat. I haven't. I have accused him of lately behaving like one, which is quite different.
And secondly: petty of me, perhaps, but I can't help but be amused by this. _________________________________________________
Since I appear to be one of these authors with a small mind and a small talent, I feel totally justified in suggesting that Terry Deary has a small something else.
Well put. One of the ironies of all this is that Amazon have just patented the right to re-sell ebooks and earn full share of the profits (see link). One wonders how Terry Deary will take this news. I can't see any difference between that and libraries initially purchasing the books and then loaning them for free. I wonder if he'll offend the ebook community next? I know he's lost his fan base amongst librarians. http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/feb/16/amazon-ebook-patent-lucy-mangan
Agree and agree again. Sigh - when will people realise that libraries are at the very centre of any community? When will they realise that, much as we might want to, none of us can buy every book we want to read?
Firstly - sorry for the late arrival of this post! We usually like to get our blog entries up first thing, but sometimes life gets in the way.
Now - about not being funny:
Funny is what I do. I'm one of those irritating people who has a witty quip for almost every occasion, even when something a bit more thoughtful might be more helpful. I love it when someone reviews one of my books with the words "I laughed as much as my kids did". I don't, generally, find being funny all that difficult.
Except, of course, when that's what's expected of me.
An editor at an educational publisher recently asked me to write a funny book. Most of our books have an element of humour, she told me, but we want this series to be really laugh-out-loud funny. Send me some ideas.
Could I think of anything? Like heck I could. I racked my brains, I thumbscrewed them, I jammed them into the iron maiden... all I got was instantly rejectable ideas. Being funny is like being in love - as soon as you start focusing on the state itself, or trying to analyse it, you're no longer doing it; you're doing something else instead. Indeed, a potentially funny idea loses all its potential to amuse as soon as you start trying to make it actually funny.
Well, I came up with some ideas in the end; and of course I came up with them by forgetting about thinking up funny ideas and doing something else instead, for several days in a row. And one by one I jotted them down, making sure not to worry about whether they were any good. And then I rather apologetically sent them off unfiltered, and got a reply back that began: "Wow, you’ve given us loads of great ideas here!" Rob Brydon once said something to the effect of, "People say, Oh, my mate's really funny, you should have him on your panel game. But the question is not Can you be funny down the pub? but Can you be funny at 7.30 every Tuesday evening for at least half an hour?"
There's a lesson in there. And for me, it's: When you appear at the Cheltenham Comedy Festival, make sure to have some funny things to say prepared in advance.
Great advice, John! Nothing brings such paralysis to the imagination as a request with that kind of expectation. Glad you managed to sidle sideways at the funny - as ever! :-)
Okay, that doesn’t look very exciting written down, but I think it is. I’ve signed up for a new scheme, the brainchild of Tim Redgrave, head teacher at Ysgol Esgob Morgan in St Asaph, North Wales. The idea is that a school adopts an author as Patron of Reading, to develop a relationship with the school and its pupils and to foster and promote a culture of reading.
The idea came to Tim following a hugely successful visit by my friend Helena Pielichaty. This doesn’t surprise me at all; I’ve had to spend a ridiculous amount of time this week alone telling my daughter to put down that blimmin’ Girls FC book and get dressed/have your breakfast/brush your teeth/get in the car.
Anyone who knows anything about my views on education knows how important I think reading for pleasure is. It’s the key; there’s so much more evidence to support its foundational role than just about anything else. So I’m delighted to be part of this scheme. I could witter on about it for pages & pages, but I think instead I’m going to direct you to Helena’s blog, where she explains the whole thing. Please take a look - you'll be inspired!
And if you’re a teacher or school librarian looking for ways to promote reading for pleasure, or an author wanting to get involved, please contact Tim via the link on this page to add your name to the list of potential patrons!
I expect some of you are still in bed and fast asleep. I expect I am, too. It's lovely being able to schedule posts in advance. Of course, it means I have no idea what sort of New Year's I had, since I haven't actually had it yet. But I'm sure it was great.
You might have noticed that we took a longer than usual Christmas break this time around. We're back now, stuffed full of turkey or the vegetarian equivalent and ready to hit the new year running.
This year we're posting on Sundays too, so in 2013 every day will be an Awfully Big Blog day! We hope you'll join us, and point your friends here for our awfully big mix of wisdom, wit & whimsy from our current roster of 30 contributors. And if you missed yesterday's close-of-year post by Penny Dolan, do take a look at it now!
I hope 2013's good for you. I'm looking forward to it. In January, I'll be:
Happy New Year, John! OK, since you asked, here's what I'm looking forward to this month:
1. Like you, getting stuck in as Patron of Reading, in my case at a secondary school in Scotland. 2. Joining you for my first meeting on the Children's Writers' and Illustrators' Group of the Soc of Authors. 3. Preparing far too many events, including a new one on teenage stress. 4. Starting a new novel, set in the Blitz. 5. POSSibly hearing news about a proposed project, also about teenage stress. Fingers crossed :) 6. Going to the gym a few times. 7. Making a decision about something.
Happy writing, working, and playing to all of us! And thank you to you and the other ABBA leaders for all you do. :)
Generally speaking, it’s a Bad Thing. I fume as much as the next author when I read one of those articles about a US school board voting to remove To Kill A Mockingbird or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the library because of some imagined unsuitability. I thought the Daily Mail was a bit off with its recent suggestion that teen fiction dealing with issues like terminal illness or self-harm qualifies as “sick-lit” (and, no, I’m not going to provide a link; it’ll only encourage them to do it again).
And yet, occasionally, I’ve found myself censoring children’s books.
I don’t mean that I go through them with a marker pen deleting the ‘unsuitable bits’; and I certainly don’t mean that I remove books from my children’s book shelf, but… well, let me give you the most recent example.
I’m currently reading Watership Down with my kids (they’ve got older since the photo was taken, as have I). My daughter, now aged 10, wasn’t sure about it at first, but they both seem to be really enjoying it now. And so am I; I loved it when I was about their age, and I’m loving reading it again. But a few nights ago, I ran into a sentence that made me feel a little odd when I first read it, and makes me feel extremely odd now.
For those of you who know the book, when Hazel & his companions are in Cowslip’s warren, their hosts ask if one of them will tell a story. And the next sentence reads:
“There is a rabbit saying, ‘In the warren, more stories than passages’; and a rabbit can no more refuse to tell a story than an Irishman can refuse to fight.”
When I encountered this sentence as a child - well, I can’t remember exactly how I felt, but I know it made me pause. I’m Irish - Northern Irish, to be specific - and I’ve never felt particularly inclined to physical violence. Yet here it was, in a book - a terrific book, at that: just an aside, here’s something we all know about Irishmen. They’re violent. Why on earth should the author say that?
So it made me a bit uneasy then. It makes me more uneasy now, not least because in my first proper job - in England - I worked with a colleague who was convinced that Ireland, and especially Northern Ireland, was a horrible violent place. A lot of our clients were troubled young men, but my colleague took it as read that being Irish - or, in the case of one client, merely having an Irish father - would mean a particular predisposition towards violence. It was a dreadful belief to find in someone who was generally thoughtful and intelligent, and in the end it rather poisoned our working relationship.
So the sentence I’ve quoted above is, for me, problematic - as problematic as would be a sentence suggesting that Jewish people are prone to parsimony or black people to idleness. But I’d forgotten about it until… well, until I reached it.
If either child had been leaning on my shoulder, silently reading along with me, as they sometimes do, I’d have had no option. But it so happened that they were reclining at opposite ends of the sofa with their feet on my lap. Which gave me a choice, and a second in which to make it.
I went for the easy option. I censored. I read the second half of the sentence as “no rabbit can refuse to tell a story” and read on.
Did I do the right thing? I don’t know. Perhaps I passed up an opportunity to talk about prejudice. My children are sensible enough to question this sort of statement. Probably both of them would say, “that’s silly’; my son, now at secondary school and becoming more interested in societal issues, might say, “that’s racist, isn’t it?”
And to be honest, I still don’t know quite why I did it, or even for whose benefit it was - theirs, or mine.
An interesting question, John. I think for me it would depend on the context in which I was reading. If it was a bedtime story, where the emphasis was on peaceful enjoyment and close engagement, I'd skip it. If it was the middle of the day (and the child was old enough to engage with the debate) I'd read the sentence and pause, giving them the chance to say something. If they didn't, I'd say something like 'that's a funny thing to say' and comment on passing time, prejudice changing attitudes.
They're different activities/ways of engaging. Maybe better suited for happening at different times? Though your kids are unlikely to need convincing, having grown up with you!
It is indeed a tricky one. Of course, sometimes the publishers have been there before you, which can be problematic in another way. I remember reading the first page of Five Fall into Adventure (1950 - but in a 1980s edition) to my daughter: George's "arms and legs were as brown as a traveller's." Presumably trying to sidestep "gypsy", but toppling into nonsense. You have to be quick on your feet as a bedtime reader!
