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As I have mentioned before in ‘When We Were Little’ posts (here and here) we lived for a time in England when I was little. Rupert the bear was another of the English characters that is indelibly linked to my memories of our time there. I still have a copy of a Daily Express Rupert Annual, which I think was given to me one Christmas.

Having now done some research into the Rupert story, I am blown away by the endurance of this ever-so-English little bear.

Rupert Bear first appeared in 1920 in the Daily Express comic strips by Mary Courtel. In an incredible feat of longevity for the world of the print media, the Rupert Bear strips continue to this day. The artist has changed several times, and one of the most significant storytellers and artists responsible for Rupert was Alfred Bestall, who held the reins from 1935 to 1974. Each year, a Rupert Annual is published, and my copy is the 1981 hardcover edition.

One of the most distinctive aspects of the Rupert stories is the story-telling format. This is not a regular cartoon comprising pictures and speech bubbles. A complete Rupert story is told over several pages of an Annual. Each page consists of a simple heading and four or five illustrations, and the illustrations are captioned by four pairs of verse. At the bottom of each page, a paragraph of prose repeats the story again, which means that the story can actually be read on four levels.

As a reader, it’s a slightly unnerving format, and the verse is often slightly ‘off’. But it is interesting - and means that children of different ages can enjoy the story. These days the first thing I think of is what a nightmare this must be to copywrite and edit - how restrictive must those word limits for each written element be…

Rupert himself is said to epitomise traditional British public school values. He lives in an idyllic English village and, with his friend Bill the Badger, has a series of unexpected  magical adventures. With their gorgeously distinctive outfits and occasionally their leather rucksacks, Rupert and Bill always get home safely to Mrs Bear, who never seems the slightest bit perturbed by their adventures.

Clearly, the character of a newspaper comic who has been around for nearly ninety years is iconic. Paul McCartney’s inspiration for the song ‘We All Stand Together’ (

My copy of Katie has lost it’s dust jacket and is falling apart- it has been very well loved.

Written by Richenda and David Martin and published in 1974 it is based on the true story of the authors black and white kitten named Katie.

‘Mr and Mrs Dodds lived in the Australian countryside with their son, Ian. Mr Dodds wrote books and Mrs Dodds taught in the little bush school. In summer the big wide shady veranda of their house was also the schoolroom.’

Ian is given a kitten one day by the post mistress in their small town and he calls her Katie. She is a tabby cat with a white bib and four white socks plus a white tip on the end of her tail. Katie likes to snuggle in warm cosy places and one morning when Mr Dodds is getting ready for a trip to the big city Katie falls asleep in his suitcase.

 And so the story goes; poor Mr Dodds is stuck in the big city with a kitten in his case and a meeting with his editor imminent and meanwhile back at home Ian, his mother and the school children are frantically searching for the cat.

Silly Mr Dodds tries the police station to get some help with the kitten and then he can’t get a hotel room because the town is full ‘…on account of the big cattle sales this week’ In the end, alls well as he leaves the kitten with a friends family, attends his meeting and eventually takes Katie home to the country.

Although this was a cute story I have realised that is the illustrations that really make this picture book special. The story is quite long, and a little strange but it is Noela Young’s gorgeous illustrations of this curious little kitten that I fell in love with ‘when I was little’ and fell in love with again now. Some stories and characters I remember vividly from childhood and I have found that that is also true with illustrations.

This illustration of Katie the kitten asleep in a dolls pram with paws wrapped around a dolls bottle is one that I absolutely remember fondly.

Noela Young also illustrated the classic Muddle-Headed Wombat series of books written by Ruth Park. Katie is now out of print.

There were so many comments on Katie’s When We Were Little Post about Judith Kerr’s The Tiger Who Came to Tea. Everybody remembers that book with so much fondness.

There is an amazing museum in the UK called Seven Stories that is devoted to children’s literature and the latest exhibition is of Judith Kerr’s work.

Although I’m not planning a trip to the UK any time soon - unfortunately! Seven Stories is a lovely website to visit for anyone who loves children’s books.

The detail in this beautiful screen print of an original papercut called a Squirrel Village instantly reminded me of the lovely posts Katie has done in the past of Need a House? Call Ms. Mouse and the Alison Uttley books. 

Artist Cindy Mindy Pindy has some beautiful work in her Etsy store here.

The Tiger Who Came to Tea is one of those books that I don’t recall having on my bookshelf as a child, but it nevertheless made a big impression on me and I remember it very fondly. It has been on my mental wishlist for ages, and when some colleagues gave me a bookstore gift voucher before I went on maternity leave last month, I used it to buy two picture books. One had to be a beautiful hardback edition of this book.

Rowan is into tigers in a big way at the moment - he is obsessed with David Attenborough documentaries - so we have both loved reading this book together.

A little girl called Sophie opens the door one day to find a big, furry, stripey tiger on her doorstep. When the tiger asks if he can join them for tea, Sophie’s mummy invites him in. But the tiger turns out to be very, very hungry - he not only eats all the food and drink on the tea table but proceeds to raid the kitchen, eating all the food on the stove, in the fridge, and even all the water from the taps.

Eventually the tiger leaves, and Sophie and her mummy are left to figure out what to do - there is nothing for supper and Sophie can’t even have a bath because all the water has been drunk from the taps…

First published in 1968, The Tiger Who Came to Tea is gloriously old-fashioned. Taking place in the days of the milkman and the grocery boy, it is a time when daddy’s supper was prepared in time for his arrival home and going out for dinner was practically unheard of. I love Sophie and her mummy’s outfits; Sophie’s purple pinafore and checkerboard tights are perfect!

I think one of the reasons I loved this book was the fact that it presented elements of fantasy as real. The scenario of a tiger appearing at the door appears perfectly reasonable, as is the idea that the water can be drunk from the taps. When Sophie and her mummy go to the supermarket to replenish supplies, they make sure that they buy a big tin of tiger food. What else do you buy in case a tiger were to stop by?!

