Your Favourite Book From Childhood
I briefly touched on my favourite childhood books last week when I was talking about The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom.
I was trying to think if there were any particular books I remember from when I was really little and the main one I think I remember is The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, but then again it could have been that my brother had it.
Around about the age of 9 or 10, I went through a stage of not being able to sleep well – I don’t really know why but I ended up reading and reading and reading until I would fall asleep. I think this was what created my passion for reading now. I remember also having The Borrowers Omnibus which was fine but it was about 4 or 5 inches thick and I couldn’t really lift it to be able to read it while in bed so I would get it off the bookcase try reading a few pages then give up and put it back on the bookcase. It was about this time that I started getting Shakespeare plays out of the library to read. I remember reading Romeo and Juliet or Midsummer Night’s Dream when I was about 11 or 12 I think (and it was under my own steam in fact yes I was a strange child! I’m not sure if I remember how much I understood at the time but it stretched what I was reading and often gave me a head start in front of my class at school).
When I was at Middle School I was in the middle set for English rather than the top set (I think it was to do with lack of space and my surname being near the end of the alphabet but that’s a whole other argument to be having). Anyway so I was in the middle set and the top set was reading Enduring Love by Ian McEwan – so what did I do? I went to the library with my Dad (As we did most weeks while me and my brother were growing up) and I got it out the library – I read it about the same speed (if not slightly faster) than the class in my own time while still doing my normal work for English at school.