Well, I'm not a writer. I do though come here occasionally to check out another world from my one.
I actually hate reading something that I know is bowdlerised. I think I would prefer to read it out as it's written. And for kids.., to insert quietly.. "Of course, they don't all fight.." or somesuch..
If they're 10 they seem old enough to learn about prejudgment, not be hidden from it.
That's a fair point, Andrew; and I hope I do teach them about prejudice in other ways. Is there a real difference, do you think, between removing a phrase from the text and adding one that's not in there?
Fascinating, and I agree it depends on context - if you are reading aloud to kids there are all sorts of things you might omit for all kinds of reasons.
But - to stir a bit - times have changed in all kinds of ways, and Adams may not even have intended any kind of negative connotation? The phrase might imply - have a strong sense of honour and therefore don't back down, even when things get rough - a different code, but not necessarily meant to be derogatory?
It’s going to be an unashamedly political post today, folks; but before I begin here are a few pictures from my recent visit to Delhi for the Bookaroo festival:
Big thanks to Jo Williams and the Bookaroo team for inviting me and for organising such a great festival, and to the British School in Delhi for sponsoring my events!
But while I was having such a terrific time in India, hanging out with the 2 Steves and making some lovelynewinternationalauthorfriends, events were moving on apace with the campaigns to save our libraries.
Campaigners on Judgement Day
As you may know, on 16th November Mr Justice McKenna ruled in the High Court that Gloucestershire and Somerset County Councils’ plans to drastically cut our library services were unlawful on equalities grounds. “Hurrah!” we all said, as the judge quashed the plans, and told the councils they had to go back to the beginning and start again.
So, what’s the problem? Well, here in Gloucestershire the council’s statements about the High Court judgement have been somewhat austeritical with the truth.
On the day of the judgement, council leader Mark Hawthorne told Channel 4 news that the judge had ruled that the council had not breached its duties under the 1964 Libraries Act - an assertion he repeated on BBC local radio the next day. He has also been widely quoted as saying that “the most important thing here is that the judge said that there is nothing wrong with our plans to transfer some libraries over to communities”.
Nice for the council if it were true. In fact, as explained here, this is based on a misreading. All the judge was saying was (a) it’s for the Secretary of State, not him, to decide whether the council’s plans comply with the act, and (b) since community libraries fall outside statutory provision, they’re not relevant to the act. You can have 100 libraries handed over to communities, or none: the question is, do the council’s own libraries meet the requirements?
Okay; but we can see how
5 Comments on Big Fat Fibs and the Big Fat Fibbers Who Tell Them* - John Dougherty, last added: 12/7/2011
It just gets worse and worse, doesn't it? And yet these are probably the same people who were furious with the rioters and shouted about 'the rule of law.' Trashing a library is equivalent vandalism anyway. Well done for telling us about this anyway, John, however depressing. But in a country where cancer patients who haven't got better soon enough are to be told they are fit to work..if they weren't layabouts, they WOULD be better, after all. Ha! They could be sent to staff the community libraries.
Brilliant acronym, Cathy. And brilliant piece, John. The trouble is the majority of the good citizens of Gloucestershire are probably reading/listening to Cllr Hawthorne, and not this blogpost. 'Lies, damn lies and [political spin]' comes to mind (pace Stephen Jay Gould).
Stereotypes can be really useful to a writer. You want to quickly communicate exactly what sort of person this is? Just pop in a few generally-recognised characteristics, and the average mind will fill in the rest.
So, for instance, you give a character bad breath and equally bad teeth, and chances are the reader will identify him as a bad person.
Or give her blonde hair, long legs and a high-pitched giggle, and you’ve got a bimbo. See? There’s even a specific word to match the image! And just one little detail can make a big difference: replace the giggle with a sly, sulky pout and, hey presto, instant High School Queen Bitch!
Then there’s this one: a young black man in a hoody wandering through an expensive, exclusive gated community at night. He’s got his hood up and is walking slowly, muttering to himself. There’s something in his hand. So: burglar, probably on drugs. Possibly armed. Definitely dangerous.
The problem here, of course - as some of you will already have worked out - is that real life doesn’t deal in comfortable stereotypes. And the character I’ve just described wasn’t a character. He was Trayvon Martin, a 17-year old who had every reason to be in the expensive, exclusive gated community, since he was staying with his father who lived there. And he wasn’t actually talking to himself; he was on his phone, using a handsfree headset. And he was walking slowly because…
You know what? I don’t know why he was walking slowly; and actually, it doesn’t matter. At all. There’s no reason anyone should have to explain anything about Trayvon Martin’s behaviour that night. He wasn’t doing anything wrong. Walking slowly isn’t a crime in Florida, where the gated community is; nor is talking on a mobile phone; or carrying a bottle of iced tea and a bag of Skittles; or wearing a hoody; or wearing your hood up; or being young, black and male.
Yet now Trayvon Martin is dead. He’s dead because he fitted another man’s stereotype of villainy; and because that man was licensed to carry a gun.
And because Florida has a law that allows anyone to use deadly force if they believe themselves to be in danger of death or serious injury, the man who shot Trayvon Martin has not been arrested or charged.
Stereotypes. They should come with a warning.
You can read more about the Trayvon Martin case here, and you can sign a petition to have his killer prosecuted here.
Very good points John - yes stereotypes give writers quick pen portraits - yes we all stereotype and also sometimes we need our defence mechanisms up on high alert. As a middle aged short woman walking the streets alone I am wary of teenage boys with their hoods up. But no way would I shoot one!! Or expect anyone else too. Because while being on high alert, I also remain open and I am just as likely to nod to such lad and say, 'Alright?' as I go past, with a motherly smile. Because I refuse to be sucked into - They are all this, that or the other. So the death of this poor boy breaks my heart too and should make all of us stop and think how far we allow ourselves to be influenced by stereotypes, particularly of teenage boys. Thanks for your post John.
A great post John. We're looking at stereotypes and prejudice in class at the moment and I think I shall use your post (if you don't mind) to get them thinking and changing attitudes.
Its amazing and also sad how we're wired to to look at a few visual clues and then bingo draw the wrong conclusion! I wrote about this on ABBA a week or 2 ago (11th March) called In Praise of Hoodies and Skateboard Parks.
Therefore I think that children's writers have a duty to eradicate stereotypes from their books. I don't care that I might be labelled by the anti "politically correct" lobby.
If we don't write about real people as individuals with all their positives and negatives, then attitudes will never change. I think the children's writer can make a small but significant contribution here.
There are other stereotypes which are just plain wrong. How often do blind people get portrayed as being exceptionally musical or able to hear more acutely than other people? I really liked In Praise of Hoodies and Skateboard Parks, not least because it reflects my own experience.
Michele, I shall be honoured if you use my post to facilitate your work in class - but thanks for asking!
Dianne, I thought your In Praise of Hoodies... post was spot on. It reminded me of one October night, a few years ago, when I took my kids - then about 7 & 5 - up a nearby hill to watch the firework display. We ended up near some rough-looking and very loud hoodied teenagers, and when one of them, fag in mouth, approached us I felt instantly apprehensive - until he drew a lighter from his pocket and offered to light my children's sparklers.
Giles, I agree - I'm not sure if we can entirely eradicate stereotypes from our work (the human brain is, I think, wired for them) but we should challenge them as much as we can.
Having overslept a little, I'm just packing to go off to the Wychwood festival in Cheltenham, to hang out in the Children's Literature tent with the likes of Philip Ardagh, Jamila Gavin, and our very own Elen Caldecott & Cindy Jefferies. So today's post is going to be a relatively short follow-on from my last one, with other people doing most of the talking.
The destruction of our library services continues apace, and there have been a number of developments over the past couple of weeks.
It begins to look as if these closures are ideological. But whose ideology? Yes, most of the councils that are closing libraries are Conservative-controlled; but if we put this down to Toryism, how do we explain the disgraceful behaviour of Labour-run Brent Council, with their secretive, heavy-handed night-raid and acts of cultural vandalism?
Perhaps it's not ideology. Perhaps it's idiocy. Perhaps, as Philip Pullman says, our libraries are in the hands of people who simply don't understand them. Or perhaps all our major political parties are now infected by the same stupid, greedy philosophy which says that unless you can see exactly how much money something is making, it has no value.
Hope you have a great time doing Wychwood. I did an event with puppets and paper butterflies there a couple of years ago. We got to stay in a tent for the weekend too - it was wild.
I don't know if you heard Ed Vaizey's recent appearance on Radio 4's Front Row, during which he claimed that there's no library service crisis (and I ended up shouting at the radio)?
