All About Books discussion

1. Have you always loved books? Who, if anyone, in your life has most inspired you to read?

Books were very much a part of my childhood. I was surrounded by books. Friends from school would come home to tea and gawp at the shelves and shelves of books, even though none of my parents' generation were able to go to college or university. My uncle particularly gave over his front room to books, with shelves stacked in parallel lines, filling the room. To a small child it was a wonderland - a personal library to hide in. Everyone in my family got a lot of pleasure from reading, whatever their tastes.

I remember my Dad reading stories to me; Brer Rabbit by Joel Chandler Harris was an especial favourite, with Uncle Remus, also the Just So Stories stories by Rudyard Kipling, and The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. I could never get into the Winnie-the-Pooh books by A.A. Milne, not understanding why the author said "you" to me all the time, and feeling confused and rather frightened by it.

Mum used to read me Milly-Molly-Mandy Stories stories by Joyce Lankester Brisley, and also the Madeline books by Ludwig Bemelmans, and the books about "Orlando the Marmalade Cat" such as Orlando the Marmalade Cat: A Seaside Holiday by Kathleen Hale, all series (and the latter two both picture books) which I could "read" to myself later. I loved a tall picture book called "Neddy the Donkey" which I still have, and "Circus Boy" - a TV spin-off book of stories about "Corky", a circus boy played by the child actor Micky Dolenz (who was later to be cast in a pop group.)

I was one of those children who sat in the corner devouring books, in a world of my own whilst the grownups gossiped, occasionally making a joke about it. As well as stories, I loved the oversized Ward Lock "Wonder Book of..." series, such as "The Wonder Book of Nature" and so on. The "How and Why?" series was another I liked. And the smaller ones, the Ladybird Publishing information books and "Observers' book of..." series, which I used to collect and ask for when I won Scripture Examination prizes.

I had regular comics too, and particularly looked forward to the Tuesday after Easter when our local paper shop had all the comic "annuals" (which I had been told we couldn't afford when they first came out at Christmas) marked down to half price. To me, Easters were more about lots of extra reading than chocolate eggs! Similarly, we always went on holiday to the same little boarding house in Scarborough. Every morning I was given pennies to go to the corner shop and buy comics. What was so special about it, was that the newsagent didn't just stock "Finding Out" or "Judy", which were the comics I had every week at home, but the superhero comics published by D C Comics and Marvel Comics. So I'd buy "Superman", the "Fantastic Four", "Spiderman" and all those fantastic comic strips which I'd been told were too extravagant to buy regularly. Every single day I could buy several new comic books, feeding my ravenous reading appetite, for what seemed to be an endless two weeks in the Summer.

Back at home I had lots of books of my own, which I kept in strict "library order" inventing a system of cataloguing and issuing tickets. All my books were labelled and rubber-stamped with a stamp from my "Polar Bear library" and I fixed a sheet in the front, so that I could date-stamp them. I made tickets for each book, and "Polar Bear Library" library tickets for family members and friends. I liked adventure books mostly, and books about animals and nature.

I went off to the public library on my own, walking through two long parks with my dog, and tying him up outside in the grounds of the library when I got there. The library was evidently once a country house with its own landscaped area. I'd choose books like Little Old Mrs Pepperpot by Alf Prøysen, or ones with more than a hint of magic like Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce, Marianne Dreams by Catherine Storr or Finn Family Moomintroll and all the Moomins series by Tove Jansson. I enjoyed Just William by Richmal Crompton, and liked finding a new series like this, dashing excitedly to the shelves to find another one or two the next time. It never seemed to matter what order I read them in. The School at the Chalet and all "The Chalet School" series by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer was another one I remember, and Lorna Hill's "Sadlers Wells" series, and of course, being a staunch member of the "Famous Five" Club, I raced through The Famous Five Series by Enid Blyton. The book of my own I kept coming back to at home was The Wonderful Birthday, which I felt must have been by her, although now I find it was by Freda M. Hurt.

I remember checking my books out of the library, and taking them outside to read on a bench with my dog. I'd read them very fast and could never understand why they didn't want me to return them for others, and couldn't find them in the issue straightaway! Later on, from the age of 19, I worked in bookshops and the public libraries of various towns and cities for a few years, during a gap in my formal education. (I had left home by then and lived in one room laughingly called a "bedsit" at the time, just scraping by. Thank goodness there were no tempting bank loans or credit cards available in those days!) So a few years later I was to understand exactly why the library assistant used to get so cross when I tried to return books a mere hour after they had been issued!

As a younger teenager though, when the time came for me to be enrolled in the "adults" section, I felt very proud to go through the polished wooden doors to such a hallowed area. I remember the first two books I borrowed, one by Agatha Christie, and the other a book of Sherlock Holmes short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. When I got home for tea (boring grownup people were always coming to tea in our house, which is probably why I liked to sit in the corner and read...) this family friend told me that one of the books was much better than the other - but would not tell me which one!

