When I was little, my parents joined a bookclub which specialised in doing lovely books for kids. Not just good reads, great pics – this was really special editions of classic books. It was a decision that still feels like a gift now – and I still have many of them.
This is a point at which I really need to break out the pictures to show you what they look like – and I will, I promise. I’m looking to get an upgrade for the site soon, where I can actually link to things without the system looking blankly at me in surprise.
Still, back to the books. What did they choose? A very special copy of Peter Pan, with those great illustrations that have a cobwebby page opposite them to protect the prints. This one definitely evoked magic – as well as having a striking illustration for that doom-laden opening sentence ‘Two is the beginning of the end.’
A heavily illustrated copy of The Wizard of Oz. I read this one out loud, over the Christmas holidays last year, and it is still such a beauty, really going to town on how the Emerald City looks through those special glasses.
A Maurice Sendak illustrated version of The Nutcracker. Ideal for the Gothic aspects of Nutcracker toys. The Rat King is properly scary – but with the slightly stylised Sendak touch that doesn’t mean you are actually terrified.
Michael Ende’s The Neverending Story, with print in different colours. I think that was one of the last. I don’t remember how old I was when it stopped – perhaps my book habit was being fed more at the library as a way of keeping up.
These ones I definitely know were bookclub purchases. There may have been others. There is a wonderful version of the Sleeping Beauty where the pictures are dreamy, like light falling through dappled trees, foreshadowing the forest that will grow up around the castle, even before she finds the fateful spindle.
There is also a lovely version of The Selfish Giant. In fact, I mis-attributed this in a post in the last little while – I thought it was The Happy Prince that I couldn’t finish reading without crying, but it’s actually this one.
The giant’s emotions, his transition, are writ so large, you live out his grumping, his anger, later his indignation for the little child, as you read it.
The final pages, with pictures of fruit blossoms in the garden, now make me think of the point in Kung Fu Panda where the old tortoise disappears in a whirling cloud of peach petals. I can imagine the giant ebbing away with the blossoms swirling around him.
What does it do for us, having beautiful books? Again, it teaches us that these things are possible – that great stories are worth exquisite illustrations, fine binding, and the weight of hard back covers.
We learn about art, about the noble tradition of children’s book illustration, about how the best books are often the perfect match of picture and words, twined around each other.
It offers something of a child’s worth – that they are entrusted with such treasures. It encourages you to look after them, to open them carefully and pass on the spell to others in time.
I love charity shop book acquisition. And I like a bargain too. Most of our books come in this way, and there is nothing like the thrill of the chase in finding a copy of a book you have been hunting for.
But there is also something of quality, of appreciating something that has been made with care. It says something of the art of making books in the past – the attention lavished on creating illustrated manuscripts.
For now, I am grateful – that this gift was given, and that I still have the enjoyment of it, decades later. So thanks, Mum and Dad, and thanks also for the publishers who made them.