My Top Fifty Children's Books - The Final Instalment

Well, we’re now at the end of my fifty favourite childhood books and thank you very much if you’ve persevered with me over the course of these five posts.  The Falaise family arrived back from our French sojourn on Friday night and, once mini-Falaise’s birthday and first day of school are done with next week, we’ll be saying farewell to what has been a pretty fine summer and looking forward to the joys of autumn and winter – Hallowe’en, Bonfire Night and then Christmas.  All of which should mean I’ll be able to post more frequently and regularly from now on – and maybe even catch up with some of my massive backlog of reviews.

Anyway, back to the task in hand……..here are numbers 41-50 in my list.

41.          The Long Walk by Slawomir Rawicz.  Like a couple of others on this list, this isn’t exactly a children’s book but it does seem to be a book that children enjoy – indeed, when we were looking around a prospective school for mini-Falaise last year, the headmaster was just starting to read it with some of the pupils.  It’s the story of how the author, a Polish army lieutenant, had escaped from a Soviet POW camp in 1941 and escaped to India across the Gobi desert.  I loved this book as a child and I hate to have to break this to anyone else who loved it that, according to Soviet archival material, the story is untrue.

42.          The Wooden Horse by Eric Williams.  Apart from the fact that this story is indubitably true, this book falls into the same category as The Long Walk and tells the story of the Allied escape attempt from Stalag Luft III in WWII, using a tunnel dug under a wooden gym horse.  It’s exciting stuff.

43.          The Dribblesome Teapot and Other Incredible Stories by Norman Hunter.  I’d quite forgotten about this until I did some internet memory-jogging for this list.  It’s basically a collection of ten pretty eccentric tales with kings and queens and countries called things like Kumdown Upwardz and Urgburg under Ug and it’s great fun.

44.          Carrie’s War by Nina Bawden.  This is a classic children’s novel about Carrie, a young girl evacuated to Wales with her brother in WWII and the strange families they end up living with.  It’s really quite dark and mysterious.

45.          The Once and Future King by T.H. White.  One of the great retellings of the story of King Arthur.  I recall that I much preferred the Sword in the Stone, the first of the four books that make up this cycle.

46.          The Adventures of Robin Hood by either Richard Green or Roger Lancelyn Green.  I can’t remember the author of my childhood copy of this and the internet credits both Greens with having written a version so I’ll hedge my bets.  In any event, the Robin Hood story remains a classic and I lapped it up as a child.

47.          Clever Polly and the Stupid Wolf by Catherine Storr.  In writing this list, I’ve been

intrigued that so many of the books I read in the ‘70s and very early ‘80s had actually been written decades previously – and not just the obvious ‘classics’.  This collection of stories was written in the ‘50s and remains fresh today.  I’m looking forward to reading this one with mini-Falaise soon.

48.          Asterix and the Olympic Games by Goscinny and Uderzo.  I was in two minds whether to include this as I’m a huge Asterix (and Tintin) fan and get irrationally annoyed when they are dismissed as children’s comic strips because the humour is so clever.  Anyway, as a child, my parents disapproved of comics and so I wasn’t allowed Asterix.  But, one day, my mother and I were in WH Smith in Stevenage (I led a glamorous life) and I saw this in a black and white paperback novel-sized format.  I showed to Mama Falaise who, failing to inspect the inside of the book, assumed it was a written version of Asterix and allowed me to buy it.  Result!  How I cherished that book.  The coda to this is that, later, my parents relented and finally allowed me to buy Asterix………in French.

49.          Chikdren’s versions of the Odyssey and Iliad.  I don’t know who adapted the Originals but I had abridged and adapted versions of both these and absolutely loved them.  As with Roger Lancelyn Green’s books, they instilled a love for myth and legend that persists today and probably also contributed to my enjoyment of fantasy and even sci-fi.  It also proved a precursor for my education as I ended up reading both in the original Greek as part of my Greek A-level work.

50.          A Book Whose Name I’ve Forgotten.  The plot of this book revolves around a schoolboy who discovers that there is a secret criminal society made up of some of the girls in his school and that only he can save the school from them.  It was a great book that I borrowed from the local library many times.  The thing is that I can’t remember either the title or the author and, try as I might, I can’t track them down on line.  If anyone recognises this, please, please let me know as it is really bugging me.