Partworks had just started to be published, and I was desperate to have one called "Purnell's Encyclopaedia of Animals". It was - and is - simply beautiful with stunning wildlife photographs. Those 6 leatherette encased magazines still sit on my bookshelves, and are the first reference point for any creature we want to find out about. The internet is great for looking most things up, but in my view that encyclopaedia is still the best for wildlife! At the time magazines such as "Knowledge" and "Look and Learn" (both of which the family took) offered binders every so often, but after you had collected about a dozen, the novelty began to wear off, not to mention them taking up a lot of room. "Partworks" with a definite completion in mind were a new idea. They are still very popular, and I've had several since, varying in subject from photography to rocks, but no others have stayed with me like that first one.

Of course at the time it was far too expensive every week - more than the rest of my comics and magazines put together. I had pocket money, but it wasn't much, and I wasn't allowed to spend it on myself anyway. It was for saving, and to buy birthday presents for others with. My parents made Christmas and birthdays a lot of fun for all of us, with lots of presents. At other times Mum with her inspiration and talent made me lots of beautiful clothes out of bits and pieces - and presents were never clothes anyway. We were usually given sweets on Fridays, so all in all I was hardly deprived - it was just a different way of looking at things to have no actual "spending money."

At 13-14 years old I was just old enough to get a paper round. I did - in fact I got 2 (so it was seven days a week) so that I could use part to save up for a new-fangled thing, a tape recorder (spool-to-spool as this was before the days of cassettes) which I was also desperate for, being mad about classical music. I was most definitely not a morning person at that age, and my mother told me she was embarrassed to go to the newsagent to pay for the papers, as I was always at the last minute to do my paper round before school. But I bought my encyclopaedia. And after a couple of years, my parents gave me a bit of money to pay for the final few issues, probably amazed that I had stuck at it for so long. It did teach me that you have to work for the things you want.

I will have to keep my answers to these questions a lot shorter!

2. What was your favourite childhood book?

My favourite book as a child was The Weirdstone of Brisingamen byAlan Garner, which I was thrilled to discover for myself - and also to find that it had sequels. I was hoping that Alan Garner would be as "productive" as the authors whose series I devoured, but of course he was far more imaginative so couldn't churn them out to order. So I just reread it, to capture the magic over again. Oh, may I have two? Because a little earlier there was also Happy Tramp: The Story of a Little Girl and Her Old English Sheep Dog by Muriel Denison. I still have my original copy. Says it all really!

3. Which books do you remember studying at school? Did you enjoy them?

I was never a "straight A's" kind of child. I did love my first class in the Infants school, with its coal fire, frozen bottles of milk heated on the pipes (you even got a biscuit from the teacher if you remembered your penny!) and general cosiness. And the thrill when the teacher put a proper book Janet and John: Here We Go in front of me! At the first parents' evening my Mum and Dad were told that yes, I was getting on very well. No, I wasn't cheeky or naughty, but... (a pause.) I did tend to sit at my desk obsessively organising my pencils and crayons and muttering to myself, "I don't know why we have to do this…"! This was at 5 years old, but perhaps it was a portent.

Although later on I passed the "11-plus", I think it must have been on what they call "natural ability" in English, Maths and those fun logical puzzles, because at the Grammar school I was pretty hopeless at most subjects, except for Music, Art and English. I had loved Primary school with my chosen topics such as prehistoric animals, astronomy, nature study and botany. Here the teaching of subjects seemed so dry and boring. I spent much of my time daydreaming and looking out of the window at the surrounding countryside. Whenever there was "silent reading" of a passage from a textbook in History, Geography, Maths etc., I would be one of the first to finish - with none of the information having been transferred through my eyes to my brain... Answering questions became impossible and I was often the butt of the jokes in class. Occasionally something would capture my imagination, such as when we went on a field trip to some limestone caverns in Derbyshire, and I fell in love with the stalactites. My essay on that was so well researched and illustrated that it earned me an "A" from the Geography teacher, who seemed a bit nonplussed at the failing pupil at the bottom of the set (me) displaying a sudden flair.

Books on Geology suddenly became my passion, though I continued to be bored out of my mind by sheep farming in Australia or a random list of kings and queens of England. Most of my subsequent general knowledge has been gained outside school. The other girls seemed very indulgent in retrospect, seeming to take me on my own terms, accepting that on the inside of my desk lid I had pictures of Rudolph Nureyev and Yuri Gagarin (the astronaut) rather than the pin-ups of pop stars that they did. When our form room was the Music Room, I spent every wet lunchtime that year, answering requests for Mendelssohn's Venetian Gondola Songs, "Santa Lucia" or "La Paloma" and so on, on the piano, while they ogled the boys through the windows - or read their "home readers". (They were very romantic - Beethoven didn't get a look in.) So piano music was also part of my preferred "reading", and miniature orchestral scores too. I used to sit at a desk poring over these, and "playing" the symphony or whatever the score was in my mind.

It was quite a traditional girls' Grammar school until the 6th form (when it went Comprehensive and the double barred doors between the boys' half and the girls' half were unbolted) but in some ways it was quite unusual. There was a six-day week for one thing (on a rota) so that no one teacher/subject would always be on a Friday afternoon. And although it was very academic, not vocation-based, we didn't have homework. The headmistress felt the subjects should be effectively taught within the school times (I don't think many of the teachers can have agreed) and that by the time we needed to put in more study for exams, then it would be up to us, the pupils, to decide how to do it, and how much.

