Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

I was thinking about the Jan Mark paperback of various short stories called Nothing to be Afraid of - the title of the first short story in the book. There were ten of them in the book, and it had very sinister stories made for the 9 to 13 age group - stories such as a young boy who was four years old and was young for his age, taking his Doggy toy wherever he goes; the young boy with his granny telling him tales, and the boy says at the end: "I can see up your nose - it's all whiskery". Something called Nule which was the final story in the book.

The one I remember the most was the third one called The Choice is Yours where the protagonist, a schoolgirl called Brenda was both a member of the school choir and the hockey team - unfortunately, a special hockey match coincided with a music lesson and she obviously couldn't be in two places at once. So she ended up going backwards and forwards telling each teacher that she couldn't make it to the lesson - she had to run between rooms and running was forbidden, and the prefect caught her running. In the end, she decided to leave both the music lesson and the hockey team, and just went to the junior cloakroom and cried. I saw a clip of the dramatization of the short story on the Book Tower.

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

As a child at school I enjoyed reading the Griffin Pirate stories by Sheila McCullagh.

McCullagh also wrote the Puddle Lane stories (as most people know, it was developed into a children's TV series for Yorkshire TV in the mid to late 1980s); and also the One, Two, Three and Away reading book stories that most Infant schools had in the mid 1980s - Billy Blue Hat, Roger Red Hat, etc.

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Hi,

If you're serious, you may know the films that have been made from some of his stories:

Fantastic Voyage (Stephen Boyd, Donald Pleasance, Raquel Welch)
Bicentennial Man (Robin Williams, Sam Neill)
I, Robot (Will Smith)

I am still not very familiar of him.

[zabadak]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Never heard of him!

Hi,

If you're serious, you may know the films that have been made from some of his stories:

Fantastic Voyage (Stephen Boyd, Donald Pleasance, Raquel Welch)
Bicentennial Man (Robin Williams, Sam Neill)
I, Robot (Will Smith)

[Moonraker]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

As a child at school I enjoyed reading the Griffin Pirate stories by Sheila McCullagh.

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Green eggs and ham.

(Long before Edwina Currie of course).

[tex]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Dr Seuss, methinks?

Tiz he...

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

The obvious Mr Men books - never got the full set. Also got the Mr Men annuals - they were numbered such as No 3 or No 4 and never had the year on the front cover, but I guess that they were from the late 1970s. Animation such as that never seem to date in the same way as people did back then.

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Dr Seuss, methinks?

[tex]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

The cat in the hat comes to mind...really sparked the imagination of this 10 year old.

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

What about the Happy Families trilogy of books by Allan Ahlberg? His wife Jannet illustrated them - I always associate them with the school library on Friday afternoons and borrowing one of them a week.

Mr Tick the Teacher was basically a satire on how schools close down due to falling number of pupils on role - his six kids were pupils in their "school" and were represented as different ones in different classes. It was only a few years later when I realised that the "Tick" bit in his surname was obvious referring to when teachers marked our work.

Also, Miss Jump the Jockey; Master Salt the Sailor's Son; Miss Wobble the Waitress - any more? - I think that there were at least a dozen of them. I know that Children's BBC did a series based on those in the books either in the late 1980s or early 1990s - not to be confused with that Andrew O'Connor game show of the same name from 1993.

[beccabear67]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

I don't recall any favourites as such but I enjoyed the books of Isaac Asimov a lot!

He held records for number of books of all sorts, fiction and non-fiction, published at one time I believe. I keep meaning to read his commentary on the Bible someday (having an interest in comparative theology and writings about origins etc.)

Did anyone ever have any Sooty books? I have a selection of the things now, I got into collecting various annuals and I love the old Harry Corbetts I've been able to see. I'm not sure how much Mr. Corbett had to do with the books but the artwork is usually well done if not quite up there with Clangers and Bagpuss' Peter Firmin illustrations. There were Sooty annuals starting from the late '50s, and little story books with dust jackets mentioning a 'TV Town', and some other thin middle sized ones, plus he was in TV Comic like Muffin The Mule I think (co-starring Sweep I'm sure).

[George 1978]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

I don't recall any favourites as such but I enjoyed the books of Isaac Asimov a lot!

Never heard of him!

[zabadak]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

I don't recall any favourites as such but I enjoyed the books of Isaac Asimov a lot!

[beccabear67]

Re: Favourite Books or stories from childhood.....

Heidi by Joanna Spyri was one of my favorites, also Bambi by Felix Salten.

I have some fond memories of those precious little Beatrix Potter books too with the tipped in colour-plate on the cover. Our school library had most of them I think.

I also liked a version of Heidi for tv, not the Shirley Temple, I think maybe it was something dubbed in from some continental production. We also got The Phoenix and The Carpet, the Railway Children and The Secret Garden as tv serials or full-length specials, I still haven't 'read' those however.

A little older there was the Tripods trilogy books, they were exciting, and along with a couple by Robert A Heinlein my first taste of science fiction. There is a band in Seattle circa from the mid-'80s named Capping Day so I wasn't the only ones into those books! Sad they never got to complete the tv adaptation...

Going backwards maybe before I could read I remember loving these books of lots of animals in clothing going about their day in elaborate town scenes... Richard Scary? A bit like the Where's Waldo without Waldo, or a dutch artist who does these large scenes with lots of cartoon people in them. Jan van Haaseteren (they sell a lot of jigsaw puzzles of his).

I also would go over cheap comic books many times, mostly we had U.S. ones in colour, and in with them were some things like Noddy and Uncle Wiggley. Also, even if the content was a bit over my head, collections of newspaper cartoons by Giles and a Canadian version named Norris. We would trade comics and things like that with other kiddies in the neighbourhood or at school.

Oh, and there was a very nicely illustrated book on dinosaurs, I wish I knew which one, I remember sort of b&w art with one colour extra added to it.