One of the single greatest things about being a Dad is reading bedtime stories. I love books and push them on the kids like a QVC huckster. Last night I wondered whether we had a copy of the Winnie the Pooh in the house so that I could read it to Big S. We didn’t, so I went online and as soon as I saw the illustrations I had Proust moment. Suddenly I was 5 again, taking my father’s copy from the bookcase and poring over EH Shephard’s illustrations. I could remember exactly what I had thought back then:
What is he picking up? Is that …? No, really? Eeewwww? Is that why they call him Winnie the Pooh?
Why have they called this little girl Christopher Robin?
I went looking to see if the Puffin Post was still going. The Puffin Club was the first club I ever joined. I wrote the application letter myself having found the address in the flyleaf of a library book. I felt giddy sending off a stamped addressed envelope. In the 70s most truly magical things seemed to require you to send off an “SAE” and to “wait 14 days for delivery”. It must have been a eerie job being a postman. Each street you turned down would reveal a fresh row of children’s faces pressed against windows with excitement, their eyes following your progress, their furrowed brows trying to force you telekinetically up to the front door. The Puffin Post was my dream magazine. It was full of pictures of the covers of new books (so I could judge them) and had nerdy articles that appealed to swotty little middle class children like me. Hence my knowing, at age 7, what a “palimpsest” was. I tried to work it into school essays at every opportunity.
I’m pleased to see that the Puffin Club is still going but it now costs £45 a year and has, dispiritingly, a commission scheme. What would Kaye Webb have thought?
I was bookworm too – every Christmas my Mum used to buy me and younger sis two books each from the Dean & Son list – mostly abridged classics and everything from Little Women to Moby Dick via The Swiss Family Robinson, Alice in Wonderland,The Three Musketeers and Kidnapped. Sis wasn’t much of a reader, having much more of a practical bent, but I loved them. I can’t remember how many times I was clipped round the ear by exasperated Mum who had been standing right in front of me telling me it was my turn to set the table – I don’t she ever believed I really couldn’t hear her …
We get booklets home from the children’s school, I think one was puffin books, then there is red door and lots of others. You don’t have to ‘join’ (I think the school may have a membership)you can just order from the booklet…Our last order was the whole series of ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ for Sam (4 books for around £6 all up) and Emma chose a Disney sing-along book for about £1. Great value for money, but not sure I’d join for £45!
Ah books… I remember them with fondness too. We were too poor to be able to afford to buy them at the rate I read so the weekly trip to Ealing Lending Library with my dad (3d on the bus)and the sheer delight and anticipation in picking the three I would take away that week is what I remember from those early reading days. Use a Kindle these days, up to now I thought it was the bees knees….
I was a bookworm too and can definitely identify with what Pog said.
I’m still an avid reader and like PeterM am a fan of the Kindle. It’s not the book that’s the important thing, it’s the magic that goes on inside your head.
I hope, Moobs, you do all the voices when you read the stories. Bedtime stories should ideally be performance art as well as a good story. There’s nothing like laughing your pants off funny voices for the various characters (although the shorter younger children’s books are a lot easier for that).
Just looked you up for the first time in YEARS – the last post I read was an anguished one about IVF – so it was wonderful to read the words ‘One of the single greatest things about being a Dad’…! Have read more and will continue to read back through your journey with great interest. Well done, congratulations, and it’s disheartening to see that parenthood hasn’t diminished your writing ability one iota. 😉
Sharing a book can heal a bad day more quickly than almost anything else–whether I had the bad day or my boy did.
And you can rewrite a classic in the most unforgettable fashion better than anyone I’ve ever known!
Isn’t parenting the best gig ever?