Part of this encouragement of independence was giving us the "home readers" I referred to before, each term. These were two selected novels - usually Victorian or slightly earlier - which we never studied in class, but were expected to read over the term in our own time. To this day, I can never think about Silas Marner by George Eliot without also thinking of Lorna Doone in Two Volumes by R D Blackmore, or Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson without thinking of Ivanhoe by Walter Scott, because they were paired one term! If I stick to the "Literature" lessons, (as English Grammar was taught separately) it's quite varied. Celtic Legends I remember, and stories about Perseus and Jason of the Argonauts The Heroes of Asgard, Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes by Robert Louis Stevenson. We studied one Shakespeare play every year - and I could still tell you the order! I don't remember studying many novels in class. Poetry we tended to study from anthologies such as Palgrave's Golden Treasury until the "O" and "A" Levels, when we studied particular poets (John Keats and John Donne.) One of our texts for "O" Level (GCE - the earlier examination in England which was eventually combined with CSE to form GCSE) was Gavin Maxwell's The Ring Of Bright Water Trilogy. I remember being thrilled because it was a brand new copy, with a beautiful cover, whereas all the school books I'd been issued with before were ancient and tatty clothbound books with many pencilled notes from previous pupils (although we were supposed to rub these out at the end of the academic year.)

By exam time I'd decided my favourite dramatist was George Bernard Shaw. The novelists I studied were H G Wells, Jane Austen and Thomas Hardy. I tended to immerse myself in all their books that I could get hold of - not just the one I was studying - and have been surprised since to find that this is unusual. On the other hand, I sloped off whenever I could to the library to do this, and also to read any novels I was passionate about, such as H G Wells 's SF novels (as opposed to The History of Mr. Polly or Kipps, which I was studying), stories by Arthur C Clarke and Isaac Asimov. Plus those novels of John Wyndham - all of which I still love. I'd read them in a day - or a couple of afternoons when I was usually meant to be somewhere else...

My English teacher that year told my parents how disappointed he was that I didn't go to university to read English, but I was very taken with the idea of Art College (probably partly to do with the 1960's culture, and partly that we had a young, dynamic and trendy Art teacher.) In a way it was a big mistake, as I spent most of the days missing my books! I knew that friends were off at university reading all sort of things; for instance my boyfriend was at Oxford reading philosophy - on the other side of the country - whereas I was stuck hammering, sawing, drilling, and mixing resins and glass all day. (I did Sculpture.)

I escaped after the initial Foundation Course (a year) to "find myself", which I now realise must have been incredibly worrying for my parents. I left home with a valise containing a few of my paints, clothes and my beloved books, just buying a one-way train ticket. They were wise enough not to "forbid" or even advise against it, but gave me a £5 note to hide somewhere, on the understanding that it was not mine to keep or spend, but that I must use it in an emergency, such as needing to get a train ticket back home to them. (I had no car, obviously.) I found a room to rent - a tatty place without even a fridge - the milk had to be kept in the wardrobe - and a job, within a few days. My Dad brought my records, record player and the rest of my books down in his motor-bike and sidecar on a one-day round trip the first weekend, building bookshelves for me without screws in the walls so that I would not get into trouble with the landlord. Mum sent me stamps so that I could write home (there were no mobile phones, no land line where I lived, and call boxes in the street usually had queues outside) and I was perfectly happy with my books and my independence, just going "home" occasionally for Christmas and special birthdays.

My first job was in W. H. Smiths, the booksellers, where the manager was slightly worried that my rent was exactly half what he proposed to pay me. Heating was extra by coins in a meter... He asked if I would be able to manage, to which I replied, of course I could! I just needed a job... So I worked in bookshops at first, to pay my own way, but that wasn't really what I expected either. I seemed to have to spend time dusting the shelves! I did learn where everything was, obviously, and customers were often surprised to find that the young flibbertigibbet had not only heard of the newly published book by Arthur Koestler,The Case of the Midwife Toad, or Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's August 1914, but could tell them exactly where to find it (the bay, the shelf, how many books along...) Counter duty was the best though, in both bookshops and the libraries I worked in after a while. I could sneakily read for myself under the counter! I'd read the books in the shop, and also novels, Roald Dahl and W Somerset Maugham's short stories, children's fantasy books, and works such as Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch and Colin Wilson's The Outsider, both of which impressed me a lot.

But after a few years of this, I went back into full time education as a mature student, with references from my old English teacher (who was overjoyed that I had returned to "the fold") and the chief librarian where I worked. All the students were told in the initial introductory lecture by the Dean of the Faculty that it would "ruin all your reading plans for the next few years" for all of us, because as students we would have so much reading to do for the course... but that is another story and this is getting long again.

4. Where do you most enjoy reading? Do you need silence to read, or can you read almost anywhere?

On the lawn, surrounded by flowers in the garden is perfection, with a cold drink next to me, on a sunny Summer's day. Or late Spring, as now, with the fragrance of the lilac and my dog next to me snapping occasionally, and uselessly, at tiny flying creatures.

