Paul Whybrow
Full Member
British writer Lucy Mangan has just published a charming book in which she reminisces on her childhood reading:
Bookworm review: Lucy Mangan looks back at the books that inspired a lifelong love
My parents were both avid readers, with mum favouring books about nature, including the Gerald Durrell non-fiction adventures with his family and other animals, while dad preferred manly action novels by Wilbur Smith.
I devoured many of the Enid Blyton stories, initially the Noddy tales, then The Famous Five and the Adventurous Four, which is when I first became aware of how a writer churned out a series.
My mum introduced me the public library, which I thought was the best idea ever! Orchard Road Library was opposite a stately mansion, guarded by high brick walls, which were embedded with shards of glass in the top—to discourage scrumping youngsters who might shin over to steal the apples from the large orchard—some of the trees were so tall, that they shed their fruit onto the road to be crushed by cars. I doubt that it's legal to use broken glass as a security measure these days, though razor wire is OK! Seeing the glass made me aware of 'them and us'—how the rich kept commoners away from their possessions, even if they were only apples.
The single-story 1950s library stood at the top of the road, and was one open space, with a carpeted children's section and a small room that served as the reading room and reference library. In the early 1960s, information was gleaned from newspapers in a rack, and a book case of encyclopedias and dictionaries, Wisden Cricketers' Almanack and Old Moore's Almanack.
There was a table for spreading the broadsheet newspapers out, which I sometimes did, as I liked feeling grown-up and getting black newsprint on my fingers!
Above the bookcase was a framed print of Édouard Manet's A Bar at the Folies-Bergère, which puzzled me at the time, and for years afterwards, as it's fraught with problems of perspective and layout. I didn't realise for several decades, that the barmaid's reflection is shown in the painting, as I thought it was a second barmaid facing away from the viewer. I first became aware of art by staring at this painting every week.
Other reading matter came from what were then called bric-a-brac or junk shops, and I grew up trying to learn things from rather dated sets of encyclopedias which clung to a colonial take on the world, as they'd been printed as the British Empire was breaking up, with countries seeking independence.
For leisure reading, I was captivated by the Biggles WW1 fighter ace adventures and Tarzan of the Apes, both of which ran into scores of stories. In true child is father to the man fashion, I'm now writing the fifth novel in my own Cornish Detective series, which is set in the world of art, and has a sub-theme of class war.
How did you get infected with the reading bug?
Did you visit a neighbourhood library?
Was your reading matter sourced from charity/thrift stores, car boot sales or garage sales?
Remember the thrill of receiving a book token as a birthday or Christmas present?
Bookworm review: Lucy Mangan looks back at the books that inspired a lifelong love
My parents were both avid readers, with mum favouring books about nature, including the Gerald Durrell non-fiction adventures with his family and other animals, while dad preferred manly action novels by Wilbur Smith.
I devoured many of the Enid Blyton stories, initially the Noddy tales, then The Famous Five and the Adventurous Four, which is when I first became aware of how a writer churned out a series.
My mum introduced me the public library, which I thought was the best idea ever! Orchard Road Library was opposite a stately mansion, guarded by high brick walls, which were embedded with shards of glass in the top—to discourage scrumping youngsters who might shin over to steal the apples from the large orchard—some of the trees were so tall, that they shed their fruit onto the road to be crushed by cars. I doubt that it's legal to use broken glass as a security measure these days, though razor wire is OK! Seeing the glass made me aware of 'them and us'—how the rich kept commoners away from their possessions, even if they were only apples.
The single-story 1950s library stood at the top of the road, and was one open space, with a carpeted children's section and a small room that served as the reading room and reference library. In the early 1960s, information was gleaned from newspapers in a rack, and a book case of encyclopedias and dictionaries, Wisden Cricketers' Almanack and Old Moore's Almanack.
There was a table for spreading the broadsheet newspapers out, which I sometimes did, as I liked feeling grown-up and getting black newsprint on my fingers!
Above the bookcase was a framed print of Édouard Manet's A Bar at the Folies-Bergère, which puzzled me at the time, and for years afterwards, as it's fraught with problems of perspective and layout. I didn't realise for several decades, that the barmaid's reflection is shown in the painting, as I thought it was a second barmaid facing away from the viewer. I first became aware of art by staring at this painting every week.
Other reading matter came from what were then called bric-a-brac or junk shops, and I grew up trying to learn things from rather dated sets of encyclopedias which clung to a colonial take on the world, as they'd been printed as the British Empire was breaking up, with countries seeking independence.
For leisure reading, I was captivated by the Biggles WW1 fighter ace adventures and Tarzan of the Apes, both of which ran into scores of stories. In true child is father to the man fashion, I'm now writing the fifth novel in my own Cornish Detective series, which is set in the world of art, and has a sub-theme of class war.
How did you get infected with the reading bug?
Did you visit a neighbourhood library?
Was your reading matter sourced from charity/thrift stores, car boot sales or garage sales?
Remember the thrill of receiving a book token as a birthday or Christmas present?