And there we have it – my 50 favourite childhood books.  I’m sure I’ve left out loads that I’ve forgotten and that I’ll probably remember as soon as I press the publish button but it’s a pretty solid list and I’ve enjoyed the trip down memory lane while writing these posts.

My Top Fifty Children's Books - The Fourth Instalment

We are currently on holiday in the South West of France (by far the best bit of the Hexagon, in my not so humble opinion) and, what with that and the inevitable pre-hols work nightmare, I’ve kind of got behind on posting, which is a shame as I really want to post on a couple of great books I’ve read recently – a fantastic ‘60s London crime novel and a rich and epic memoir of growing up in the Soviet Union.  Still, before I can do that, I need to finish my count down of my top fifty childhood books.  So, continuing where I paused, before swanning off to sun, sea and gorgeous food……….

31.          Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling.  Leaving aside his questionable imperial politics

and iffy poetry, these timeless tales continue to appeal in their simplicity and originality.  Mini-Falaise enjoys How the Leopard Got His Spots as much as I ever did – what makes it even more special is the fact that the cover of the Folio Society edition from which I read to mini-Falaise is the same as that of the edition my father bought for me nearly 40 years ago, O Dearly Beloved.

32.          Noggin the Nog by Oliver Postgate.  This series of books, based in the cult children’s TV series, featured the aforesaid Noggin, the heir to a quasi-Viking throne, who is constantly battling his wicked uncle, Nogbad the Bad.  This one probably won’t ring any bells for anyone non-British or under the age of 40.

33.          Comet in Moominvalley by Tove Jansson.  One thing I’ve noticed in this top 50 list is the Scandinavian influence, either authorial or in the characters – I don’t know if this is coincidence or whether Scandinavia was an epicentre for children’s writing during the ‘70s but it’s interesting (at least to me).  I don’t think I read all the Moomins books but this is the one that has stuck in my mind.  The Moomins were white, round-faced fairytale-like characters who lived in Moominvalley and had numerous adventures.  As well as also featuring in a TV series, there is also apparently a Moomin theme park in Finland.

34.          Tarka the Otter by Henry Williamson.  This is another wonderful book where one has to separate one’s views on the book from one’s feelings about the author (Williamson’s popularity dwindled after he became a supporter of Oswald Mosley).  It tells the story of the life and death of the title character, an otter living on the banks of the rivers Taw and Torridge in Devon.  What separates this from the usual animal story is its lack of anthropomorphism – Williamson tends not to ascribe human motives or emotions to his characters – and a pretty brutal description of the hunt for Tarka by the local otter hunt.  It’s a real antidote to much of the over-sentimentality that features in children’s books with animal characters.

35.          Smith by Leon Garfield.  I don’t know if children still read Leon Garfield’s books today – if not, it’s a shame because they are rich and vivid.  Smith is the story of a young pickpocket in Victorian London who witnesses a murder and finds a document belonging to the victim, which leads to him being hunted across London.  I remember the feel of London that Garfield created (and which I can now describe as Dickensian!).

36.          Jennings and Darbishire.  Technically, Jennings is the protagonist in Antony Buckeridge’s tales but Darbishire, his side-kick and foil, is so integral to them that it seems unfair to exclude his name.  As a pre-school kid in late ’70s England, these stories were almost custom-built for me.  Jennings and Darbishire are boarders at Linbury Court, a fictional prep school.  Their adventures were hilarious (although probably massively dated now), revolving around Jennings’ uninhibited curiosity.  I can’t pick a favourite but Jennings Follows a Clue and According to Jennings would be contenders.

37.          The Silver Sword by Ian Seraillier.  A true classic, this is the story of four children in wartime Europe, trying to make their way from Poland to Switzerland to find the parents of three of them who have been taken away by the Nazis.  

38.          The Witch Family by Eleanor Estes.  Brilliant story about two girls who draw a picture

of an old witch, living alone on a glass mountain.  She is lonely so the girls draw her a family and these are their stories.  I loved this as a kid.

39.          The Diary of Anne Frank.  It’s a classic, everyone knows it and there’s little I can add to the sum of human knowledge about it, save to say that, like millions, it touched me deeply.