Clearly the man was unaffected by our seventh most viewed post, in which I sang a satirical song about how useless he's been at looking after our libraries:
Once, the first thing you saw as you came through the door would be a large semicircular counter behind which librarians would stand, dealing with customers or ready to help while others buzzed about busily from shelf to customer to desk. Before long, you’d know them - librarians and library assistants: skilled; knowledgeable; professional - by sight, at least, and they would recognise you, and exchange a pleasant word.
The bookshelves were tall enough that you’d have to reach up to the top shelf, and they filled up the library and were packed with books, so tightly you’d need both hands to squeeze browsed unchoices back into their places; and every time you came, there would be new treasures hidden on those shelves - here a book you’d been longing to read; there another you didn’t know you were looking for until you found it.
The children’s section, too, was bursting with the new and the old. Brightly coloured cushions in animal shapes invited you in and made you welcome.
There was life there. Then the council made its plans. “We’re improving things,” they said, as they ripped out the counter, leaving fade-marks on the carpet, and stuck up racks of battered DVDs: films you’d seen already, or didn’t want to.
“We’re improving things,” they said, as they sent out redundancy notices, and hid the few remaining staff - or the volunteers who replaced them, or the temps brought in for the day from other branches - behind a small table round the corner.
“We’re improving things,” they said, as they tore out the tall shelves and wheeled in small ones, four-tiered trolleys which still seemed suddenly too roomy for the few books that remained.
“We’re improving things,” they said, as they inserted automatic tellers which check out your choices but never see your face or learn your name.
“We’re improving things,” they said, as they hollowed out our libraries and left them to rot from the inside. Now, the first thing to meet your eye is the trolley of old stock for sale. You can visit, browse, borrow without a single human encounter; when someone deals with you, it may be someone you have never seen before, and never will again. The gaps in the shelves gape like those in uncared-for mouths with diseased gums, and the forward-facing books do nothing to hide the decay. The brightly-coloured cushions have faded and sagged out of shape, and will not be replaced.
And one day, they will tell you that no-one uses libraries any more; and they will not ask themselves why that might be; and they will close and lock the doors forever.
Remember this, when they tell you they are investing in the community, and in the future.
Remember this, when they talk of their commitment to education; to driving up standards; to literacy and reading levels.
Remember this, when they stand on your doorstep, smiling and asking for your vote.
9 Comments on A Death in the Library - John Dougherty, last added: 9/8/2012
I SO wish we didn't have to keep on writing sad elegies for libraries, John. Wouldn't it be nice if we could write paeans of joy instead? One day, the destruction of our libraries will be seen as a great shame of the early 21st century. But of course, by then it will be too late.
I too remember the pleasure of childhood visits to the library. The click and clonk of books being stamped were frequently the only sounds to be heard.
I was an advanced reader and the librarians knew both me and my ability. As such, I was permitted early entry to the adult book shelves.
I would spend hours (both as a child and later an adult) walking the aisles and discovering new books. The librarians would ask about the books I was returning and suggest others.
Now the library is noisy, understocked, stocked with old DVDs and apparently unmanned by humans. The Victorians would be angered to see what we have done to their legacy.
What society can call itself civilised if the leaders show such disregard for the wriiiten word and all books?
I agree this seems a long term plan to justify their closure, but perhaps they should heed a warning from the BBC. Michael Grade cut the budgets, etc for Dr Who as he wanted to get rid of it. Years on, where is he? Dr Who is now one of the biggest shows the BBC produces. Sometimes the worm fights back...
Well I have to say the new, improved library in Coleford, in the Forest of Dean - (same County Council as John) is bright and busy with lovely books and staff that greet you warmly from behind their lovely counter - yes there's automatic too, but some people like that. There's a wonderful computer suite, where I recently ran a course on YouTube for business and where you can get a cup of coffee too.
It's moved to the right part of town- accessible to young families - and is doing well.
Entropy is such that not all things stay the same for ever. Life moves on and new things come to replace old, sometimes better, sometimes not, but sighing about past glory won't save libraries. You need to get people out there and using them. If they don't or won't then, sadly, it's time to move on.
Yes - but I think part of John's point is that if you starve the library of cash till it becomes rubbish, then it's not going to be fun to visit and so people won't. So you create a self-fulfilling prophesy.
Sounds as if you're lucky enough to be living near a library where the reverse has happened...
Alan Wylie said, on 8/22/2012 1:17:00 PM
A wonderful post john, sums up the whole bloody tragic affair!
I got back from my summer holiday last night. I went to CWIG, which is not an obscure Welsh village, but the Society of Authors Children's Writers' and Illustrators' Group conference. It happens every three years in different cities, and this year it was in Reading.It was called 'Joined-up Reading'. Is that 'joined-up reading' or 'joined-up Reading'? Who knows. Maybe both.
Normally, we writers and illustrators spend our days, doing what we want, bossing around people who don't exist and skiving work to chat on Skype/Facebook/twitter about the work we should be doing. We're not used to being with other people all the time, or doing as we're told. We're not used to having to get dressed before working, eat at regular times, use a knife and fork nicely or sit quietly without telling a bunch of lies. But a conference is a proper organised thing with set mealtimes, talks to attend and other people to interact with.
So why do we go? Holiday!
CWIG is a delight. Full of old friends and potential new friends, a chance to gossip, eat, drink and whinge. If any snippet of useful information leaks in, that's a bonus.
Nicola Davies, unfazed by being elbowed by a giant ghost - all in a day's work for us
CWIG is just writers and illustrators - it's not somewhere to look for an agent or publisher. And so no one has to be impressive, there's no point in showing off, and we can all just relax. It's a time for singing silly songs and drinking the bar out of wine. (We did that on the first night; the last time I was party to drinking a bar out of wine was in Outer Mongolia in 1990 on the day the Iraq War started.)
I loved it. But like all the best holidays, it had its grumble-points. The food was poor, the bar was hopeless, the cabaret compulsory (hah! we laugh in the face of compulsory!), the coffee undrinkable (that's serious) and the microphones non-functional. The Germans took all the sun loungers and there was tar on the beach. Oh. Hang on.
But we don't get this stuff every day, unlike, say, manager-type-people who are forever going to conferences and staying in the Scunthorpe (or Dubai) BestWesternMarriotHilton hotel. Indeed, most days we don't get interaction with another human being who actually exists. To be in a whole room of around 100 people, none of whom can be given green hair or three arms on a whim, is quite a novelty. CWIG is a weekend away in the real world.
Only our invisible friends were skiving outside
But look - we can play in the real world, too.
We talked about the state of publishing (in turmoil), of what the hell the government thinks it's doing with libraries (wanton armageddonising), of the progress of e-books in children's publishing (mollusc-like in its rapidity) and whether Allan Ahlberg's glass contained red wine or Ribena (who knows?) And heard the usual disingenuous comment from a publisher that there's never been a better time to be a children's writer.
Now for my holiday snaps. Don't shuffle like that. You might like to visit the real world one day.
Here is our venue: a very plausible-looking Henley Business Centre at Reading University.
We had proper signage, just like real business people. Well, perhaps not quite like real business people.
Just in case we didn't know where to walk ...
.... and where to dance, there were some stick people drawn on the floor.
(Obviously the nice people at Reading know that all writers - and especially illustrators - speak fluent stick.)
We know how to dress. Alan Gibbons and John Dougherty, as usual, wore shirts chosen to burn out the eyes of Ed Vaizey. I won't dazzle you with those. Sarah McIntyre chaired her session in the best conference hat I have ever seen. [What do you mean, 'what's a conference hat?']
Allan Ahlberg brought his teddy.
And he had a drink on the stage, though his wasn't see-through, like they usually are when you see conferences on TV.
We all transacted our own little bits of networking and business. I secured a promise from Catherine Johnson to translate some text into Jamaican Fairy and asked Jane Ray if I could commission a dodo from her.
So you see, we do know how to do it.
I had a wonderful time, but holidays can't last forever and it's time to settle be back into speaking stick and bossing around a steam-powered autamaton and an orphan in a boat. Sigh.
(If you would like to read a more informative account of what happened at CWIG, you could turn to David Thorpe. I'm sure more will appear, and I'll update this list later in the day/week/millennium.)
Sounds like a right proper writerish conference- wish I could have been there but I was at a wedding, which was lovely, but hope to get to CWIG next time.
Lovely to see you again, Anne, albeit quite briefly, when I was complaining about the tonic water (which turned out to be soda water, not surprising it tasted awful with gin). Too many people to see, to meet, but it was lovely to briefly catch up and meet new people. For me it was my first as published author so that made it extra special.
Janet Foxley said, on 9/17/2012 10:19:00 AM
Actually the food was OK if you pretended to be vegetarian.
My first CWIG conference - and lots of fun to hear such passion and I came away full of ideas and renewed zeal to help save the libraries.
Food really was pretty unspeakable though. Ran out of the veggie options on the first night (maybe because of the refugees from the meat options, Janet) and on the second I ate meat for the first time in over twenty years when what I was told was mushroom stroganoff turned out to be . . . well, beef. Or lamb. Or something. Euch.