Or at home any time of year, in a comfortable chair where I can control the lighting and break off for a cup of coffee and to stroke the dog. I used to be able to read anywhere, but now I do tend to need silence. I think the change began when I was teaching, and having to have "eyes in the back of my head". It's no use getting particularly engrossed in anything if a kid is about to climb out of the window, and even in the best managed classrooms you have to be alert to "trouble spots" which could flare up at any moment.

5.Choose five of your favourite books and tell us why you loved them so much!

These are very personal choices:

a) A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.
My favourite ever book, and my father's too. He used to tell me the story when I was quite small, and it resonates for me even now.

b) Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy. So tragic. You can sense that the characters are doomed from the start and know that, at that time and place, a thirst for knowledge, optimism, determination and hard work are just not going to be enough. Hardy's writing is so convincing and evocative. He always rated his poetry higher than his novels, and I can see why - but I love his novels, and think this one is the best.

c) Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier. Almost the diametric opposite to Jude. Here is a hero of mine, Mary Anning. This is a semi-factual novel about her, showing how the great respected fossil-hunters of the time owed a lot to her expertise and knowledge, and describing the scandal of her not being allowed into their Geological Society. Lots of detail about my passions, the Dorset Coast and Geology.

d) The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle. The favourite book out of those Chris has read to me. Over the years we've been together (since 1969) we've shared C S Lewis 's The Chronicles of Narnia and his "Cosmic Trilogy" - Out of the Silent Planet / Perelandra / That Hideous Strength, most of J R R Tolkien more than once, Ursula le Guin and Mervyn Peake, Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising Series, Chris Naylor 's own The Camelot Wizards Trilogy series of novels, Mythago Wood by Robert Holdstock - even Peter Ackroyd's brick of a biography of Dickens, and many more. But The Last Unicorn keeps coming back to me. It is just so magical, poetic and yearning.

e) Brick Lane by Monica Ali. Except for one, I've always worked in inner-city multicultural schools, my teaching experience being totally different from what I saw as a child. The first school I worked in, spending several years there, was at the end of Brick Lane, in East London. At first it was multicultural; by the time I left it was 99% Sylhetti-speaking Bengali. Most of my reading at that time was to immerse myself in the folklore and culture of Bangladesh. I did courses in ESL (English as a Second Language) and a further 2-year part-time post-graduate Diploma in Education for a Multicultural Society. Oh, and a piano diploma. As I was also a full-time class teacher there was little time for any other sort of reading for about a decade.

I campaigned hard for books to be published in the different languages spoken by the children I taught. Story books in languages such as Bengali, Hindi, Punjabi, Gujerati, Tamil, Cantonese - in fact any languages which did not use the Latin alphabet or script (which were usually South East Asian languages, rather than African languages) were just not available. For a few years see-through plastic sheets with different languages had to be "stuck over" the pages, to make them dual language, before the publishers caught on. Even then the children I taught were initially disadvantaged, some never having been to school before and having to go through all the stages of reading at super-warp speed. They might have to be shown how to hold a pencil. I remember one vivacious child needing to cover a whole sheet of paper with blue paint - just to see what it looked like. She was hardly ready to start learning to read, even at 9 years old. Now she tells me (through Facebook) she has just completed her post-graduate doctorate in business studies. But Monica Ali's Brick Lane captures that twilight world between two cultures very well.

6. Do you prefer reading fiction or non fiction?

I suppose I have to say fiction. The story gets me every time, and this is true of plays too. Short stories and poems are more difficult for me to become engrossed in. With non-fiction books I can never see the point of those "bitty" sort of factual anecdotal books which seem to be so popular around Christmas. But I love "faction" or accounts about something that interests me made into a novel. I love browsing in reference books too, although you can't really read them in a sustained way.

7. Are you fond of a particular author and what attracts you to their books? (You can pick a few if you can’t choose!)

Charles Dickens is my absolute favourite. Basically because he can make me laugh out loud one moment and yet fill my eyes with tears the next. He's someone I never studied at school; he seemed to be out of favour with the critics at that time and rather looked down on as being too "populist". Discovering him later "all by myself" may well be part of the attraction. Nowadays he seems to be much more in vogue. I can't even remember which of his novels I read first, although I had a lot of the Heron Centennial Editions, and worked my way through these.

I had already read virtually all of Iris Murdoch's novels and Daphne du Maurier's. So I had been trying various contemporary award-winning novels, and enjoyed some classics, although I could not relate to Emily Brontë's embryonic stream-of-consciousness at all. Despite being brought up in Yorkshire, both the writing and the content of this seemed to me to be self-indulgent silliness, and serious modern novels with their navel-gazing were little better. I had a demanding job plus a demanding commute each day, and vividly remembering carrying Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose to and fro for months trying to read it and being unable to concentrate. Charles Dickens spoke to me in another way, grabbing my emotions and reinforcing my sense of fairness and social convictions.

8. Is there an author you haven't yet tried but you'd really like to?

Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I didn't really give him a chance.