The text is beautifully understated - I especially love the page showing the family walking down the High Street on their way out to supper. You can tell how special the outing is to Sophie, how rare it is for her to be out in the street after dark…

So they went out in the dark, and all the street lamps were lit, and all the cars had their lights on, and they walked down the road to a cafe.

Judith Kerr also wrote the series of picture books about Mog the cat, and I only realised tonight that she was author of a young adult novel that I dearly loved, When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit. If you are familiar with her books, you should definitely read this lovely interview with Judith published in the Telegraph.

||The Tiger Who Came to Tea is available from Amazon||

A guest post by one of our favourite bloggers, Scribbler, founder and writer extraordinaire of the utterly fabulous blog called Vintage Kids’ Books My Kid Loves. She is mum to a 4-year-old aficianado of vintage kids’ books.

I’ve loved books my whole life. Children’s picture books in particular, and if you read my blog, you know I sort of went nuts after I had my son… obsessively collecting books for him that I’d had as a child and ones I wished I’d had. I don’t remember exactly which Molly Brett title was my first… I just remember an American childhood filled with her books and illustrations. Wonderful little worlds inhabited by cuddly animals and fairies. Adorable wooded scenes with teddy bears and squirrel babies. A moss-covered wonderland where salamanders lead pet snails around on leashes. Owls wear top hats. Where children’s toys are in cahoots with sparrows. And frogs shop for sausage links. All the sorts of things little girls imagine to be happening right outside their bedroom windows when they are just out of ear shot.

A native of Surrey, England, Molly’s mother was a painter of animals, so although Molly had no training, she was a natural at creating the stories so many children around the world came to love. Under her publisher, The Medici Society of London, she produced 21 books and countless illustrations for greeting cards and prints before her death at 88 years old in 1990.

I spent hours and hours of my youth, poring over these intriguing tales, then would close my eyes at night and wish and pray they were real. Oh, what I would have given to be invited to an animal tea party! One of my favorite stories from this book in particular is called “The New Policeman” and involves a mess of sweet forest animals driving around in toy cars:

Fuzzy Hedgehog felt rather lonely as he scuttled through the wood, for the other animals found him too prickly to play with, although he longed for friends and to join in all that went on around him. Just then he saw a notice on an oak tree which said—‘Nest Builders and Hole Holders are asked to a Meeting to discuss the Dangers of Traffic on Winding Way.’

Well, one thing leads to another, and one can only imagine how proud Fuzzy must’ve felt when he received his policeman’s helmet and set to work making the traffic right. Delightful! If I remember correctly, most of her books were made up of a series of stories, each with one illustration in color and then sketches on the type-page in black and white.

There is lots of Beatrix Potter on these pages, and one has to assume Molly grew up studying her books. There’s just something about the English countryside that breeds this sort of enchantment. Brett… Potter… Milne. The landscapes and gardens are ripe for one’s imagination to pick. A medley of trickling brooks and sparkling skies. Shadows and toadstools and beds of leaves hidden beneath shady branches. Really, I could wax poetic for a lifetime about these amazing people who brought the magic of England all the way across the pond to my own little bewitching corner of the globe. South Carolina might be a world away from Surrey, but to my childish heart, we were all living in the same hundred-acre wood.

A guest post by Sarah, mum to Neve, Cissy and Jemima

There is a lot of talk amongst parents about learning to read and reading dutifully to the kids every night – so much so you would think it had all become just another chore! Many experts agree that children need to hear a lot of stories before they can learn to read. But there are other much better reasons to read to the children every day… because it is fun, because you get special time together and because these moments are the stuff of wonderful memories. I think that When we were little Sunday is all about the specialness of these moments – even more than being about the books, it is about those shared times that make me remember being little and the important people in my life who read to me.

And with that in mind I want to talk about a book which I have never seen in a bookshop – have never been able to source secondhand and have never seen in a books in print list. (I know because I have tried to obtain a copy numerous times.)

It is The Story of Horace, retold and illustrated by Alice M Coats. My Grandma bought this book at the Presbyterian Bookroom in Collins St, Melbourne, sometime in the 70s (there is a sticker in the front).

The Story of Horace is about a family:

There was -
Great-Grandpa,
Great-Grandma,
Grandpa,
Grandma,
Pa,
Ma,
Paul
and little Lulu.
And with them lived Horace.

Horace was a bear!

One day Pa went out hunting.

And on the way back, he was met by – Great Grandma, Grandpa, Grandma, Ma, Paul and little Lulu.

And they all said, “What do you think has happened?”
And Pa said,
“What HAS happened?”
And they said;- “Horace has eaten GREAT-GRANDPA!”

And Pa was just WILD,
and he said,
“I will KILL Horace!”

But they all took on so,
he hadn’t the heart to do it.

And you can all guess what happens next….

Horace eats his way through Great Grandma, Grandpa, Grandma, Ma, Paul and Little Lulu until it is Pa’s turn. Believe it or not when it is only Pa and Horace left…

And Pa was just WILD,
and he said,
“I will kill you Horace!”
But HORACE took on so -

he hadn’t the heart to do it.

And the next day HORACE went out hunting.

Really it is a terrible story which to begin with just plain terrified me. But it inevitably became a favourite amongst all of my cousins, my brother and I. Sleepovers at grandma’s had to be accompanied by the bloodthirsty Horace. I think this had a lot to do with the way Grandma would read it. The fantastic repetition of the story, no matter how gruesome, made it truly entertaining. Every time Pa came back from his various hunting exploits, he was greeted by one less family member, and every time they would say “What do you think has happened?” I just love the fact that he never could guess!