40.          One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.  Like Anne Frank’s Diary, this wasn’t specifically written as a children’s book but we read it at school when we were quite young so I feel free to include it here.  As it says in the tin, it tells the story of one day in the life of a prisoner in one of Stalin’s gulags.  Obviously the political detail escaped me then (if you’re interested read Gulag by Anne Applebaum – brilliant history) but it moved me and made me think hard.

So there we have it, just ten more to go…………which will follow on my return from La Belle France.

My Top Fifty Children's Books - the Third Instalment

And, now, in the third instalment, we count from 21-30……………………..

21.       The Adventure series by Enid Blyton

Although I loved many of Enid Blyton’s books, I think this series was probably my favourite.  In some

respects it followed a classic Blyton concept - four children with an animal companion (in this case Kiki the parrot) off having adventures and solving mysteries without much assistance from adults.  In other ways, however, I think it was much more interesting than her other adventure books.  Firstly, the children were, generally, more well-defined with their own talents and clear personalities.  Secondly, there was even less adult involvement than in, say the Famous Five - for instance, in The Circus of Adventure (my personal favourite) two of the children are, essentially kidnapped at the beginning of the story and taken abroad where the other two follow them with no adult assistance.  But, most interestingly, was the gradual construction over the series of a traditional nuclear family as, firstly, the mother of two of the children adopts the other two children (who were orphans) before, later in the series, she marries the main male protagonist, Bill Cunningham, completing the family.  It kind of chimes with Blyton’s anachronistic social mores and, maybe, wouldn’t work today.

22.       Emil and the Detectives by Erich Kästner

Written in 1929, Emil and the Detectives concerns a small boy who is sent to Berlin by his mother with some money for his grandmother.  The money is stolen from him on the train so he puts together a gang of Berlin children to be his detectives and hunt down the thief.  It’s a relatively simple tale but one I rather enjoyed.

23.       Tales of the Greek Heroes by Roger Lancelyn Green

Ever since I can remember, I’ve loved mythology and, especially Greek and Roman mythology.  My parents bought me versions of the Odyssey and the Iliad for children and I suspect this love pushed me towards studying classics at school and, eventually, taking both Latin and Greek A-levels.  One of my favourite books about mythology was Roger Lancelyn Green’s collection of Greek myths for children.  All the old favourites are there and, as it’s definitely still in print, I’d heartily recommend it.  Mini-Falaise is blissfully unaware but, one day, her old man will be sitting down with her to read this.

24.       Tales of the Roman Heroes by Roger Lancelyn Green

See above but this time in Rome.  I never read his books on Arthurian, Egyptian and Norse mythology but wish I had - I may have come to those mythoi sooner.  Incidentally, I didn’t realise that Lancelyn Green was a former pupil and, later, friend of C.S. Lewis, another resident of this list.

25.       The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

I can’t help thinking of this as a book of wordplay and language teaching as much as a story.  It’s a fun story of a boy, Milo, who drives his toy car through a magic tollbooth to the Kingdom of Wisdom where he visits places such as Dictionopolis and the Island of Conclusions and goes on a quest to rescue Princesses Rhyme and Reason.  If you haven’t read it, it’s really very good with lots of puns and suchlike.  When I was a teenager at boarding school, my parents occasionally used to take me to a restaurant called Le Talbooth for lunch which always triggered memories of this book and tickled me somewhat.

26.       A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula le Guin

With due apologies to fans of J.K. Rowling, before Hogwarts there was Roke and before Harry there was

Ged.  A Wizard of Earthsea is Harry Potter with added oomph.  It is the story of Ged, the true name of a goatherd who, having shown great but raw magical power is sent by his first master, Ogion to the school for wizards on the island of Roke.  Although still nominally a children’s book, it is filled with more sophisticated images and ideas and is much scarier and adult in tone than Rowlings series.  As a standalone novel, it is fabulous and also forms part of the Earthsea cycle of five books.  It’s meaty and substantial fare and I still have a copy on my shelves.

27.       Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert O’Brien

I loved the idea of a group of rats with human intelligence helping Mrs Frisby move her poorly little son to her summer house and away from the farmer’s plough.  It’s a lovely book.

28.       The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

Need I go on?  The tales of Mole, Ratty, Badger and Toad are all-time classics.  Loved them then, still love them now.