9. Do you rely on goodreads to keep track of your reading or do you have your own method?

I've always kept a note in my diary of what I read for pleasure, ever since my late teens. Plus a word or two (literally - I use pocket diaries!) about what I thought. I like the Goodreads system as you can easily record so much more, plus it will display the covers! I am gradually going back in reverse order, entering in what I have read, but have only gone back about a decade so far, I think. When I remember odd ones I also put them in, if I can remember when it was, but if I can't remember them very well they'll get a mid-rating (3★) or no rating at all. I only review books I have read or reread since joining Goodreads.

10. What's the best book you've read so far this year? What are you reading at the moment? What will you be reading next?

a) (Calendar year) The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. An incredible story and a shameful part of history.

b) Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens. My favourite quotation is,
"Mr. Squeers's appearance was not very prepossessing. He had but one eye, and the popular prejudice runs in favour of two." And my favourite scene is where he gets his comeuppance at the hands of our eponymous hero!

c) Next I will be reading To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. There's a party game in the book I've just read, Changing Places by David Lodge, called "Humiliation". Basically you have to think of a book you haven't read, but suspect that everyone else will have read already. Then you earn one point from everyone who has actually read it. I think if I suggested this book, I would probably be a clear winner of that game, as so many of you have already read it, or even studied it at school. In fact I cannot think of one American author I ever read at school! I am really looking forward to it.

Reading this through, I realise that it's more of a ramble than a journey, with the questions interspersed. But if you're still there, then I'd like to thank you for accompanying me, as I meandered my way through some of the byways in my past.

off to make a coffee and then settling down to read this, Jean:)

Jean, Jean, Jean! I loved your reading journey. If this were a book, I would rate it 5★. So many of the books you have read, I also read at the same age.

Wow Jean, you have certainly worked hard on this. I loved finding out about your reading journey and learning more about your life. So many great books and your passion shines through in your answers. Thank you so much for this :)

Jean ,
Thanks so much for sharing that with us . It was really nice to see how you were influenced by books at various times in your life .

As a retired librarian , I was particularly impressed about your personal cataloging and check our system - lol !

Wow Jean! I read your first question- I also read Mrs Pepperpot and Milly-Molly-Mandy. Will sit and read the rest tomorrow when on my laptop not the phone.

I limove your writing!

great job Jean

Thanks everybody for sticking with it! And there are so many authors I forgot to mention (such as George Orwell!) Despite appearances, it's just dipping in really, isn't it, a journey like this?

Angela - later on I realised that my "Polar Bear" Library was based on the Browne issuing system, where each book had a card which was matched with one of the reader's tickets (they'd have about 6, according to how many books they were allowed to borrow) by being slotted inside a little pouch. These formed the issue - long rows of them all in strict order. I still think it's a pretty good system as you can locate the right book from thousands, in moments. I found J R R Tolkien's tickets in the issue once, as I worked in his local library, at Bury Knowle in Oxford.

Then after a couple of years came an interim system of photographing the title page plus a reader's ticket. The record ended up on something a bit like a microfiche. It was a very boring system to operate though!

Then "light pens" (lasers) came in, so temporary staff were employed to stick a barcode in each book. We called these people "the badgers" because they were sticking "badges" in the books! That in turn led to more computerisation, until the incredibly hands-off systems we have now, but by that time I was elsewhere...

I was a bit young to get to grips with the Dewey decimal system of cataloguing, but did sort by category in my "Polar Bear" library!

Jean ,
You would have been a wonderful librarian !

What an inspiring account, Jean! Your passion for books sizzles and you are such an excellent organizer :) Thank you for sharing so many interesting details too!

Great journey Jean!!!!
So many things we have in common - and that I already knew! - but also a lot of ideas and books I've not read.
You should definitly give Gabo a chance!!!

I really enjoyed that Jean. I love your descriptions of being the book-loving child. I have a copy of Tom's Midnight Garden on my shelves at the moment and I've been meaning to re-read it as I too used to love it in childhood.

I love that you still have contact with your ex-pupils on facebook. You sound like a very inspiring teacher. You are also a very talented writer.

Enjoy To Kill a Mockingbird, it's a wonderful book

Really enjoyed reading this.

Thanks Jean, it's been wonderful to read your journey, I really enjoyed your trip down memory lane, especially when you talked about comics - I loved comics as a child/teenager, and that's where my pocket money used to go!!

I have added Jude the Obscure and Remarkable Creatures to my to read list, and I am very much looking forward to reading To Kill a Mockingbird with you very soon! Did you know, this has now been removed from the curriculum, along with Of Mice and Men, due to the government's recent changes?

I can understand why Brick Lane would have meant so much to you, now I know about your teaching background.

I loved your polar bear library system! I used to rearrange my books but I didn't go so far as to make them into a proper library, with cards and everything! I think I would have loved to have you as a childhood friend, none of mine read as much as I did.

Thanks for taking so much time and effort with this, it's been well worth the read!

Jean, I've really enjoyed reading this. Thanks! I'm glad Orlando the Marmalade Cat was part of your childhood also.

Wow! The best reading journey I've read!