We all loved it so that on her 90th birthday Grandma read it for us, whilst my uncle videoed it for posterity (sorry didn’t have time to convert it so I could post it here - but it was a legendary performance!) This book brings with it so many memories of my lovely Grandma, it will always be super special. As you can see from the pictures, I am the lucky custodian of the family copy of this book.

A guest post by Nicci D, mum to Nuwan aged 2.

Whenever I asked my dad to read me a bedtime story, he often chose Badjelly the Witch by Spike Milligan. I remember feeling delighted and anxious, both at once, at his choice: delighted because I knew Daddy would soon be chuckling once again at Milligan’s dark humour, and anxious because I found the story quite frightening – enough to give me nightmares.

Badjelly is a fairy story about Tim and Rose, who lived with their Mummy and Daddy in a big log cabin made from wood trees. When Lucy their cow went missing, Tim and Rose went looking for her, even though this meant heading into the dark forest, braving the trouser robbers and, ultimately, being captured by Badjelly the baddest witch in the world. In the end, they all lived happily ever after (except Badjelly, of course), but I was always relieved to hear this, no matter how many times I heard the story.

Milligan includes all the details that were important to the six-year-old me: what colour Rose’s hair was; how thick the trees were in the forest (as thick as Tim and Rose’s teacher’s legs at school); and what sort of wallpaper was in the bedrooms of Binkle-bonk the goblin’s house. At the same time, his pen-and-ink illustrations leave enough space for a child’s imagination to run wild – which mine did for several days and nights after each reading.

Milligan wrote Badjelly in 1973 (my lovely hardback copy still carries its price-tag of $3.20!) for his own children. Although quite long for a picture book, it is handwritten by the author, and I was as fascinated by the quirky lettering as by the illustrations. When the tin lion says ‘Roar! Roar!’ (then ‘Squeak!’ because he’s rusty from sleeping in the rain), Milligan’s lettering really seems to Rooarr. And when Dingle the mouse warns Tim and Rose to run away if they see Badjelly, even the word ‘her’, underlined and annotated, still sends chills down my spine.

Badjelly’s significance in my world seemed to be heightened by the fact that it mentioned God (‘just then God came along’). This occurred in such a different context to most ‘God’ references that I wasn’t sure what to think, but it provided the opportunity for some wide-ranging discussions with my dad! (When an audio version of Badjelly was made in 1975, the BBC removed God from the story because God appeared to have been placed on the same level as goblins.)

My childhood wouldn’t have been quite the same without Badjelly, and I’m planning on introducing it to my son once he’s at school. Perhaps we’ll read it first in the afternoon, before it gets ‘very dark-and-night-time’.

(By the way, for dedicated Playschool watchers like me, Spike Milligan also wrote the poem ‘On the Ning Nang Nong’…)

||Badjelly is still available from Amazon||

Robin Klein is indelibly linked with my memories of primary school years. The school ballot for Children’s Book Council Book of the Year Awards, waiting lists for books at our library, and swapping favourite books with my friends - all these aspects of my late primary school years feature Robin Klein’s books. 

Klein’s series of Penny Pollard books stand out as being some of my favourite books of primary school, starting with Penny Pollard’s Diary. It’s written in the irresistable style of a diary by 10-year-old Penny, who hates pink, loves horses and is definitely not the teacher’s pet. Penny meets the equally idiosyncratic Mrs Edith Bettany (’Mrs B’) on a school excursion to an old people’s home, and this first book follows the development of their friendship. There are some fabulously funny passages as the two swap stories.

Mrs B told me she used to have a carpet snake for a pet when she was my age and lived in the bush. Wow! Next to a horse, a snake would be the best pet ever! Told Mrs Bettany about when I was in kindergarten and I wanted a pet snake and mum kept saying Santa might bring one. And that Christmas I found a stupid big patchwork stuffed snake under Christmas tree. Mrs Bettany agreed it must have been a terrible disappointment. I told her about trying to flush patchwork snake down loo only it wouldn’t fit. She said when she lived in the bush they kept a stick to kill real snakes with next to their loo because it was miles down backyard. Told her there weren’t miles any more, only kilometres.

Mrs B appreciates Penny’s taste for double-headed lime Interplanteary Missiles from the milkbar and in turn Penny learns about how different - and how similar - life was growing up in the 1920s. And unexpectedly, both gain much from their unusual friendship. The feelings of not always living up to expectations and of being a bit different to everyone else are concepts that most primary school kids can relate to, and I think it is this aspect that my friends and I all loved so much in Robin Klein’s writing.

The diary is made to look ‘real’ with sketch drawings, photos and hand-drawn maps - all annotated by Penny. The illustrations are actually by Ann James, who does an amazingly convincing job. The original design is an exercise book-sized production, and the cover design graffiti no doubt inspired my own secret diary cover which I started in Grade 5 (and which I surprisingly managed to find this evening… The big question is: where is the key?!).

For some reason, the Penny Pollard books went out of print for many years, and I remember when working in bookshops being asked for them many, many times. They were thankfully re-issued by Hachette Australia in 2004 - but unfortunately (in my opinion) the format was not retained and they are now regular sized mass market paperbacks. As I had only borrowed copies when I first read them, I felt very lucky when I found the first two books from the series at the Lake Daylesford Book Barn a few years ago. Just a couple more books that I will treasure…

I learn something new about my favorite books from childhood every time I do this post. I had no idea that Evaline Ness the author/illustrator of Sam, Bangs and Moonshine was married to US Treasury Agent Eliot Ness - famous for being the leader of the Untouchables and adversary of Al Capone.

The book Sam, Bangs and Moonshine, Ness wrote in 1966 and she won the Caldecott Medal for it in 1967. It is the story of Sam (Samantha) who lives with her father a fisherman and cat called Bangs. Sam’s mother is dead and she has developed a penchant for making up stories, or Moonshine as her father calls them and he warns her that she needs to ‘talk REAL not MOONSHINE. MOONSHINE spells trouble.’

