As you may remember, the name was overwhelmingly the most popular in a 2016 poll for the name of a new polar research ship. Sadly the name finally chosen by the National Environmental Research Council was the RRS Sir David Attenborough, which had come fifth in the poll. Worthy, but not fun; childish, some might say, and indeed have said. But what's wrong with childish, or, more properly, child-like?
I've just been re-reading a book that was deliberately written not for children, but for "the child-like of any age" - and sometimes I think you have to turn to older people to find that quality! The book is The Princess and the Goblin, by the Scottish author, poet, and Congregational church minister, George McDonald (a fascinating man - look him up on Wiki! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_MacDonald ). I found it by happenstance the other day on my Kindle. My own paperback copy, and its sequel The Princess and Curdie, were given to me a long time ago, when I was still at Junior School, by my maternal grandmother, but they have long since disappeared from my book shelves. I'm glad to say that the other books she gave me, however, have travelled everywhere with me, although increasingly battered. They are the Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis, which compete with Rosamund Pilcher's Winter Solstice as my must-have Desert Island Discs book!
There is a richness in these so-called 'children's' books that endures, and they introduced me to the realm of what is now called High Fantasy, which I still enjoy today.
The grandmother who gave them to me was a painter, weaver, and linguist: she taught herself Mandarin when her son went to China in the 1950s, and learnt Russian, as far as I know just for interest's sake, when she was in her 70s. She had a great collection of rather battered hats. And she also passed on to me a love of the music of Bob Dylan, who I first heard by listening to her collection of EPs, including Blowing in the Wind, Corinna Corinna, and Tambourine Man. I loved them - which my poor parents no doubt regretted when I later took up playing the guitar and singing!
In case you're wondering, I have fond memories of my paternal grandmother too, not least of her long long white hair, rolled into a bun at the nape of her neck, the humbugs she kept in a tin in her sideboard, which I used to suck while sitting underneath her big square table, covered with a green velvet cloth with bobbles round the edges (the table, not me!), on our weekly Sunday afternoon visits, and for the cockle shells she edged her flower beds with. They made me smile too!
No comments:
Post a Comment