Jean, such a huge effort you put into giving us thorough answers to all the questions. all is clearly and emotively expressed. Thank you for opening a window into your book life.

I am kind of chuckling over the fact that you absolutely adore Jude the Obscure! And you didn't get annoyed at me when I came with criticism. Thanks for that too.

I have been surprised and very moved by your responses, as I was biting my nails, thinking I had rambled on for far too long!

Bette - thank for your incredibly enthusiastic response, which made me feel not quite so silly ;) Pink too :)

Angela - it's funny, I nearly went that way, after I'd had a few years' experience of working in libraries. But the best library school here at the time was in Wales, and I wanted to stay near London. What I really enjoyed was when I was responsible for the mobile library, travelling to various sites around Oxford. I really loved the fact that, even if all an old person could do was just hobble a few yards up the road to the library, no, they didn't have to make do with the books on the shelves. I could get virtually anything in print for them and have it on the van ready next time they came, or shortly after. I thought that was wonderful :)

Alice - Yes, I loved the organising aspect as well though, as you noticed. Thank you for your lovely comment. Halima, Maggie, Alannah and Amber too :)

Laura - yes, you know I didn't go much into the classics as I felt it would be obvious which 19th century English authors I had read! But you're quite right, we do share the same taste :) You know, for a moment there, I wondered where your comment about Gabo came into it. Remember I did Sculpture? Well, to me "Gabo" means the sculptor Naum Gabo!

Heather - How extraordinary that we read some of the same children's books, so far apart :) It just shows, doesn't it, that children's classics are not just Peter Pan by J M Barrie or The Water Babies by Charles Kingsley - wonderful though they are. These simpler, more recent stories have also survived the test of time. Thank you so much for your enthusiasm and support. I really enjoyed your account too, and will always now think of you (affectionately) as "nose-in-a-book!" ;) Lovely! And let me know when you want to reread Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce, as I'll do it with you :)

Gill - I'm sure we shared lots of the same books at the time. Isn't it lovely when you get a "blast from the past" like that? :)

Chrissie - Thank you! And of course I wasn't annoyed! One of the great things about this group is all the insight and constructive criticism. We don't have to feel the same :) Your points made a lot of sense! The upside of it is that I now want to reread the book in the light of what you've said :)

Shirley - I love it that you shared my enthusiasm for comics! Sometimes people tell me that they "weren't allowed" to read such and such, and I am pleased that that never happened to me. I think my parents were just glad that I was such an avid reader. I did come across Mum reading my books occasionally! Maybe that was a check? Or maybe just that she read anything she could get her hands on too! LOL! And thinking about it, perhaps that is why I have such difficulty with the "What is your reading guilty secret?" thread! I never had one!

Oh yes - Chris told me that those American books To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck have been "removed from the curriculum". A weird coincidence, as I'd only posted it about an hour before! I think it's very sad though. When I was at school as a child they just hadn't been considered, and then progress and enlightenment came - and now we are back to a sort of biased prejudice. Well, in my view anyway. It does seem incredibly judgmental, whereas before it was a more genuine ignorance.

You are absolutely right it was a real "trip down memory lane" for me. But of course when I thought about this, I realised it had to be so, because of the questions. I have been on this Earth a little longer than some of our members, but the questions obviously have to apply to everybody :)

There was a lump in my throat when you said you would have loved to have me as a childhood friend, as I feel the same. I feel that about many of the lovely people I meet here. But isn't it fantastic that so many of us have managed to link up later on, and can share our enthusiasm for books in this way :)

A big THANK YOU to you all :)

Thanks Jean! A great read, a nice narrative into your reading journey. I still remember the days of the encyclopaedia. I used to love wandering through them. I especially liked the sections on the universe (animals as well).

You said, "So piano music was also part of my preferred "reading", and miniature orchestral scores too. I used to sit at a desk poring over these, and "playing" the symphony or whatever the score was in my mind."

We have a lot in common there. I was a classical guitar student for many years, and I read a lot of music too :-)

I am also a huge Roald Dahl fan. I love his short stories especially. You've convinced me to give Harding a try. Thanks for that!

Aww that was brilliant Jean:) You really have put your heart and soul into telling us your story.
Some of the books you read as a child I also read and we all know how you feel about Mr D and your enthusiasm has certainly lead to my passion for him too.
I think that using the questions as pointers and aids rather than as an 'interview'is much nicer and much more open to interpretation which is always good.
Thank you for sharing Jean x

Thanks Roderick! Yes Roald Dahl's short stories can come as quite a surprise to those who think of him as a children's author can't they? I didn't know of his children's stories until decades later. I first came across him when we were about to leave school, just after "A" Level, when the English teacher read us a story "Pig", I think it was, from the collection Kiss Kiss. Of course we were all riveted and very impressed...

Conquering Space was such a 1960's ideal, so I tended to make a beeline for any books about Astronomy, Space Travel, rockets etc. They look quite quaint now,when you come across them in charity shops, but were awe-inspiring at the time.

Interesting, your connection with music :) I sometimes "played" the piano on a tabletop...