‘Not even the sailors home from the sea could tell stranger stories than Sam. Not even the ships in the harbor, with curious cargoes from giraffes to gerbils, claimed more wonders than Sam did. She said her mother was a mermaid, when everyone knew she was dead. Sam said she had a fierce lion at home, and a baby kangaroo.’

It is her little friend Thomas to whom she tells the most Moonshine sending him on missions all over their village looking for her made up kangaroo, he believes every word she says. On one particularly perilous day by the sea, Sam sends Thomas directly into danger with another story about her fictitious kangaroo. 

At this point the story becomes really powerful and while re reading it recently I instantly recalled the feelings that it conjured up for me as a child. I know exactly how little Sam feels as she worries intensely for her friend who she has put in danger because of her Moonshine, it’s the same feeling I can still get as an adult when you have unintentionally done something that may hurt someone else. Sam really suffers, hoping and waiting to see if her friend can be rescued and also craving her fathers forgiveness.

This is not a story that revolves around the moral, it’s not purely about the pitfalls of telling untruths it’s a story about love, understanding, imagination and forgiveness.

Along with the powerful text Ness is also an amazing illustrator. Using only a colour palette of blacks and greys with splashes of bronze in her paintings she creates an amazing atmosphere for this story. There is no glamour in this book, the illustrations accurately portray a fishing village, slightly dreary and cold.

Ness is also amazing in her portraiture and capturing her characters emotions. In one illustration in particular where Sam in crying there is such a mix of  pain, sadness and relief in her expression and body language that it is just heart breaking to look at.

Although I know there has often been debate about this books worthiness of a Caldecott, I would go as far as to say I believe it is one of the most beautiful and important picture books ever written.  It has certainly left it’s mark on me.

My mum has a fabulous games cupboard, where she keeps a lot of the toys and games we had when my sisters and I were little. Rowan is gradually discovering some of the 1970s and 80s gems to be found in there on his Fridays at Nanou’s.

When I went to pick up Rowan a couple of weeks ago, they had out some of the playing cards I remember from my childhood. I’d forgotten how many of these had a book-related theme to them. 

So, a bit of a tangential ‘When We Were Little’ post from me this week, here are some photos of a few cards from each of these gorgeous card sets.

Noddy Snap cards

Babar Happy Families (love how these connect to make a frieze scene)

Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five Adventures game

Little Grey Rabbit Counter game (see my previous post on Little Grey Rabbit)

Racey Helps Woodland Happy Families

The feeling you get when you revisit toys and games of your childhood is very special, and very hard to describe, but I’m really glad that these card games have been preserved for Rowan to love too.

This book was one of my very favorite books from childhood and I remember it vividly…

Whistle For Willie is about Peter, a little boy who really wants to learn to whistle his very long sausage dog - Willie. It is such a simple story but it meant so much to me, as it has to millions of other children since its publication in 1964. And still now I am just in love with Keats.

Just like Sesame Street did, Ezra Jack Keats and his picture books opened up a whole different world to me. I learnt about big cities on the other side of the world, urban landscapes that I had not experienced but they fascinated me.

The illustrations in this book are as vivid as my memories of it. The colours are loud and happy, the sky bright blue and the pavements gritty grey. There is funky graffiti on the streets and gorgeous 60s floral wallpaper on Peter’s walls at home. Keats used a spectacular technique of blending gouache watercolour with collage in his illustrations that gives the book an illusion of texture.

I don’t remember ever questioning  the fact that Peter is an African American child and I was interested to find this quote by Keats on his Foundation website…

“…None of the manuscripts I’d been illustrating featured any black kids—except for token blacks in the background. My book would have him there simply because he should have been there all along. Years before I had cut from a magazine a strip of photos of a little black boy. I often put them on my studio walls before I’d begun to illustrate children’s books. I just loved looking at him. This was the child who would be the hero of my book.”

Peter is every child; he struggles with learning to whistle, he plays, he skips and he explores. His enthusiasm and joyfulness in life is infectious and irrepressible. His expressions and his movements are just delightful and just looking at this book makes me want to give him a big kiss.

This animation of Whistle For Willie was filmed in 1965.

Whistle For Willie was the second book written by Keats about Peter, the first being The Snowy Day for which he won the Caldecott Medal. The Snowy Day is also gorgeous; for me imagining a city covered in snow is still a dream and of course this book also taught me the art of making snow angels. Peter goes on to feature in four other books growing up to be a teenager. You can see that lucky Katie found a second hand copy of Goggles starring Peter in this photo from her loot at Booktown. The Keats books are actually hard to find in Aus.

There is a beautiful clip from a film made about Keats on the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation website. Watching it brought me to tears today as I discovered so much about the man who created these amazing stories from my childhood. Overwhelmingly what comes from this piece and the rest of the information on the website is that Keats just adored children. Although he never had a family of his own he respected children and really believed that all children have a place in the world and should be loved and treated well.

On this Mothers’ Day I feel very lucky to have had a mother and grandmother who instilled such a love for reading and literature in me. I know that I want the same for Ned and the best way to do that? I think I’ll share some stories about Peter with him.

||The Snowy Day is currently available from our online store||

||Ezra Jack Keats Foundation Website||

This unassuming collection of stories and poems made a disproportionately big impression on me when I was little. I spent many, many hours reading Ward Lock’s Book of First Stories. You can tell how loved it was by the split spine and dog-eared pages, and my sister Jane confirmed tonight that she loved it just as much, 10 years after me.

The book is designed to be a first collection of stories and poems designed for 2- to 7-year-olds. Ward Lock was a British publisher, established in the 1850s and eventually bought out by Penguin, but not before this book was published in 1975. It includes classic fairy tales like The Three Little Pigs and The Little Red Hen, and other stories and poems that I haven’t seen in any other collections. My favourites were ‘The 621 Friends of Aaron Zee’ by Ann Tompert and ‘I Went to the Zoo in the Rain’ by Betty Lacey. As a mum, I think I sometimes underestimate the appeal of collections of short stories and veer towards single volume picture books. But revisiting this book reminds me how much I loved this format myself.