Kate - I don't eat meat, but do eat fish, so ate the dried-out, shrivelled salmon the first night as the slices of pastry thing were so HUGE. I'm surprised they 'ran out' though, as they were offering it reheated for lunch on Saturday! When, again, they had no clue which dishes had meat in and which didn't.
John - I think your medals for school visiting are showing. It was school-dinner fare!
Do you remember the Opening Ceremony? It’s a measure of its impact that I don’t have to say which one, or what it opened. You know what I’m talking about. For days - perhaps weeks - afterwards, the country seemed like a warmer, friendly place.
I don't have permission to use any photos of the Opening Ceremony. So here instead is a picture of some cake, courtesy of Michael at www.foodimaging.co.uk
Of course, not everyone felt this way. Daily Mail columnist Peter Hitchens on several occasions derided it as ‘a social worker’s history of Britain’, a phrase which I found revealing in its oddness. Does Mr Hitchens believe that social workers don’t have a right to history, or that their history is somehow inferior to other people’s? Does he think that a person who spends his or her working life looking after the needs of others is somehow less worthy than someone who spends his working life writing opinions for a newspaper with a less than glorious history of bendingthetruth, not to mention supporting parties with less than pleasant ideologies?
It’s the sort of question that is all too pertinent in these days of Gategate, the scandal of the Government’s Chief Whip apparently calling a police officer a “pleb”. The whole row has that sense of “some people are better than others, not because of who they really are but simply because of their station in life”, which unpleasantly echoes Hitchens’s ‘social worker’ jibe. I’m reminded, as the row unfolds, of how the Opening Ceremony made me feel.
You see, I’m not the only one to have reported unaccustomed feelings of patriotism after watching the Opening Ceremony; and I think I know why. On previous occasions on which I’ve been asked to feel patriotic, the feelings were supposed to be stirred by things that, well, don’t stir me. I quite like the Queen, I suppose, but I don’t feel the country would necessarily be a worse place to live if someone else were our Head of State instead. I never think, “I love being British because we have an army and some big ships!” or “gosh, isn’t it great that we once sent emotionally damaged ex-public schoolboys out all over the world to impose their values on whatever cultures they found there!"
But what Danny Boyle and Frank Cottrell Boyce did, bless them, was to provide an alternative narrative of which I could feel proud. Free universal healthcare! Black people and white people having babies together and nobody even thinking it comment-worthy until that twerp Aidan Burley and, yes, the Daily Mail point it out! Creativity in writing and music and art! Children’s literature, for goodness‘ sake!
I suppose, really, that what it did for me - and this is hugely significant, considering that I grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles - was to tell me: it’s okay to be British my way, whatever that means to me. If I want to prefer a social worker’s history over a right-wing pundit’s history, I can. It doesn’t make me a “pleb” who needs to ‘learn my place’.
So why am I mentioning this here, so long after it’s all over? Well, I just felt moved to point this out:
Literature, and perhaps particularly writings for children and teens, do this as well. Can you remember, during your childhood, reading something in a book and thinking, “But I do that, too!” or “That’s just how it feels!” or “So it’s not just me!”
I can. And the lesson of the Opening Ceremony is that that’s important. Enormously important. Children’s writers do many things, but one of the best things we do is to say to children: “You know - it’s okay to be you.”
I totally agree John...much more so than the floaty Jubilee stuff. Loved the shout out for children's literature too. The Mail article is unbelievable...
And never let it be forgotten that shortly after the Mail article, of course, Jessica Ennis won the heptathlon, bringing the Mail's comment that “it is likely to be a challenge for the organisers to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family in such a set-up" back to haunt them...
But in one sense Mitchell is quite right: we should know our place. Danny Boyle helped British people to remember their place, and its history, exactly by setting up a narrative counter to the one that's usually trumpeted by the Mail and its readers. People recognized this portrait. Okay, it was a flattering one, but the occasion demanded it, and perhaps it would be more accurate to call it aspirational. They looked at it, and remembered that "Yes, this is who we are! This is what the place is, or could be! And now we know it."
Great post. In some ways Danny Boyle gave us permission (not that we should need it) to be proud of the things that really matter - the things that make us who we are today.
As for Mitchell - it is acceptable to use the term 'twerp'?
Excellent reminder of how it felt to be watching that amazing Opening Ceremony, John! Especially welcome now the season of loud party politics has arrived in full spate.
I was so pleased to not be ashamed of what the event was saying about us to the world.
Excellent as always, John. Makes me wish I'd actually watched the ceremony. (I dodged it precisely because I expected it to be the usual 'patriotic' right-wing crap.) Thinks: I'll find it on YouTube!
Sue, all the BBC's Olympic coverage is still available on the BBC website! Here's the link to the Opening Ceremony: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/2012/live-video/p00wm0br
I took great pleasure in reading over all the comments about it in the other countries - I think the BBC had a link on their website. So many of them were flattering and admiring - that made me feel really proud of that ceremony, to be able to show something to the world other than the usual Empire/War/Posh sterotypes, and for the world to like it!
So much better than the Jubilee, where I spent half my time wondering what on Earth all the fuss was about - her Maj has no connection for me whatsoever, while the Opening Ceremony was about my home.
Please forgive me if this posting takes you longer to read than usual. That'll be because I'm typing it very slowly.
The reason for that is that I'm only using one hand.
And the reason for that is that on Sunday afternoon I broke my left wrist. Rather badly.
I'm not telling you this just to get a bit of sympathy, although quite frankly that would be nice. Rather, I thought I'd use this opportunity to share with you an opinion that just about everybody - including me - has voiced in order to cheer me up:
"Oh, well, you can write about it in your next book."
To be fair, not everyone has assumed it'll be the next one: only that the experience will be useful source material at some point. But it is intriguing, this general assumption that when a bad thing happens to me I'm likely to write about it.
Equally intriguing, by the way, is that nobody's mentioned money. There's no sense of, "Shame you broke your wrist, but you'll get a few quid out of it when you put it in a story." The feeling seems to be that the writing itself will be the silver lining, a compensation in its own right.
I don't know if I will ever write about this sort of injury in a story; but it's noteworthy that - while it has been and continues to be painful and inconvenient - more than anything, I've found it interesting. It's all an experience: the moment of sharp, sudden, numbingly wrong pain; the first sight of the swollen question-mark of my once exclamation-straight wrist; the jarring pangs as every speed-bump takes me ruthlessly closer to hospital; the strange blurring of the world as the morphine takes effect; the peculiar internal disassociation as the doctor and orderly take hold of an end each of my twisted forearm and pull it back into shape; the hot rush of blood back into my veins after the bier block... I've lived it all, but I've also noticed it all, and noticed it in a way I don't think I would have done, once upon a time before my working life was taken up with stories.
So perhaps Anne Rooney was right, when she said in Saturday's entry that "Writing is our way of making sense of the world" - or perhaps writing teaches us to make sense of the world. Whatever the truth of it, I'm going to leave you with a question posed to me in sympathy on Sunday evening, by the lovely Katie Fforde:
How do people who don't write deal with it, when terrible things happen to them?
Agreed! Every sympathy to you and your left hand, John. (And possibly to your guitar?)
But how exactly did you do it - or is that what you're saving for the future fictional moment?
Aha! I see! You're keeping the sense of dramatic suspense in your tale even when badly broken-boned. I am most impressed! Hope the arm gets stronger & more comfortable soon.
Ouch, the description made me wince, John. Sympathy coming your way. I agree we take more notice of the small details when things like this happen to us, and even if we don't write directly about them they can be stored up until we need to use part of the experience or perhaps have it happen to some poor character in a book.
oh John, you have heaps of sympathy from me. I managed to break my ankle a few years ago, missed all sorts of non-repeatable treats, never learned how to go up stairs on crutches, watched lots of afternoon TV, and generally didn't learn anything useful from the experience. Oh, I did give a character in my last book a broken ankle and for once didn't have to look up the details. Still, injuries do mend and life goes on.
Poor John! Has no-one thought to check that you are not left-handed and can still type? That would have been my first reaction - after ouch! Lots of sympathy.
How horrid! I've no idea about an up-side to a broken wrist, unless it's getting you out of the washing up. It would just make writing annoyingly slow and guitar playing impossible. Hope it mends very soon. How on earth did you do it?
Thanks, everyone! Firstly: no, I'm not left-handed, so I can still type; but I'm between projects at the moment, so I don't quite know what to type (and the pain-killers are making me drowsy, so I'm not feeling terribly inspired, either). And, worse, I'm having to postpone school visits and speaking engagements!
Oh - and when I can get back on the circuit (hopefully in a couple of weeks) I'll probably have to leave the guitar at home for a bit.
As to how I did it: playing football with the kids in a muddy park. Slipped; hand went down; ouch.
Hope your wrist heals well and soon - sounds a nasty injury.