Thank you Tracey! I don't think you needed any nudging from me towards Charles Dickens though! You were singing the praises of A Tale of Two Cities already! :D

Jean, your narrative on your reading journey is remarkable. Your passion and your love of literature really shine through. I've put several of your books on my TBR list. I'm surprised that you've never read an American author. (Although my own reading reflects my passion for all things British and Canadian, I still read a lot of home-grown material.) I read To Kill a Mockingbird in my freshman year of high school. It's a very powerful book.

Oh I am trying to make up for it now Terri - it was at school I was talking about! There was definitely an idea that "English Literature" was written by English people! It seems to be conveniently forgotten that a lot of them such as Oscar Wilde were Irish, or Welsh such as Dylan Thomas. They were sort of "allowed", but US literature was considered beyond the pale. LOL

I have seen adaptations (film and theatre) of To Kill a Mockingbird, so know the story and am really looking forward to it. I have it on order from 2 libraries, one for a month now.

I DO need to read more from other English-speaking nations though, as my reading is still very Anglocentric. Even Canadians, the only ones I have read are some novels by Carol Shields, Robertson Davies and Margaret Atwood. I've read a fair few US mysteries/thrillers too, but tend to revert back to British writers with those, and don't mind as they're almost "comfort reading".

And thank you :)

all this talk of TKAM is making me want to re read it. :)

Ooo I hope you do, Tracey! There's a readalong thread set up already :) If it doesn't arrive at either library then I shall assume the politicians have confiscated all the copies, and I'll buy it on Kindle as soon as Harper Lee releases it in July :D

I didn't study To Kill A Mockingbird at school. I wasn't in the highest set for GCSE. I did study Of Men and Men, then again I studied Dickens as well, we did his short stories especially the Signal Man. When we did that module I had a great teacher on placement while studying for her PGCE and she really made it enjoyable.

Your teacher had good taste Alannah! I love The Signalman and think it's one of Charles Dickens's best stories! How wonderful to study those books at school.

As for Of Mice and Men and To Kill a Mockingbird, I can hear the radio News through the kitchen wall now while Chris cooks tea, and they are talking about those and other USA books in the National Curriculum at this very moment! Whether it's ideological or political... Maybe the hoohah will all blow over after all :)

A lot of people I have spoken who are annoyed at the change either studied Of Mice and Men or To Kill A Mockingbird, they're not fans of Dickens. It does annoy me because from a few articles I have seen, it is clear that they have very little knowledge of Dickens, despite that he writes big books with funny names.

It is odd, I agree. There are so many wonderful adaptations of his works that you would think more people would want to read the source material! Sybil Thorndike said, "Dickens has the film-novel technique developed to its highest - and very wonderful that art can be."

But the books have so much more of everything! More descriptions, many extra characters, more humour, more pointed sarcasm... Better stop now as I am in danger of "going off on one" again :D

Wow, Jean! I have just skimmed through and will come back and read it all more carefully when I have a bit more time... you did inspire me to put Brick Lane on my TBR though!

Hope you enjoy TKAM :)

Dickens just has to be a really high point in literature. He paints such a picture for the reader with every single paragraph. Personally, I think he should be on a Compulsory Reading list for all students.

And yet, here on Goodreads in his book comments, the thing I see so many times is "too much description" which fairly makes me near bolt out of my chair, yelling "WHAT?????"

From title page of More of Milly Molly Mandy

Jean, I'm holding up in front of my laptop, my first edition 1929 copy of More of Milly-Molly-Mandy by Joyce Lankester Brisley for you to see:P I'm guessing you can't see it, haha; what a bummer:( The original cover is not available of GR; shame because it's a great old-fashioned cover.

MMM was one of my childhood favorite books too.

Cover. A really bad photo, sorry; I have an HTC phone (not the best camera in the world).

Oh, Milly Molly Mandy. Lovely!

And how about The Family from One End Street? Any fans of that?


Re Dickens, I'm not a massive fan. There are things about him I like, like his strong feelings about poverty and workhouses, some of his humour. But I don't enjoy many of his caricatures, and there are times his writing style annoys me.

Re Dickens. Great as he is, I don't think I was exposed to any of his works in high school - weird! I would like to explore him a bit and "A Tale of Two Cities" caught my fancy and will be my first venture into the Dickens world.

Bette - I did see the cover of "Milly Molly Mandy"(in my mind's eye) as soon as you said that ;) This one: The Milly-Molly-Mandy Storybook is the edition I remember.

If you don't revel in his caricatures, Gill, then I'd suggest Charles Dickens is really not for you! They're one of his great strengths. I personally try not to read any authors who annoy me! Although every so often I wonder what I am missing and give them another go...

Bette - exactly! Dickens's powers of description are simply phenomenal. Here's an example from the book I'm reviewing at the moment, Nicholas Nickleby. It's of Arthur Gride's house,

"an old house, dismal dark and dusty, which seemed to have withered, like himself, and to have grown yellow and shrivelled in hoarding him from the light of day, as he had in hoarding his money, lived Arthur Gride. Meagre old chairs and tables, of spare and bony make, and hard and cold as misers' hearts, were ranged, in grim array, against the gloomy walls; attenuated presses, grown lank and lantern-jawed in guarding the treasures they enclosed, and tottering, as though from constant fear and dread of thieves, shrunk up in dark corners, whence they cast no shadows on the ground, and seemed to hide and cower from observation."