What holds this collection together and shines brightly through it even today are the illustrations by June Goldsborough. Her artwork has a distinctive 70s style, and I love the details of the hairstyles, clothes and interiors. Lots of pinks and oranges and purples wash the pages with the look of that era too.

Pixigenné, who makes the most beautiful decoupage suitscases for Mahar Drygoods, made an exquisite tear-drop case using some of June Goldsborough’s illustrations. Check out her whole Flickr set for some equally amazing productions using children’s picture books. Sometimes I justify buying a particularly damaged edition of a picture book by my intentions to use the illustrations for some sort of decoupage project - but I can never bring myself to take out the scissors!

There are more examples of June Goldsborough’s picture book illustrations viewable on Flickr.

The idea of living and surviving in a world without adults has always been popular with children. Imagining doing your own things, eating whatever you want to, going to bed whenever you want; it’s all so appealing to children when they feel that their lives are dominated by rules and adults. The theme has hence has been used many times in children’s literature and film and television.

My favorite story of a self-sustainable child was always Pippi Longstocking, first published in 1945; the gorgeous red headed Swedish nine year old.

‘She had no mother or father, which was actually quite nice, because it meant that no one could tell her that she had to go to bed just when she was having most fun. And no one could make her take cod liver oil when she would rather eat sweets.’

Pippi is fun, warm, loyal and unusual. She is financially independent because she owns a suitcase of gold pieces. She can shoot a revolver and sail on the seven seas. She can carry a horse, outsmart burglars, she owns a monkey and she can outlift the strongest man in the world. Her house is Villa Villekulla and her friends are her neighbours; brother and sister Tommy and Annika.

Apart from being an outrageously fun character Pippi also has always represented to me a strong female role model. Although it has been noted that author Astrid Lindgren did not intend Pippi to have a feminist agenda, I do have to attribute to Pippi my love of strong female characters in my reading. Pippi is not pretty, she’s tough and acts on impulse, some may call her a tomboy and as a somewhat shy child I relished and admired all her qualities.

‘The light from inside the house fell all around her. There she stood with her red plaits sticking straight out. She was wearing her pappa’s nightshirt, which dragged around her feet. In one hand she held the pistol and in the other the sword. She used the sword to present arms.’

Pippi has been translated into 91 languages and in 2007 was published with illustrations by the beautiful Lauren Child. In that edition Lauren had this to say about Pippi…

‘I suppose the real key to Pippi is that she is an entirely free spirit; she is a girl who is both exciting and funny, refreshing to encounter even after all these years.’

There is also a really lovely illustrated collection of the three Pippi books illustrated by Michael Chesworth.

You can stay at Astrid Lindgren world and there is an online shop where I thought this little skirt was pretty cute …

The largest prize for services to children’s literature in the world has been named in Astrid Lindgren’s memory (Lindgren died in 2002). It is awarded to a body of work by authors, illustrators, storytellers or promoters of reading. Australia’s Sonya Hartnett received the award in 2008.

While writing this post I have been thinking about the other strong female characters that shaped my world. Here are some I came up with but I’d love to hear about the female characters in others’ lives.

The Paper Bag Princess - Robert N. Munsch - Princess Elizabeth is the ultimate in strong characters. I couldn’t resist the fact that she tells the prince where to go. Who needs an ungrateful Prince who only wants you when you look pretty?

Judy Woolcot - Seven Little Australians -  This novel first published in 1894 absolutely devastated me and I have never ever forgotten it. Judy and her six brothers and sisters have a violent and distant father and a step mother who has no idea what to do with them. Although Judy often inspires mischief in her siblings she is also incredibly strong willed and protective.

Matilda - Roland Dahl - I have already mentioned that I loved the Matilda movie version. Matilda is smart and incredibly patient, especially with her horrible parents. In classic Dahl style he gives Matilda, the child, all the power in this book.

My introduction to Australian poetry was via this volume of verse by one of Australia’s most famous poets, C.J.Dennis.

C.J.Dennis was a turn of the century writer - and was most famous for his verse novel, The Songs of the Sentimental Bloke, published in 1916 - one of the highest selling verse novels ever published in Australia.

C.J.Dennis’s poetry for children, A Book for Kids, was published some years later. He and his wife had no children of their own, but he wrote his first story for children for a friend’s son who was in hopsital.

My volume contains 16 of the poems, and when I read them now, I can hear them being recited in my mum and dad’s voices. There must have had many, many readings… There is definitely a sense of nationalism that comes through the verse, and I imagine this is one of the things that made the poetry of C.J.Dennis so popular at the time.

One of my favourites was The Triantiwontigongolope:

There’s a very funny insect that you do not often spy,
And it isn’t quite a spider, and it isn’t quite a fly;
It is something like a beetle, and a little like a bee,
But nothing like a woolly grub that climbs upon a tree.
Its name is quite a hard one, but you’ll learn it soon, I hope.
So, try:
           Tri-
                     Tri-anti-wonti-
                                 Triantiwontigongolope. 

The illustrations are by Lee Whitmore. I adored the colourful artwork and all the little details. I must have spent many hours looking at the cover itself, as when I look at it now, I almost feel like I have been to that fun-fair, and slid down that slippery-dip!

Like Lou showed last week, with her fabulous illustration of Clifford, one of my artistic endeavours was inspired by this book. I did my own version of an illustration of The Dawn Dance - very strongly influenced by Lee Whitmore’s version - for a melamine Pictureplate in 1984…

There is no other series that transports me instantaneously to my childhood like that of Beatrix Potter.