29.       Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.

The classic tale of pirates.  Long John Silver, Israel Hands, Billy Bones and Jim Hawkins.  As well as being an exciting adventure full of action and skullduggery, it also introduced some of the now-standard pirate tropes - the treasure map where X marks the spot, the treasure island and fifteen men on a dead man’s chest.  Brilliant stuff.

30.       The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall

I have to confess I had to do a bit of searching to find the title of this book and the name of the author as only the basic plot had stuck in my head.  In my defence though, it is over thirty years since I read it.  This story, set during World War II, revolves around a group of kids who find a crashed German bomber with a machine gun in full working order.  The kids turn it into a fortress to defend their town.  It’s tense and exciting and is another book where the children take on the adult world independently.

So, that’s all for today.  There are 20 more to go on my list.  Tune in again tomorrow…..or maybe the next day for numbers 31-40.

My Top Fifty Children's Books - The Second Instalment

Carrying on from my last post, here is the second part of my Top 50 children’s books……….

11.       Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome

I spent most of my childhood living either in a city or a suburban town and so Ransome’s tale of dinghy sailing, camping and outdoor adventure totally appealed to me.  Funnily enough, although I loved this, I never bothered reading any of the other books in the series and I can’t, for the life of me, remember why.

12.       The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

I can’t think of anything more enticing to a child’s mind than the thought of discovering a completely new world accessible through the back of a wardrobe.  Add in fauns, a witch, snow, Turkish delight (yum) and Aslan and it’s an all-time classic.  I read a couple more in the series but then lost interest and this one is clearly a cut above the others.

13.       Watership Down by Richard Adams

Apparently, Watership Down has been described as an allegory of the endless struggle between freedom and tyranny.  I can’t say that occurred to me as a young boy; I just enjoyed it as a story with its quests, escapes and heroic battles.  It’s also got a deeply poignant ending which I won’t spoil for anyone who hasn’t read it.  It was made into an excellent animated film with that Art Garfunkel song.  My father took me to see it and, dear reader, I might have had a moist eye or two at the end.

14.       Paddington Abroad by Michael Bond

I was a big Paddington fan generally but this story of the Browns’ holiday to France and Paddington’s misadventures on the continent is the Paddington story that stood out for me, especially the cover with Paddington’s usual hat replaced by a French beret.

15.       The Secret Seven by Enid Blyton

I was much more “Team Famous Five” than “Team Secret Seven” but I did love the idea of their clubhouse and the secret password.  Basically, however, I loved all those stories of Blyton’s about groups of kids solving crime and having adventures.

16.       Fantastic Mr Fox by Roald Dahl

Another in Dahl’s amazing catalogue of children’s books.  I was a big fan of this story of Mr Fox and his struggles to feed his family and the other underground creatures in the face of constant attack from Messrs Boggis, Bunce and Bean.  The edition I had contained a brilliant illustration, showing Fox’s underground run from his burrow to the farmers’ storehouses.  It’s a shame that the recent film takes liberties with the story.  Mini-Falaise thoroughly enjoyed this when I read it to her.

17.       Diving Adventure by Willard Price

I read all of Price’s wildlife-based adventure stories but tended to enjoy the diving or sea-set ones best.  This

one revolved around a diving expedition to an underwater city to collect specimens and the whole underwater city really grabbed my imagination (The whole undersea thing may explain why The Spy Who Loved Me remains one of my favourite Bond movies).  Some of Price’s attitudes are a bit anachronistic but I am glad to see that some of the books have been reissued - I bought two of them for my oldest nephews birthday last year.

18.       Mrs Pepperpot by Alf Prøysen

I only read some of the Mrs Pepperpot stories but they were very enjoyable.  For those unaware of her, Mrs Pepperpot is a little, old lady with the unfortunate habit of sometimes shrinking to the size of a pepper pot, occasioning some inventive stories of how she escapes from the tricky situations this lands her in.