I don't know how people cope with nasty events if they don't write about them. I've been trying to think what I used to do before I started writing, but I can't remember!!
The first thing I did when I landed in hospital with an ankle in plaster a few years ago was send my husband out for a notebook and pen / I was so furious : a cancelled holiday, etc., writing was the only way I could deal with it. I wish you better, John.
Ask some people to define the perfect job, and they’ll start by describing the salary. Ask others, and they’ll begin with working conditions, or colleagues, or sense of purpose, or flexibility. There are as many perfect jobs as there are types of people; and there are as many types of people as there are... well, people, probably.
So to anyone who’s just dropped by for some careers advice: sorry. Can’t help. Whatever your skill-set, you’d be better going and asking a careers advisor. No, what I’m musing about today is why writing is my perfect job - or, at least, the perfect job for someone with my particular well-defined and carefully honed flaw-set.
For a start, I’m a procrastinator; and I’d imagine there are very few jobs which suit the procrastinator quite so well as writing. When you’re a writer, you see, you start work on a story long before you actually realise you’ve started work on a story. By the time you get round to thinking it might be time to procrastinate, it’s too late. You’ve started work.
Procrastinators - assuming I’m typical of the breed, of course - are daydreamers; and there’s no telling which bits of your daydreams may end up sparking off a story, or changing its course, or providing a resolution, without your having the slightest intention of doing any work. The characters form, the plot builds up, the dialogue begins to whisper, all inside your head and long before you ever consider putting pen to paper or finger to keyboard. It happens while you thought you were avoiding making a shopping list, or doing the washing-up, or paying the bills. And once the story has firmly taken root in your imagination, and is expanding by the day, well, you might as well sit down and tap out a few ideas. It’s not as if you’re actually going to do the whole thing. Not at once, anyway.
And then: well, disappearing down to your shed and writing the next bit is a great way to avoid all those other tasks you’d otherwise have to be doing, isn’t it?
So much for procrastination. But I also suffer from its equal and opposite flaw: a fear of finishing. A dreadful drawback in most spheres of work, I’m sure you’ll agree; but the thing about writing is, you never really finish. Not properly.
You get to the bit where you write the closing sentence, of course; but you never know if that really is the closing sentence. No, you send the MS off to your editor safe in the knowledge that it really isn’t finished yet; that she’ll get back to you sooner or later (later if you have a procrastinating editor who should really have been a writer but never quite got round to it) with lots of helpful suggestions about how to improve it. Finishing the first draft really isn’t finishing the story at all, because there’ll be lots more to do.
Even when you’ve finished the rewrites, in all probability there’ll be more rewrites, and maybe even more. At no point do you send back the re-re-re-re-redrafted work knowing that that’s it, and it’s al
7 Comments on The Perfect Job - John Dougherty, last added: 3/21/2010
Procrastination is definitely in the the job description! There is no better job for a procrastinator than writing, I agree. Of course writers never get a day off or holidays as we are always mulling over ideas for our writing. Julie
If there were no editors or deadlines or people wanting to see it, I would probably never finish anything... it's only the thought that I'll get another chance to rewrite it that makes "finishing" a book possible.
I mean the blog, not invading Poland. My grandfather helped do that, and he regretted it. Oh, sorry, no, he invaded Czechoslovakia with the full approval of the British government of the time. He still regretted it.
I like series fiction. Or, at least, I like the series fiction I like: Discworld; Jeeves and Wooster; Narnia; The Church Mice; The Sandman... It’s a lovely feeling when, browsing the shelves in the library, I come across an unfamiliar volume of a well-loved series.
And I like writing sequels. Zeus on the Loose and Zeus to the Rescue will next year be joined by Zeus Sorts It Out, and I’m currently working on a couple more ideas about the egocentric deity and his long-suffering high priest. Jack Slater, Monster Investigator returned last year in Jack Slater and the Whisper of Doom. Bansi O’Hara and the Bloodline Prophecy is soon to be followed by Bansi O’Hara and the Edges of Hallowe’en.
I would, however, hate it if someone decreed that from now on series fiction was the only legitimate form and no-one was allowed to read, write or publish anything else. Just imagine a world in which such a law had always existed: a world in which Hardy’s The Return of the Native came between The Native and The Native Returns Again; in which Watership Down was followed by Watership Up and Watership Left A Bit; in which Treasure Island was but one book in the Treasure Archipelago series. A world, in other words, which had no room for the stand-alone novel.
Of course, that would be ridiculous.
And yet... it would appear that something not a million miles away from this is happening in children’s books, or at least in books aimed at the newly-confident reader. It seems as if, no matter what I submit at the moment, the question comes back: “But does it have series potential?” A quick glance at my ‘recent rejections’ file comes up with this sort of thing:
“We all enjoyed reading this... The writing is really good... pitched at the right age range... very much like Roald Dahl... the main problem was that we can't see this working well over a series”
“utterly charming... truly very funny... loved the concept...What we’ve had a little difficulty seeing past is how to truly make this into a series.”
This can’t be right. I know there are economic imperatives to consider, but surely there are also cultural imperatives? Should we be teaching newly confident readers that all good things come ready-branded; that no story is self-contained; that one is never enough? Can’t we make children into readers without also turning them into consumers?
Worse, I suspect that for certain publishers the ideal is a series which can be pitched in a maximum of three words, and which combines two concepts from a limited and familiar range. Superhero Pirates! Football-playing Dinosaurs! Vampire Fairies! Ponies in Space! Better yet, slap some vapid c
11 Comments on But Seriesly... - John Dougherty, last added: 5/21/2010
I agree with you, John. Children should have access to a full range of styles and formats. Most of our classic novels are stand-alones. Unfortunately this seems to be yet another example of the finance department over-powering editorial decisions.
The first comment, which refers to Roald Dahl, seems particularly ridiculous - surely nearly all Dahl's books were stand alone stories? (I can only think of the two Charlie books as the exception).
Of course you're absolutely right, John. I wonder whether the publishers' argument is even that sound in purely financial terms. If you have a successful series, that's one thing - but what if you lay out a big advance for a trilogy, only to have the first book bomb? Haven't you then committed yourself to a money sink?
And there are bound to be readers (like me) who have a special fondness for writers who do something different every time, like Geraldine McCaughrean and Frances Hardinge. What are we to do?
John, let me know the names of those publishers, because I WANT to do some series fiction!!! (My refusals are more along the lines of "X books are a lot to ask a publisher to commit to... can we just make it one?")
Ideally, though, I think the story should dictate the form, not the other way around. Some stories make obvious series projects, whereas others cry out to be stand alone novels. I don't think you can force it. Planned sequels are fine, but sequels written (or more likely filmed) only because the first one was a runaway success are nearly always a disappointment.
So true, John! I noticed this as a bookseller, too. And then there's the sequels-to-classics phenomenon. Hmm, Treasure Archipelago sounds quite good, though...
It sends the wrong message to emerging readers,also, that books always have to be part of something longer and can't just be stand alone and complete. I've nothing against book series but do sympathise with this gripe!
Imagine pitching the following story, aimed at the pre-teen market, to a publisher:
A girl and her two brothers, left alone while their parents are at a party, are enticed from their home and taken to a faraway island by an amoral and egocentric stranger. No sooner do they arrive than the stranger’s accomplice attempts to have the girl murdered by enticing another child to shoot her.
The girl survives, and she and her brothers join the community there - a community entirely made up of abandoned children (of whom the stranger is the leader), surviving without adult assistance. After many adventures the girl and her brothers decide to return home, but before they can do so the entire community is captured by a band of criminals.
The criminals attempt to murder the children, but the tables are turned, and the children slaughter the entire gang, stabbing most of them to death one by one. The girl and her brothers return home.
If all this isn’t enough to put the publisher off, add in the descriptions of the parents at home, lamenting the loss of their children, and follow it with the eventual death of the kind and beautiful mother. And, just to confuse them, throw in a fairy or two.
Now: is any publishing house in their right mind, in the present day and age, going to publish such a story?
As you might have gathered, I’ve just finished reading Peter Pan to my kids. My goodness, but it’s dark.
Not unremittingly - far from it. There’s a lot of humour: some of it poignant, some of it merely well-observed. But there are enough threads of darkness running through it to terrify any modern editor looking for a potential best-seller for the young reader.
Not only that, but the language is not always easy. On a single page (263, if you’re interested) we encounter a bountiful selection of words including: industrious, essence, commonplace, pathetic, infinitely, fount, unconscious, bulwarks, miasma, prone, mechanically, unfathomable, tabernacle, bellied, elation, gait, sombre, profoundly, dejected.
What’s my point? I’m not entirely sure; except perhaps to say that it’s easy to set rules for what will and will not do in children’s fiction - and that in doing so, you may miss out on a classic.
8 Comments on Sense and sensibilities - John Dougherty, last added: 6/26/2010
Very well observed John and we could probably apply this to so many children's books : don't get me started on Alice, which is why there are no rules and our job is just to write the book we want to read. Thanks for a great post.