My main BP memory is of being tucked up in bed at my grandparents’ house, in flannelette sheets and with a feathered pillow and eiderdown. My Papa is reading me and my sister one of the small format Beatrix Potter books…

Once upon a time there were four little Rabbits, and their names were––
Flopsy,
Mopsy,
Cotton-tail,
and Peter.
They lived with their Mother in a sand-bank, underneath the root of a very big fir-tree.

Papa had a unique storytelling style, and he used lots of dramatic tonal variation in his renditions of these stories. Sometimes he would make up new narrative and dialogue. (I remember that I would get quite annoyed when he did this – I just wanted him to read the story ‘properly’!) But what is obvious to me now is that he got an enormous amount of joy from reading these books to us.

A little shelf of the Peter Rabbit books were kept on a dresser in the room that we always stayed in at my grandparents’ house. As much as I remember being read the stories, I also remember reading the books myself, selecting different volumes from that little shelf.

Mum later told me that BEFORE these books were at my grandparents’ house, they lived at my mum’s grandmother’s house. By my calculations this makes them at least 50-odd years old. First read by my mum and her sisters, then by me, my sisters and cousins, this is one well-loved set of books.  

After my Nana died, just 6 days after Rowan was born, my Mum passed on to Rowan the set of books, still enclosed in the same set of shelves.

So Rowan is now the lucky guardian. At some stage, we will have to see if we can get some preservation work done on the books - undoing the well-intentioned scars of sticky tape. Hopefully we can ensure they last long enough to be passed on to his grandchildren too. 

Beatrix Potter first self-published The Tale of Peter Rabbit in 1901, based on a story she’d written in a letter to the five-year-old son of her governess. In that story she invented an exquisite and believable world of animal characters and the stories of their interactions with human characters. She broke many conventions of her time, and – I think – she inspired many other great pieces of children’s literature. The first book was later picked up by publisher Frederick Warne & Co, and by the end of 1902, 28,000 copies were in print. It’s hard to believe, but a soft toy of Peter Rabbit was produced just a year later, in 1903, which makes Peter the oldest known licensed character!

The joy of Peter Rabbit lives on - there are countless editions of the series now, in every available format. For me, it represents the most timeless children’s series of them all. It seems like perfect reading for the lead-up to Easter, and I will be sharing the tales of Peter Rabbit, the Flopsy Bunnies and Benjamin Bunny with Rowan over the next couple of weeks - and I might not be able to resist an imitation of one of Papa’s dramatic renditions. 

||A selection of Beatrix Potter books and soft toys are available in the We Heart Books store||

Last week I was lucky to be given a copy of one of my favorite Golden Books, The Monster at the End of This Book: Starring Lovable, Furry Old Grover, by Katie and Rowan.

As a child I loved watching Sesame Street, my favorite character was always Grover, and especially his alter ego, Super Grover! The cute little blue monster is excitable, caring and compulsive, perhaps bordering on neurotic (as an adult I can see why I relate to him so well).

Author Jon Stone cleverly makes Grover speak directly to the reader of this little book, capturing the curiosity, suspense and humor of waiting and wanting to see what actually is at the end of the book. Stone was Sesame Street’s first head writer, as well as one of the show’s primary directors and producers for over 24 years.

First published by Golden Books in 1971, The Monster at the End of this Book is illustrated perfectly by Mike Smollin who translates Grover seamlessly into print. His illustrations are simple and distinctly 70s which still makes this book so adorably cool.

This book is a lot of fun to read aloud and perfect for toddlers. As I write this Ned’s dad has just read him the book causing much hilarity, now Ned is reading(!?) the book to himself and trying to emulate the way dad read it with squeals in all the right places.

Grover speaks out of the book to his audience, so they can become involved, each page turned by the reader brings them and Grover closer to the looming Monster at the end.

‘Shhh. Listen, I have an idea. If you do not turn any pages, we will never get to the end of this book. And that is good, because there is a Monster at the end of this book. So please do not turn the page’

There is no real fear in this book of actually finding a Monster. Spoiler Alert - the Monster is actually Grover! The book is more about humor and giving reassurance that the feeling of being a little scared is normal and that mostly what you were afraid of in the first place doesn’t actually eventuate.

It is currently season 37 of Sesame Street and Grover now has a new role as ‘Global Grover’ who introduces children to the world around them, and teaches them to be sensitive and respectful of our differences. The Sesame Workshop website is an amazing resource about everything to do with what, I think, is one of the most important television productions ever made for children.

Reviewed by Carmel Bird in The Age this weekend was a fascinating book called Golden Legacy by Leonard S. Marcus. The book chronicles the publishing phenomenon of Golden Books from the first release in 1942, detailing their criticism and praise as well as including wonderful archival photographs and original artwork. The New York Times review is here, there is also a great review here and the book can be found on Amazon. The customer reviews on Amazon show overwhelmingly just how much people love the Golden series of books.

Must be time for another Golden Book… I recently discovered this book was also a favourite of my mum’s so it pre-dates my 1970s childhood. It was published in 1953. The story and pictures are by Richard Scarry, although this book is very different from his Busy Town and Best Ever Word books. Right now in our house, this is not a bad thing. We are going through a phase when the little person would read our copy of The Big Busy Book of Richard Scarry every storytime, while the big people are a little bit over it…

Rabbit and his Friends tells the tale of a Rabbit who discovers a roly-poly egg outside his hole one day. Thinking it belongs to Mrs Hen, he quickly runs to tell her. But when the egg hatches, they discover it is not a chick, but a very strange animal with a tail and fur coat like their friend the Beaver, webbed feet just like Duck, and who is shy like Squirrel. The other animals all come to meet him, but soon have to rush home to supper, leaving the strange-looking animal (who we can see is a platypus) to fend for himself. The next day, his new friends return, but cannot find him, until they come across a circus and when they are let in, they discover the platypus has a new home - the circus man has asked him to be in his cricus and given him a diving board and swimming pool. And best of all, he has lots of animal friends - and he is a little bit like them all.