19.       My Friend Mr Leakey by J.B.S. Haldane

Haldane is better known as a geneticist and Marxist but I first encountered him in his guise as author of this wonderful little book, containing stories about Mr Leakey, a magician, his Djin, pet dragon and servant, an octopus.  The stories were really inventive (I particularly enjoyed A Meal With A Magician) and the illustrations are by Quentin Blake, always a plus point.  I’m pretty sure there’s a reference to custard apples in here that really fired my imagination (I really loved custard as a child).  I pestered my mother for years to find one and, when she finally did, I was most disappointed with the flavour.  Anyway, I’ve bought a copy of this and am looking forward to reading it with mini-Falaise in due course.

20.       Stig of the Dump by Clive King

One day Barney, whilst out exploring the woodland near his house discovers a cave-boy living in a pit amongst the rubbish.  Although Barney’s parents don’t believe him when he tells them about Stig, the two become friends and have lots of adventures exploring the woods.  It’s brilliant and an absolute classic and I loved it.

I’m now 40 per cent. through my Top 50 list and it’s turning out to be quite different to that of The Times, although there are some overlaps.  Do come back tomorrow - or possibly the next day - for another instalment.

My Top Fifty Childrens' Books - the First Instalment

As promised in my last post, this is the first post in a short series setting out my fifty favourite childrens’ books to compare to the Times list of 50 ‘must reads’ for the youth of today.  Like The Times, I’m going to try to stick to books that I consider to be childrens’ books.  I don’t recall the concept of YA being particularly well-developed in my day - there were just childrens’ books and adult books and one jumped from one to the other quite abruptly, via a short period of mixed reading.  Consequently, many of my favourite reads from my childhood are books that we would normally think of as being adult reads - the likes of Wodehouse, Waugh and a plethora of detective stories.  So, once these are taken out of the equation, I was really left with the books I read from the ages of about 6 through to 11 or 12, by which time I was reading almost exclusively what we would regard as adult books.

I’m not sure whether I would have preferred to have had access to today’s acclaimed books for teenaged audiences - I sometimes wonder whether they are really necessary or whether we would do better to encourage teens to engage with good adult writing.  That’s not a criticism of either young readers, their mentors or the authors of teen books; it’s really just a vague feeling that, in over-focusing or categorising, we end up limiting ourselves or our children.  In any event, I can’t say that I feel I missed out.  Unlike The Times, however, I haven’t limited myself to one entry per author - writers like Roald Dahl, who delighted me as a child deserve more than one measly shout-out.

I’m going to list my favourites ten at a time and they are in no particular order, although they are, of course, very much “of a time” - in my case the late ‘70s!

1.         Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl

I say that I’ve not put them in any order but this would have been pretty much near the top had I tried to do

so.  I LOVE this book.  I love the fantastical sweets and chocolates, I love the incredible world of Wonka, I love the slightly strange ambiguity of Wonka and I love the whole golden ticket idea……..and who wouldn’t love the idea of owning their own chocolate factory, filled with Oompa-Loompas.  The nearest I ever got was a visit to a Nestlé chocolate factory in Switzerland on a school trip in 1981 - at the end we were given 90 seconds to grab as much chocolate as we wanted from a massive sample table.  Happy days.  I’ve already read this to mini-Falaise, who was gratifyingly enamoured of it.

2.         The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Anyone who has followed this blog over time will be aware of my Tolkien-love and, as I’ve posted on The Hobbit before, I don’t intend to repeat myself here.  Suffice it to say, this was the gateway drug for my youthful addiction to fantasy writing.  The Times had it at number one and I wouldn’t be arguing against that.  Simply wonderful stuff.  There’s a beautiful Folio Society edition on mini-Falaise’s shelves for when she’s ready.

3.         The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper

I’ve written about this sequence of five fantasy stories before on here.  The overarching plot of the cycle is the age-old battle between the dark and the light set in a Celtic-Arthurian background.  The stories move from Cornwall to Wales and the heart of England and the tone varies from childrens’ adventure to something much darker as the cycle moves on.  I can’t see how The Times managed to leave it off their list as it is wonderful stuff.

4.         Professor Branestawm by Norman Hunter

Professor Branestawm was an archetypal eccentric inventor who appeared in a series of 13 books written by Norman Hunter. I only read the first few as I’d grown out of them by the time the last ones were published in the ‘80s but I loved them as a young boy.  Branestawm, who lived in the village of Great Pagwell, (surrounded by Little Pagwell, Pagwell Heights, Pagwell Gardens and several other Pagwells), specialised in weird and wonderful inventions that went spectacularly wrong, causing all sorts of problems for the Professor, his housekeeper, Mrs Flittersnoop, and his friends.  As well as being very funny, the books were marvellously illustrated.  Although many of the books are now out of print, a couple have been reissued by Red Fox and I must try and get hold of one for nostalgia’s sake.