Yes, and look at Enid Blyton books. I was looking in a bookshop yesterday at books for 5-8 year olds, and there are masses of Enid Bs. I strongly suspect that The Castle of Adventure etc wouldn't be accepted nowadays. You're right, John - rules always need to be questioned!
I was amazed when I read Peter Pan for the first time a few years ago. It's all you said and more. Who knew that Tinkerbell made a habit of attending orgies? How many children (other than David Cameron's) are going to pick up on the jokes about Eton? And that slippery narrator, changing his mind about the plot and the characters every two seconds! A remarkable book - and, as you say, one that would send contemporary publishers running.
I'm not sure A.A. Milne would be published today. Grimm's Fairy Tales are often very dark, too. Then there are novels which do get published, frequently to critical acclaim, but which are not successful until forty years later, if ever.
Interestingly I re read Peter pan a while ago when I was given a lovely hardback edition alongside a copy of Scarlett, as a present. I realised that I hadn't actually read the story since I was young and I was dismayed by the underlying tone, the voice, it was... not sure how to express it other than that it felt uncomfortable. I felt as though Barrie was angry and miserable underneath it all and I was quite pleased to get to the end.
Rules about writing are usually pretty useless and as soon as someone says there is a RULE about writing someone else comes up with a good reason for doing the absolute opposite. But most of what we know as classics, which were written years ago, would probably never get published today. I'm not sure if that is because of the way they were written or because the world was a quite different place and so very much less PC! But is it also because these books might not be quite so commercial or have such a wide appeal if there wasn't the nostalgia surrounding them that makes parents want to buy them for their kids?
I haven't read Peter Pan since I was a child but it was a huge favourite then, one of the first books I read (and reread) alone. I loved the book but Peter scared me; he was so capricious and downright dangerous. I shouldn't have been so surprised, maybe, to realise the main character in my first novel for kids (I'm a pic book writer/illustrator) is a version of Peter, and I was busy trying to 'fix' him...the book had obviously gone deep into my psyche!
I had the same reaction as Charlie when I read the unabridged Peter Pan for the first time a few years back - I absolutely loved it, though. That ticking crocodile! Best metaphor for death ever.
Some people do find children difficult, don’t they?
And just as there are those who find children hard to relate to in real life, there are those who find them hard to relate to in fiction, and who therefore assume that any book with a child protagonist must ipso facto have been written with a readership of children in mind. This attitude generally goes hand-in-hand with the sort of assumptions about the merits of children’s fiction that makes those of us who write it rather cross.
Thankfully, there are also authors on the other side of the Great Fictional Divide who understand that childhood (in which, for the purposes of this piece, I include teenagehood as well) isn’t just a period of waiting to turn into a real person. So, as my contribution to the Awfully Big Second Anniversary Celebrations, here - in no particular order - are five of my favourite depictions of children and childhood in novels written for proper grown-ups:
1. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee When I was a small child, I was told by my classmates that the house at the school gates was The Witch’s House. I remember going fearfully but excitedly up to it, one day after school, with one of my friends; and seeing, just as we reached it, an old woman’s face at the window.
We screamed and ran. We were afraid; but it was a safe fear - a fear of something we had created in our minds and fixed to someone else’s home. I don’t know why children do this - perhaps in order to practice dealing with genuinely scary things when we’re older - but in the Radley house, Harper Lee captures this sort of childhood totem perfectly; and in Scout, Jem and Dill, she creates three very real children, who play and negotiate and slowly learn about justice and injustice and the complexities of the adult world entirely convincingly.
To Kill a Mockingbird is fifty this year, and hasn’t aged a bit.
2. About a Boy, by Nick Hornby We all knew a Marcus at school, didn’t we? Except, of course, for those of us who were Marcuses - bright in some ways and yet so naive in others; misfits who desperately needed to be taken under someone else’s wing.
It’s Hornby’s masterstroke, of course, that the wing in this case belongs to someone who bridges the gap between the child and adult states - a grown-up who’s never actually had to grow up.
About a Boy is a wonderful comedy of embarrassment, with a lot of unsentimental warmth and down-to-earth wisdom about families and growing up; and with two very real boys of vastly different ages at
8 Comments on 5 Great Depictions of Childhood in Novels for Adults - John Dougherty, last added: 7/28/2010
Some great suggestions - thanks! I shall look them up. David Copperfield, though, Frances? I have a copy downstairs and will make an effort to get to it soon; but I've just listened to Oliver Twist on audio, and while I enjoyed it, one of the things that struck me (perhaps because I was preparing to post this) was that Oliver really didn't seem like a real child at all. He was too unremittingly Good and Nice, with no real sense of trauma.
I think Oliver Twist is weighed down by being propaganda - he's a bit good to be true isn't he? But DC seems to me to be written from the viewpoint of a real child - processing his understanding of the world. The story goes off though when David grows up and the awful Dora and even more awful Agnes enter.
Great post and great pic John... tanned and relaxed next to the blue sea. Envious! Yes to Cat's Eye and Lord of the Flies and To Kill a Mocking Bird. What about Tom in Graham Swift's Waterland? His sinuous story seems to manage the mangled emotions of love, sexuality, need, guilt, angst and despair... all in one boy. And on a completely different tack.. did anyone ever read Frankie and Stankie by Barbara Trapido. Maybe it recalls my own S African growing up in the 50's. And then there's Frankie in Carson McCuller's The Member of the Wedding.
This summer, we had visitors. Two girls from Belarus came to stay with us, courtesy of the Chernobyl Children’s Project.
It’s a strange experience, being unable to communicate verbally with children who are, for a fortnight, almost entirely dependent on you, but neither of our visitors spoke any English and my Russian is non-existent, so we had to make do; and by and large we did very well. Our guests learned to ask “Mehgeddown” before leaving the table, and to say “pleeeeease” in the proper way beloved of generations of British children (stretching the vowels out to improbable lengths, with a beseeching rise and fall in pitch in the middle). We learned the Russian for “orange”, “video” and “prawns”. And we got very good at miming and drawing explanatory stick-people pictures.
What was strangest about the language barrier, though - and I say this as someone to whom smalltalk doesn’t come naturally - was the consequent inability to find out anything significant about these children who were, for two weeks, part of our family. We learned - we think - that one lives at home with mother, two grandmothers, and another adult female whom we assume to be an aunt; the other lives with mother, father, and one grandmother. And that was it.
Perhaps it was because I felt I ought to have learned more that, when I took them to the airport and bid them a genuinely tearful goodbye, I found myself making up the next bit. One of the girls, I reckoned, was going home to a family who had missed her desperately and who would, as far as they were able, spoil her over the next couple of days. They would listen to everything she had to tell them about her holiday, pore over the photos we had given her, and create in their own imaginations details about us and our life in Gloucestershire.
The other, I thought, would probably be welcomed warmly enough, but without the same level of fuss and attention. By the time she got home, talk would have turned to other things, and she would be expected to be quiet - would perhaps even be almost forgotten, except as a series of tasks to be attended to. She was, I imagined, returning to a life comprising a certain level of neglect. Having watched her open up over her stay, turning from a child who stood quietly on the edge of things to one who threw herself loudly towards the centre, I felt, at the airport, that in a matter of minutes I saw precisely the reverse happen. I worried about her; and, if I'm honest, I'm still worrying.
Of course, I have no way of knowing whether this is true. Effectively, I’ve made it up, and for all I know, I’ve got it completely wrong. But it does occur to me that, to a greater or lesser extent, we all fictionalise other people. We make assumptions about them and about their lives based on very little evidence. Sometimes we’re aware that we’re doing it; sometimes we’re not.
It’s a useful attribute for a writer, of course. When a new character suddenly appears on the page before us, we have to make their acquaintance immediately; we have to know who they are so that we can tell what they’re going to do next. Is this character good, bad, morally ambiguous? Brave or cowardly? We need to make assumptions about their background, take shortcuts in getting to know them. The difference, of course, is that whatever we decide about our own characters, we know we’re right. When we make up stories about real people, we're only guessing.
John's website
6 Comments on Making up stories about real people - John Dougherty, last added: 9/14/2010
Thought-provoking, on many levels. It's that behind closed doors thing, isn't it. Do we believe everything we're told or do we at least question it? How much do we decide to show and does it tally with the reality? As a child, it took me a long time to realise that grown-ups told more fibs than children, sometimes small ones and sometimes really big ones! If I was the child's voice behind a novel, would I be an ingenue, as I was, or would I be knowing? And which would make for a better story? There are many really interesting literary adult novels that feature an unreliable narrator, and there will also be children's ones too, only right now I can't think of one. Can you, and what effect does that voice have on the story?
We did have a sheaf of papers with useful phrases translated into Russian, Cat. It's just that the children didn't seem to understand our pronunciation when we tried to use them...