Richard Scarry is famous for his anthropomorphic illustrations where animals have human characteristics. The animals in this book have clothes, but are a bit more naturalistic, and less stylised than Scarry’s more famous ones. Perhaps this is because it was one of his earlier books. But a glance at the interpretation of Rabbit shows he is clearly a relative the rabbits of Busy Town.

There is a fascinating side-by-side comparison of a select few pages from a 1963 and a 1991 edition of Richard Scarry illustrations found here. Have a look if you are interested in the decisions made to make the illustrations more politically correct - the comments made to this Flickr site are also interesting.

This lovely blog shows what looks like an earlier edition of Rabbit and his Friends which has some additional illustrations to the my 1977 edition.

There is also a lengthy and slightly tongue-in-cheek biography of Richard Scarry to be found here. It describes the process of illustration Scarry used, drawing them in pencil on frosted acetate and filling in each colour one-by-one.

I will leave the last word of this post to Richard Scarry himself:

I’m not interested in creating a book that is read once and then placed on the shelf and forgotten. I am very happy when people have worn out my books, or that they’re held together by Scotch tape.

This will undoubtedly be true in our house.

Both Katie and I could probably post about every title Pat Hutchins has ever written on our When We Were Little Sundays.  All of her books are classics and I have many favourites from childhood including Good-night Owl and The House That Sailed Away but today I am reminiscing about Don’t Forget the Bacon.

 First published in 1976 this book has Pat’s unmistakable lurid, clashing 1970’s colour pallet. 

A little boy sets of for the store with purse in hand. His mother reminds him of the list of groceries he must buy…

“Six farm eggs, a cake for tea, a pound of pears and don’t forget the bacon”

Off out the door he repeats…

“Six fat legs, a cape for me, a flight of stairs, and don’t forget the bacon”

 Well at least he will remember the bacon, or will he?

 Despite the fact that repetitive picture books often annoy adults, children delight in them. As he heads to the store the things the boy can see confuse his list. Another boy rides past on his bike with a cape billowing behind him and “a cake for tea” becomes “a cape for me”.

To frame the dialogue Hutchins uses speech bubbles and thought clouds, which for the time of publication was an innovative way to display text in a picture book. The bubbles are a wonderful way to show children when there is dialogue between characters and the clouds for when the boy s trying to remember his list.

Pat Hutchins has said that she has always tried  “to write about what children say and do” and in Don’t Forget the Bacon she has created a simple story that both children and adults can relate to. And who can resist those cool 70’s illustrations? 

If you’d like to have a look through the book you can see inside on the brilliant Harper Collins US website.

My copies of these two books show the tell-tale signs of love: dog-eared covers and well-thumbed pages. The distinctive style of writing and the simple line illustrations bring back memories of weekend projects making minty lemonade ice-blocks, pomander balls (from oranges and cloves), and estimating the hours to sunset by lining my fingers in the space between the setting sun and the horizon.

My Practical Puffins were Smells: things to do with them and Out in the wilds: how to look after yourself, but other titles included the evocative Body tricks, Strange things and Cover-ups. They were kind of like the Dangerous Book for Boys of their era.

For me, while these books were practically oriented, they opened my eyes to new worlds. And in a way that may not even have been intended by their authors, they made me imagine - dreaming up experiments and adventures.

Later, when studying publishing, and reading Hilary McPhee’s memoir, Other People’s Words, I learned how important this series was in the history of children’s publishing - in Australia and beyond. It was nice to feel part of the generation of children who were the audience for this unique and novel publishing project.

The series was written and produced by Hilary McPhee and Diana Gribble, founders of the independent Melbourne-based publishers McPhee Gribble who went on to first publish some significant Australian writers, including Tim Winton, Sally Morrison and Helen Garner.

The concept for the books was to create practical books for young children, and the approach was, surprisingly, revolutionary at the time:

speak directly to children as if they were autonomous and sensible, capable of making up their own minds, likely to be imaginatively engaged if the projects were good ones, bored if they weren’t (from Other People’s Words).

The concept and its execution were incredibly successful and by the time the book was in page proofs, the books had large orders from the US, UK and Canada. The first printing for the initial six books was an impressive 585,500 copies. In all, it’s estimated that the series sold three million copies around the world. The series became the source of cash flow for McPhee Gribble that supported their  publishing of new authors. You can only imagine how things might have turned out had this series not been dreamed up, and readily consumed by a generation of children.

We’d love to hear from any readers who remember their own Practical Puffins… Any memorable projects?

Ned and I saw this childhood favorite of mine, Frisk the Unfriendly Foal, last year in a doctors’ waiting room and recently my lovely mum bought it for me (again!) from a wonderful second hand bookshop.

I have always loved horses and they have always been in my life through my mum and my aunt who are both fantastic riders.

Frisk the Unfriendly Foal was first published in 1976. I’m not sure if any others remember this book, please leave a comment if you do, but it seems to be part of a series of books written by Esta de Fossard with photography by Hamworth Bartam and published in Melbourne.  I found illustrations from another of the series on this blog.

The story is about Frisk, a foal who always wanted to do things by himself.

“Who wants friends?” he asked.
“What’s the good of a friend?”

Through visits to a dog, a rabbit, a lizard and a boy, Frisk learns that friends can be very important and that everyone needs some.

“Friends care about each other.
They like each other. To me that seems the most important thing of all.”

I think it was the photography that really excited me about this book as a child. I adored the set up shots that make it look like the animals do actually have the personality and conversations they do in the story.

The photos are very ’70s and probably pretty daggy but still cool in a retro way.

It’s always worth keeping an eye out for those favorites from your childhood in secondhand bookshops and op shops. Frisk has given both mum and I thrill to find.

As soon as I began reading independently I loved to explore the books that my mum had kept from her childhood. These included the Silver Brumby series by Elyne Mitchell, The Billabong series by Mary Grant Bruce and my favorite Bush Christmas by Ralph Smart and M. Cathcart Borer.