5.         Agaton Sax by Nils-Olof Franzén

Wallander? Van Veeteren? Sarah Lund? Harry Hole?  Frankly, you can keep your Scandi-noir detectives because Agaton Sax is the daddy of Scandinavian crime fighters.  Sax, from Bykoping, was the hero of a series of stories such as Agaton Sax and the Diamond Thieves, Agaton Sax and the Max Brothers and Agaton Sax and the Criminal Doubles, in which he not aonly assists his hapless friend Lispington of the police but, in his spare time, runs Bykoping’s newspaper.  The books are a pastiche of detective fiction and are hilarious.  What really capped the English translations though, were the illustrations, drawn by the legendary Quentin Blake.

6.         The Famous Five by Enid Blyton

She may be unfashionable now and distinctly un-PC but I used to thoroughly enjoy Blyton’s books as a boy.  I can’t single out one Famous Five book for this list as I loved and read them all.  Even in their newly-bowdlerised state, they remain good old-fashioned adventuer stories……..with lashings of ginger beer!

7.         The Children of the New Forest by Frederick Marryat

One evening my father returned from work with two leather (or, more likely, faux leather!) bound books forTreasure Island.  I read this one first and was captivated by it.  Set in the English Civil War, its lead characters are the four Beverley children, orphaned by the death of their father, a Cavalier officer, at the battle of Naseby.  When the Puritan forces burn down their home, they are presumed dead but, having been rescued by the local gamekeeper, they are hidden in his cottage.  The plot focuses on the oldest boy, Edward, and his love for Patience, daughter of a Puritan.  The book favours the Royalists and was one of the earliest true historical novels.  It has stood up well to the test of time, having been written in the 1800s.

me as a present - this and

8.         The Wandering Wombles by Elizabeth Beresford

Those dratted humans are building a big road through Wimbledon Common and Great Uncle Bulgaria decides the Wombles need a new home.  Inexplicably, however, he sends out Bungo and Orinoco to scout for new homes, resulting in a trip to Loch Ness and Buckingham Palace.  I liked all of the Wombles books (and the TV shows and pretty much everything Womble-related) but this one has stuck in the mind as being particularly fun.  The books were reissued a couple of years ago and I’m looking forward to introducing mini-Falaise to them in due course.

9.         James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

Crossing the Atlantic inside a giant, ripe peach with a cozy stone and a crew of talking over-sized insects?  YES, PLEASE.  Another storming effort from the Master, featuring the dreadful Aunts Spyker and Sponge and an unusual way of getting rid of the unnecessary parents - death by escaping rhino.  Mini-Falaise loved it (although she got scared by the cloud giants) as I did all those years ago (without getting scared by the cloud giants - honest.).

10.       The Magic Pudding by Norman Lindsay

It’s about a pudding that reforms every time it’s been eaten.  Yes, a never-ending pudding.  Need I go on?  Oh, OK then.  It’s Australian and features three companions, including Bunyip Bluegum, a koala bear, who are constantly having to guard the pudding from the Pudding Thieves.  Lindsay wrote it to win an argument that children would rather read about food and fighting than fairies.  It’s for the younger reader but it’s great fun.

See you tomorrow (hopefully) for my next instalment………………

Best Childrens' Books Ever? You Decide

The Times recently published an article in which a distinguished panel of literary figures compiled a list of fifty books they believe every child should read.  It’s not the only such list out there – the Independent did one a couple of years and the Telegraph had a bumper Top 100 list five years ago, but, nevertheless, it’s an interesting one.  The article can be found here but I’ve set out the bare list here, omitting the paragraph of commentary on each one.  I’d recommend giving the article a read (although it sits behind a paywall) to see whether you agree with the given reasoning – it’s well worth it.