Once or twice, we used the translation sheets like that; and I used Google translate as well; but it's difficult communicating with children like that because they move around so much...
This post made me think again about that automatic process of fictionalising other people, almost as a knee jerk reaction, especially for writers. Amos Oz has based one of his latest books around this concept, Rhyming Life and Death and I used it in my workshops last year as an inspiration to writers. Great post John and well done for hosting the children from Chernobyl. I am sure they will remember you and your family for life.
I must have been mad. Gloriously, bonkersly, wonderfully mad. Whatever possessed me to suggest I mark Save Our Libraries Day by becoming a Flying Author?
Not literally flying, I hasten to add, despite the misleadingly Bigglesish publicity picture. No, the idea was that I dash around the county, doing quick 20-minute sessions at each of the libraries that are endangered by the, let's be frank, utterly irresponsible and ridiculously short-termist cuts proposed by Gloucestershire County Council.
Unfortunately, it's a big county. And there are a lot of endangered libraries. Under the present plans, 29 of the county's 38 libraries are likely to suffer huge reductions in service, with up to 17 of those likely to close altogether. Not to mention the mobile libraries, which soon no one will be able to mention except in the past tense. Yes, they're getting rid of the entire mobile library service.
Anyway, it soon became apparent that I wasn't going to be able to do more than 9 in a day. And that was without stopping for lunch.
Thank goodness, then, for Cindy Jefferies, who quickly donned her own metaphorical goggles and flight jacket to become Flying Author number two. The marvellous, hardworking and very lovely people at Friends of Gloucestershire Libraries began to get very excited - and it didn't end there. As the days rolled by, more authors, poets, illustrators and storytellers joined the squadron. Not all of them were technically Flying Authors - some stayed at a single library for a day; some could only give an hour or two of their time - but all of them helped to make it a huge success. They were, in no particular order:
Marcus Moore
the heroic Katie Fforde, who did several events despite having spent the previous night sleeping rough for charity in a public park!!!
Hannah Shaw
Sue Limb
Jamila Gavin
Alice Jolly
Shoo Rayner
Chloe of the Midnight Storytellers
Jane Bailey
Chris Manby
Philippa Roberts
Graham Mitchell
Vicky Bennett
Peter Wyton
Roger Drury
John Bassett of Spaniel In The Works Theatre Company
[and if I've missed anyone off this list, please email and tell me and I'll add you! Sorry if that's the case, but there were just SO MANY OF US!]
By the time Saturday 5th Feb came, we had something planned in EVERY SINGLE LIBRARY IN THE BOROUGH!
Well - except for the two that are closed on Saturdays. And the one in the prison.
But those aside, we had a right rollicking day of events to look forward to. You can see a fuller, but possibly still not quite complete, list of events (plus weblinks) here.
8 Comments on Attack of the Flying Authors - John Dougherty, last added: 2/8/2011
With all the effort that is going in to "Save Libraries" there just has to be some positive result! We are not facing closures here in Australia but we are facing cuts to services and that could be just as harmful, especially given our geography. Some people are still a very long way from a library - hundreds of kilometres in fact!
You have certainly put in impressive efforts to save library service! I must admit that when I have visited the UK I was very surprised that the public libraries were not as well-stocked as the one in my community in Ohio. I hope that things improve in your community.
Unfortunately, Ms Yingling, the library service here has been under slow, creeping attack for a long time - the job of librarian has been downgraded (in many library authorities, librarians no longer have the right to choose the books for their own libraries), and funding has been cut incrementally.
Thanks for your good wishes. I hope at some point we'll have the sense to elect a government that values libraries and funds them properly; in the meantime, our job is to make sure that when that time comes we have some libraries left, not to mention experienced librarians to run them!
Well done, all of you! I am very impressed, John & others, that you managed to organise the events and readings at all, as staff in my county can't get involved in protests.
Have been to one Protest, where I joined the crowd outside the small local library, and to one renewed Library Opening where I was interviewed by local paper for my thoughts on it's imminent closure.
Staff in Gloucestershire can't get involved in protest, either - or even, as I think I posted, voice an opinion that doesn't agree 100% with the party line.
However, library users can organise events. After all, they're our libraries!
I love writing, too, but it would drive me mad if I spent all my waking, or at least working, hours alone in my shed. I like - no, I need - to get out there and perform, too.
I’ve been doing a lot of it lately. I suspect it’s proximity to both World Book Day and the end of the financial year that leads to the annual rash of bookings throughout late February and much of March; but whatever the reason, it’s been great to get out of the confines of my admittedly lovely shed and meet both children and staff at a real variety of schools, from Gloucester to Bedford and from Leicester to Exeter.
There’s always the occasional niggle in school visit season. Inevitably, at some point, somebody at some school somewhere will do something to cause offence. When this happens, it’s important to keep things in perspective. What was said may not have been exactly what was meant; that omission was probably a genuine oversight; teachers are busy people who should be forgiven for not always being able to keep every single plate spinning. Yes, I’ve just driven for two hours to get here; but she may have spent the last forty-five minutes trying to control an uncontrollable Year 5. And, of course, while the best school visits - the ones where the children have been prepared for my visit and are excited about meeting a Real Live Author - are also usually those on which I get treated like a celebrity, it’s important not to let that go to my head and expect the red carpet treatment everywhere.
There was, however, one niggle from this round which has stayed with me, and I really don’t think this one is down to me being a diva (or whatever the masculine form of diva is. Div, probably).
You see, I always finish my school visits with a book signing. Yes, it’s good to earn a little extra income from selling books - most of us aren’t terribly well-off - but that’s not why I do it. Nor is it to soak up a little more adoration - very often it’s when they meet you one-to-one that they say something that brings you back down to earth. No, the book signing is much more important than that.
More than anything else, the reason I do school visits is to promote reading for pleasure. I’m passionate about it. I believe that a school - especially a primary school - that doesn’t at least try to get its pupils reading for pleasure is failing in one of its most important duties. And in my sessions, I do my utmost to link reading and fun.
For me, the signing session is an important way to do that. If a child has been inspired by the day, and is bursting with fresh enthusiasm about reading, it’s good to provide the option of a focus for that enthusiasm; and a book signed by The Author can be just the thing. It can become a treasured, even a totemic, item, invested with significance.
Obviously, not every child will need such a focus - many of them will have books at home that already have particular significance, and for many some all books will be equally special, signed or not. But the signing session means that children are at least offered the option of buying a book which, for some, will be their first Special Book - and, for some, might even be their first book of any sort.
So what’s my niggle? It’s that one o
8 Comments on Putting Pressure on Pupils? - John Dougherty, last added: 3/18/2011
I once spent a short time working in a school where almost all the children came from very, very poor families. We arranged with a visiting author that we would buy a copy of each of his books for the school library. On the day I found the children had pooled their 1 cent and 2 cent pieces (we still had them back then) so that they could buy a book to share. They did this because they "thought it was polite". The author had great difficulty in saying anything at all after that - and so did I!
You can't help but worry that telling you how you're going to do your visit might introduce a thin end of the wedge, whereby authors are no longer invited into schools for being 'troublesome'. I'm sure there are already far too many schools where cuts have meant that they have no budget for an author's travel expenses and so these visits don't happen.
When I was an impecunious editor in my twenties (still am impecunious, although no longer in my twenties!), I went to a talk David Almond gave. It was superb. Afterwards, although I genuinely couldn't afford the 6 quid needed to buy one of his books, I joined the signing queue - and asked him to sign my free hand-out Almond bookmark. I still have it! He probably thought I was a cheapskate, but I enjoyed saying hello and telling him how much I liked his writing.
I'm sure John probably does sign bits of paper - we all do. When I'm being efficient, I remember to bring along pre-signed postcards to hand out. The problem about signing in situ is you can then end up with a queue of anything up to 120 children all wanting their hands, arms or exercise books signed, plus extras for their friends who couldn't be there. Chaos!
Absolutely, Bookwitch. I never sign body parts, and I almost never sign books written by someone else - I tell the kids it would feel like taking credit for someone else's work - but if a child wants me to sign a reading record, a bookmark, or even the tiniest scrap of paper, it's an honour.
I sign body parts (arms only! though I think I once did a face!) and bits of paper - and posters if I've remembered to take them. But just on Tuesday I was at a school where the librarian had printed out dozens of self-designed bookmarks ready for the students, which were brilliant - I'm going to do some myself for next time. It was so simple I was kicking myself wishing I'd thought of it earlier (Vistaprint don't do bookmarks!)
I despair, I really do. Time was that people would go without food to afford books. I don't think they should go without a baked potato with cheese and coleslaw plus a coke to buy *my* books, particularly, (£5.99 - about the same) but where are people's priorities? A book is far more affordable, valuable and important than a computer game, a chocolate bar, a subscription to Sky TV, or a new pair of trainers. The teachers should be encouraging the parents to spend money on things that will be good for their children - like books.