And now here's its inhabitant, Arthur Gride,

"a little old man, of about seventy or seventy-five years of age, of a very lean figure, much bent and slightly twisted. He wore a grey coat with a very narrow collar, an old-fashioned waistcoat of ribbed black silk, and such scanty trousers as displayed his shrunken spindle-shanks in their full ugliness. The only articles of display or ornament in his dress were a steel watch-chain to which were attached some large gold seals; and a black ribbon into which, in compliance with an old fashion scarcely ever observed in these days, his grey hair was gathered behind. His nose and chin were sharp and prominent, his jaws had fallen inwards from loss of teeth, his face was shrivelled and yellow, save where the cheeks were streaked with the colour of a dry winter apple; and where his beard had been, there lingered yet a few grey tufts which seemed, like the ragged eyebrows, to denote the badness of the soil from which they sprung. The whole air and attitude of the form was one of stealthy cat-like obsequiousness; the whole expression of the face was concentrated in a wrinkled leer, compounded of cunning, lecherousness, slyness, and avarice."

How masterly is this? It shows Dickens's supreme craft as a writer. The way Dickens personifies Arthur Gride's house, makes it almost a living creature itself, as though the essence of its inhabitant had oozed into the very fibres of the house and its contents. Of course it is exaggerated and whimsical rather than realistic, but it is unique, and so brilliantly written. I don't know whether I prefer the description of the house, or that of the man, but putting them together... Wow!

I am ashamed to admit that I have never read Dickens. I liked the descriptions you have posted above and I think I may like him. Perhaps I have read Oliver Twist or David Copperfield but a lot of years ago and I don't remember anything about them so it is as if I have never read them.

Your childhood books are all new to me but it is interesting to see with which books people grow up all over the world.

Interesting journey Jean, we really can feel your love and enthusiasm for books. I like this!

And yes, try Marquez!

dely wrote: "And yes, try Marquez!"

Always the same suggestion!!!

Thank you Dely! Yes, I think because of the innumerable characters Dickens created - there are so many extra little cameos in each of his works just spilling over the pages - people sometimes neglect the fact that he wrote really powerful descriptions too :)

Gosh, there is no shame in never having read any - but what a treat you have in store! In case you'd like a suggestion,
I think David Copperfield is a good one to start with. But for description Bleak House is wonderful,and perhaps the best of his novels. I'm not sure - maybe I'll judge differently at the end of my challenge when I've reread them all. And others of course may feel differently :)

Leslie - I'm sure I will enjoy To Kill a Mockingbird once the library gets its act together :)

Laura - I just need a little slot for Gabriel García Marquez... it will come! :D

Heather - yes it is wonderful to find out, through Facebook, what a lot of my ex-pupils are doing with their lives now, and how they re getting on. The first one I made contact with was Ade Adepitan, through googling him, and finding that he even gave credit to his primary school which I thought was amazing! That made me very happy! Since he's so famous, (as a wheelchair athlete and commentator) lots of his old friends still know him and his sister, and it just exploded from there. They are all so very different - and say such lovely things :) And keep on coming! I know there are drawbacks to social networking, but I've been lucky. And oh, the benefits too! This sort of contact was inconceivable until very recently.

Jean wrote: "Thanks Roderick! Yes Roald Dahl's short stories can come as quite a surprise to those who think of him as a children's author can't they? I didn't know of his children's stories until..."

Yes, Dahl's stories don't match his children's stories. They are clever and a bit sinister, brilliant in my opinion...

I've read some antiquated science books too from the 70's. "Black Holes, Quasars, and the Universe" by Shipman is one of them.

I was never exposed to Dickens in school. I had to find him myself. "Tale of Two Cities" was brilliant and very influential on me. I need to read more!

Thanks again, Jean. Enjoyed reading your journey very much.

Jean wrote: "Thank you Dely! Yes, I think because of the innumerable characters Dickens created - there are so many extra little cameos in each of his works just spilling over the pages - people sometimes negle..."

Thanks for the suggestion. Will see what they have in the library but I am sure they will have a lot of books by Dickens.

I'm ashamed to say I've never read any Dickens but after reading your 'journey' and your enthusiasm I am determined to begin asap. Maybe Bleak House - I watched it on BBC a couple of years ago and loved it.

Maggie and Dely, I hope you both enjoy what you choose :)

Re Dickens, the ones I've enjoyed most are A Tale of Two Cities and The Mystery of Edwin Drood. One I have never read and will try some time is Nicholas Nickleby.

dely wrote: "Thanks for the suggestion. Will see what they have in the library but I am sure they will have a lot of books by Dickens. "

I'm sure almost all libraries in Italy have at least the classics by him.
Even if it's almost obvious, I'd start with David Copperfield, Oliver Twist or Great Expectations. Less known, but I've loved it excessively, Dombey and Son