Although there are many indisputable ‘must-reads’ on the list, there are a number of surprising omissions.  There’s no place for Harry Potter or anything by the wonderful Julia Donaldson.  Jacqueline Wilson, much lauded for her books dealing with difficult issues for children doesn’t make the cut and Michael Morpurgo, Childrens’ Laureate and author of War Horse is similarly missing.  The Famous Five and Secret Seven are absent as are Jim Hawkins and Long John Silver of Treasure Island fame.  I also have a personal grievance that they excluded Susan Cooper’s brilliant The Dark is Rising cycle and would guess that the judging criteria permitted only one book by each author to feature (how else to explain there being only one Roald Dahl entry).  I’m pleased that there was room for older books such as Vice Versa confirming that great literature is timeless, although I suspect that political correctness may have done for Enid Blyton, W.E. Johns' Biggles books and, possibly, Willard Price.

It's also interesting in that it highlights the question of what constitutes 'childrens literature'.  Back in my day, the book world was divided into adult literature and childrens literature but in recent years, books have become more and more categorised - YA, MG, new adult etc.  Yet, there are books on the list like The Diary of Anne Frank which weren't written with a particular audience in mind.  Equally, series like His Dark Materials and The Hunger Games have audiences that reach well beyond the underaged.  A personal example is One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Alexander Solzhenitsyn's novel of life in the Soviet gulag.  Not written specifically for children, we read it at prep school and it was a childhood favourite.  How do books like this fit in to this kind of list?

I suspect it’s cause for celebration that one can rattle off any number of books and authors that could have been on the list without even having to give it much thought.  My love of reading was definitely nurtured as a child by the combination of generous parents who almost never said no to a trip to the library or the bookshop and the ready availability of exciting books to read.  If that was the case in the 1970s, the same must go in spades for today’s children, judging by the number of recent books in the list as well as those mentioned above, most of which weren’t around in my youth.

Mini-Falaise is reading now and clearly loving it – Mrs F and I often turn a blind eye to the sound

of her reading out loud after bedtime and, over the next few years, I hope to facilitate this love.  I’m going to need to strike a balance between steering her towards books I loved and allowing her to explore the vast country of Literature.  I’ve been slowly and piecemeal starting a collection of books for her, including some gorgeous Folio Society editions, but need to slow down to give her the space to find her own way.

In any event, I am so looking forward to her first years of ‘proper’ reading – I hope she loves some of my favourites and that we discover some great new books together.  The Times list and mini-Falaise have inspired me to make my own list – I’ll be posting it in sections over the next few posts – please do stop by and let me know how you think it stacks up to the Times and to your own favourite childhood reads.

The Times 50 Books Every Child Should Read

1.  The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien

2.  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

3.  The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

4.  His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman

5.  Tom’s Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce

6.  A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin

7.  The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis

8.  The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge

9.  The Iron Man by Ted Hughes

10.  The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner

11.  Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

12.  Finn Family Moomintroll by Tove Jansson

13.  The Sea of Trolls by Nancy Farmer

14.  Just William by Richmal Crompton

15.  Matilda by Roald Dahl

16.  The Midnight Folk by John Masefield

17.  The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

18.  Each Peach Pear Plum by Janet and Allan Ahlberg

19.  Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne

20.  Stories for Children by Oscar Wilde

21.  Hellbent by Anthony McGowan

22.  The Mouse and His Child by Russell Hoban

23.  Five Children and It by E. Nesbit

24.  The Magicians of Caprona by Diana Wynne Jones

25.  The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr

26.  The Sword in the Stone by T. H. White

27.  The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff

28.  The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter

29.  The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling

30.  The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

31.  The Cat in the Hat by Dr Seuss

32.  How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

33.  The Wolves of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken

34.  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

35.  The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

36.  One Dog and His Boy by Eva Ibbotson

37.  The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier

38.  The Man Whose Mother Was a Pirate by Margaret Mahy

39.  Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz

40.  How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell

41.  Coram Boy by Jamila Gavin

42.  The Borrowers by Mary Norton

43.  The Snow-walker’s Son by Catherine Fisher

44.  Holes by Louis Sachar

45.  Goodnight Mister Tom by Michelle Magorian

46.  Kit’s Wilderness by David Almond

47.  Wolf Brother by Michelle Paver

48.  Vice Versa by F. Anstey

49.  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

50.  Hairy Maclary from Donaldson’s Dairy by Lynley Dodd