This is a story about a little boy, and his favourite author, and the difference a few moments of kindness can make. Sam has just turned nine, and he asked for a birthday cake shaped like a platypus, for two reasons: he’d seen platypuses on his recent Australian holiday, and he’d read in Mr Gum & the Goblins that Andy Stanton’s favourite word is ‘platypus’. It’s a bit of a running joke; in every book the favourite word changes. Sam knows that, but still…
Anyway, this is where I come in. Sam is a friend of mine - he and his family live across the road from me - and so is Andy Stanton. I was lucky enough to find myself on a discussion panel with Andy a few years ago, on which occasion I prostrated myself before his comedy genius and he was kind enough to offer effusive words of praise about my Zeus books, and, well, I like to feel we bonded.
So I texted Andy with a brief explanation, asking if he’d mind sending me a text that said Happy birthday, Sam and something about platypuses. It would, I thought, be quite special to show it to Sam round about candle-blowing-out-and-cake-cutting time.
Andy, bless him, texted back immediately with the generous message: Give me a ring from the party and put him on the line and i’ll say hi.
Sam, of course, was awestruck. He was a touch monosyllabic at first; and Andy had to loosen him up a bit:
Andy: Hello? Sam (shyly): Hi. Andy: Is that Sam? Sam (lost for words): Yeah. Andy: Do you know who this is? Sam (still lost for words): Yeah. Andy: Yes, that’s right; it’s Jacqueline Wilson. Sam (little smile appearing like sunshine through the clouds): No you’re not! You’re Andy Stanton!
And they chatted for a minute or two - with Andy doing most of the chatting - before Sam returned to the party, and to the envy of his friends (including one who muttered, “I bet it’s not the real Andy Stanton, it’s just someone pretending to be him!”).
So - what’s the big deal? Successful author does nice thing for kid. So what?
Well, the ‘so what’ is that Sam can be painfully shy - and up until a year or so back, he was selectively mute. He often finds conversations with adults difficult, and he’s never - I’ll repeat that: he’s never - managed a phone call of that length before except with his mum or dad. Phone calls and conversations with adults are, by and large, things of stress rather than joy for him.
Yet this was special. Sam’s been upset about not getting tickets for Andy’s event in Cheltenham this year; but that night, when they were talking about the party, and the games, and
11 Comments on The Kindness of Authors - John Dougherty, last added: 9/24/2011
He's lovely isn't he? He not only signed a book for my 6 year old but answered his questions (Son: My favourite character is Friday O' Leary who is yours? A.S. :Mine would have to be Polly) Six year old is also huge Zeus fan !
He's great, jongleuse - a lovely, lovely bloke, and just as funny in real life as he is on paper. And your six year old clearly has excellent taste! Thank you.
A few years ago, I was lucky enough to be thoroughly alarmed by the late Diana Wynne Jones.
I went to see her at the Cheltenham Literature Festival. In response to the inevitable question about her next book, she said that it would be published in February and was about a child who goes to visit relatives in Ireland only to find that strange things connected with Celtic mythology begin to happen.
"Eeek!" I thought; and at the end of the session I approached her with a question of my own.
"How do I tell my publisher," I asked her, "that my next book, about a child who goes to visit a relative in Ireland only to find that strange events connected with Celtic mythology begin to happen, is going to bomb because Diana Wynne Jones's book about the same thing comes out a month earlier?"
Well, she was absolutely lovely. She told me that this sort of thing was always happening, and that she was sure my book would be completely different from hers. Which, as it turned out, was completely accurate: I read and thoroughly enjoyed The Game, and my Bansi O'Hara and the Bloodline Prophecy was - thankfully! - nothing like it.
I'm thinking about this now because I've just read a terrific book about a boy who accidentally summons an ancient deity. The deity accepts as a prayer something which wasn't intended to be a prayer at all, manifests before the boy, and asks for worship and sacrifices. In the story that follows, the gods are shown to be capricious, self-centred and arrogant, with little regard for the rights and feelings of mere mortals.
If you're familiar with my work, you might think I'm describing my first Zeus book, Zeus on the Loose. But many of you may guess that I'm talking about Wishful Thinking by Ali Sparkes - and if you haven't read it, I can thoroughly recommend it. It's very different from Zeus - much more of an adventure and less of a comedy, though it does have some genuinely funny moments - and is clearly aimed at an older readership. It's also beautifully structured, and includ
15 Comments on Creative Differences - John Dougherty, last added: 11/4/2011
Cathy MacPhail and I met last week as we were both short-listed for the Catalyst book award. Her book Grass is about a boy who witnesses a crime but doesn't tell the police, mine, When I Was Joe is about a boy who witnesses a crime and does tell the police. Originally she'd planned that her character would tell..was I glad that she changed her mind!
I read When I Was Joe recently, Keren, and loved it - one of those books you keep sneaking back to for "just one more chapter" when you really should be doing something else. Will put Grass on the to-read list too!
Anonymous said, on 11/1/2011 4:16:00 AM
Really beautifully put, John. I am glad it turned out well for you.
But the anxiety about defensible originality can be crippling. It feels as if the JKRs and the DWJs almost 'sanitize' vast tracts of fantasy space. Who can write about a school for wizards ever again? Schoolchildren on trains are a bit dodgy now. Owls are out. Far too many people think that JKR invented all her her mythical creatures and therefore owns them, whereas in fact she just incorporated her research well, like many a good writer.
I am writing on a vaguely St George and dragonish theme at the moment, and had a fit of the shivers when I read a synopsis of The Hunger Games. Reading the actual book reassured me.
But you always feel there is another such threat around the corner, and that it will be published three weeks before your own book on the same subject. Michelle Lovric (as anonymous because Blogger doesnt like me today)
I remember meeting Mary Hoffman at a Bloomsbury drinks years ago and being v disappointed to discover that we'd both written fantasy novels set in an alternate Renaissance Italy. They were so different I don't think the publisher even realised.
DWJ's Witch Week, the Worst Witch stories and - most famously - Harry Potter all involve magical boarding schools, but they are completely different in feel, plot and character.
There's very little that's truly original. My book Jessica Haggerthwaite: Witch Dispatcher concerns a scientific daughter with a mum who's a New Age witch. Jessica had alreaady been published when I opened a Sunday magazine to find an interview with a New Age Witch and her extremely non-witchy daughter - although I think the daughter wanted to be a solicitor rather than a scientist.
What a fab post - you are so right, this must happen all the time but it's a real panic moment when you realise that someone else 'thought of it first'. A similar thing happened to me recently over the title of my forthcoming book 'Buttercup Magic' and my discovery that a book had just come out called 'Buttercup Mash'! Thankfully, these are two very different books, and unlike me, the publisher didn't going into panic mode!
I remember DWJ telling me (though I think she said the idea was T. Pratchett's) that these coincidences were the result of subatomic particles called "ideons" that stream through the universe, striking writers in quick succession.
Also, very often things just seem to be floating around in the air...a few years back, there were about four novels about Noah and his ark from various bods. All quite different from one another. Very interesting post!
Ooh, Nicky, which Nicky are you? I was going to say that my City of Masks came out about a week after Cornelia Funke's The Thief Lord, also set in Venice and then there was a whole slew of them.
And Marcus Sedgwick told nme he delayed writing his Kiss of Death because of City of Mask, so it cuts both ways.
I have always firmly believed in TP's ideons = inspiration particles notion.
There is no other possible explanation. But I think it might be worth letting the gods in our world idea rest for a bit. What with Neil Gaiman's Americon Gods, DWJ's Eight Days of Luke and Douglas Adams' Thor I think we should all leave it a while!
Great post, John. I firmly believe in TP's ideons too. I've noticed that there are books on a similar theme every year, but thankfully, and luckily, they have mainly had a very different take on the theme.
Ideons definitely exist, and for more than book ideas. I'm also a believer in what might be called word-ions. That's when you come across a word entirely new to you, and then hear it or read it three times in the next week! Great post, John - and I'm incredibly envious that you actually met the great Diana herself.
My son definitely enjoyed Percy Jackson all the more for having read Zeus on the Loose first! I'm sure the ideons thing is exactly what Jung identified as the collective unconscious evidenced by the similarity of myths and legends from around the world.
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“It gets adopted by the floor.”
YES!!! How wonderful.
Wow!! What a good idea for an activity.
That boy will go far!!
Nice idea and nice post!
Sounds like it was a great session, John. It's a lovely school to visit!
I love the idea of using bubbles!
Thanks for a fantastic visit, John. We loved having you! Haste ye back :-)
Fantastic! It just goes to prove what I've always known - you're never too old (or too cool) for bubbles.
Nice one.
Wonderful! What that whole story taught/reminded me is that older kids, who may exude "teenage cool" are actually just the same as all of us: we like to be children again, to do something fun and easy and different, something relaxing.
Thanks, John.