This novel was written from the screenplay of the 1947 movie of the same name. The story is classic adventure, five outback children take off after horse thieves days before Christmas hoping to rescue their father’s prized mare. With the help of Nezza, their aboriginal friend, they track the thieves through the mountains, hampering their efforts to get away with the stolen horses.

I loved dreaming about living with these children, riding horses to school, swimming in water holes and best of all chasing horse thieves. Although I had already devoured all the very English Famous Five books, Bush Christmas gave me a taste of a part of Australia that I hadn’t experienced and it was fascinating. The children were so clever and ingenious, they could handle horses and knew all about the bush.
The original movie starred popular Australian star Chips Rafferty and was excellently acted by its young cast. I especially adore the little boy who plays Snow. The film was remade rather badly in 1983 with a very young Nicole Kidman.
You can see a clip of the original film on YouTube.

When my brother and I were little we would help mum decorate the tree in our living room. He had one side to decorate and I had the other, each of us had special ornaments given to us by special people. We would move an armchair to each side and sit bathed in the glow of the lights, listening to the cicadas, smelling the pine and reading our piles of Christmas books.

One of our favorites was and still is The Little Drummer Boy illustrated by Ezra Jack Keats. The text is the original words to the traditional carol originally composed in 1958.

Come they told me, pa rum pum pum pum
A new born King to see, pa rum pum pum pum
Our finest gifts we bring, pa rum pum pum pum
To lay before the King, pa rum pum pum pum,
rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum,

Ezra Jack Keats, who died in 1983, is a favorite in the US particualarly for creating the character of Peter who stared in a whole series of books, including another of my childhood favorites - Whistle for Willie. His illustrations mesmorised me, his use of bold colours that often clashed was fantastic and it’s that style that suits the story of the drummer boy perfectly.

The Little Drummer Boy is still available, also in board book format, and is a really special book to own. I’m just glad that my brother and I still have our original copy and we can now share it with our children.

||The Little Drummer Boy available from Amazon||

||Website of the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation||

This morning I watched a cartoon version of Noddy with Ned - It’s definitely not the same Toyland that I remember. In the 1980s the Noddy books, and in fact all of Enid Blyton’s works were edited to delete any references that were deemed to cause offence.

The cheeky Golliwogs that were in the books were removed because their inclusion was seen to be racist and they have been replaced by a character called Dinah Doll. And of course Noddy and Big Ears no longer sleep in the same bed. I don’t think poor Enid Blyton really meant for those things to be read into the Noddy stories but it seems that all her books have elements that are deemed to be un - PC these days.

Really I think the biggest attraction of Noddy was actually the illustrations and I have never known who they were illustrated by until now. Eelco Martinus ten Harmsen van der Beek was a Dutch artist and really responsible for making Noddy the recognisable character he is today. The appeal of his use of bold, bright primary colours and cute Toyland landscapes and characters is what drew children in, including myself, and obviously still does. When van der Beek died in 1953 his tradition was carried on by five other artists including Robert Tyndall who will be illustrating a new Noddy book to be released next year. The book will be written by Sophie Smallwood, great granddaughter of Enid.

Noddy on television is the longest running character in British history and the books, in various forms, and toys are still hugely popular in most countries.

In a recent article in BBC News Magazine , Phillip Pullman amazing author of The Dark Materials series said this.. ‘Take Swallows and Amazons or Tom’s Midnight Garden and you can read them for the pleasure in the style. There’s no pleasure in reading Enid Blyton’s style. There’s no sense of delight or joy in the language.’

||The Enid Byton Society website||

||The Noddy Website||

When I was little we lived for two years in the UK, and amongst the books of my childhood are many very English books. Ernest Owl Starts a School and Postman Joe are two such books and are part of the Blackberry Farm series by Jane Pilgrim, first published in the early 1950s. They are amazingly timeless stories, and the pen and watercolour illustrations by F. Stocks May are beautifully vibrant. The illustration style is very realistic, and detailed. This accuracy makes the lovely additions of clothes on Mrs Nibble the rabbit, and her children, very charming. (Curiously, the rabbits, squirrels and mice are the only animals who wear clothes, although Ernest the Owl sports spectacles and Postman Joe a satchel.)

The books tell stories of life on the farm which is owned by Mr and Mrs Smiles and their children, Joy and Bob. But the main stars of the show are the animals, which include typical northern hemisphere robins and squirrels as well as the all the usual farm crew.

In a sign of the books’ era, Postman Joe tells the story of the arrival of a new animal to the farm: the Large Red Animal - an animal which breathes out smoke as it crawls along the lane. The illustration shows that this animal is in fact what we know is a tractor. Through the illustration of the family standing proudly around the Large Red Animal, and from the other animals’ reactions, you can immediately relate to the novelty of such a vehicle.

Of course there are plenty of baby animals among the residents of the farm, which is why Ernest Owl decides to start a school. I think Ernest was a very progressive teacher for the 1950s, because he structured his lessons for individual learning needs, and even designed tasks to suit personal motivations of his students: Mary Hen was taught to count marbles so that she could tell how many eggs her mother had laid! And meanwhile the bunnies learnt to write the letters of their names.

I love the way the narrative in these books includes lovely asides. When we are first introduced to Mrs Nibble’s three little bunnies, we are told they had been ‘in bed with the measles, but they would soon be better.’ Jane Pilgrim includes some gorgeous details which make the scenes believable, such as the pot-plants which are used for stools in Ernest’s school.

A few years ago, a collection of the Blackberry Farm stories were re-released in a compendium, The Complete Tales of Blackberry Farm, which is available from Amazon. This format doesn’t seem nearly as nice to hold in your hand - especially a small hand - as the individual volumes, but happily ensures a new generation of children will know and love these characters.