Chatiryworld

Upside-down houses and flying through space

There's a great piece in the Guardian Review today by Jenny Uglow, The lure of illustrated children's books.  It's a review of 1001 Children's Books: You Must Read Before You Grow Up by Julia Eccleshare, which I'm hoping Edinburgh Libraries will get hold of soon.  I particularly love the opening paragraph of the article:

'Small children are astoundingly flexible visual readers – they can take in packed scenes just as easily as bold, simple images; they can follow adventures in silhouettes against bright backgrounds and turn without a flicker to the comic-like abstractions of Mr Men. This openness is on a par with their acceptance of magical transformations, upside-down houses and flying through space, and their tendency to anthropomorphise everything, from rabbits to trains and from dinosaurs to umbrellas. They know no boundaries. They also linger over pictures, with a time-defying immersion that grown-ups tend to lose.'

So, so true.  Never underestimate the illustrations that a small child can enjoy.  I always loved packed scenes when I was a child, the more there was to look at and discover, the happier I was.

If you want to know more about 1001 Children's Books, Amy at Sweet Sweet Life wrote a great post about it, which includes lots of images.

Also in this week's review was an interview with Gruffalo author Julia Donaldson.  I had no idea her husband was a paediatrician at Yorkhill.

Wednesday 2nd December 2009

I like has been one of my favourite blogs since I was alerted to it by Amateur Ramblings.  Anne has put together a great shopping guide if you're looking for gifts that are a bit different, many with a good retro British touch, think Tunnocks, Sheffield University Arts Tower and fruit and veg.  There's also the I like bookshop which is full of good ideas if you need to buy presents for people called Jon Nagl and Hugh Leishman.

Chatiryworld also has a book shop but I don't find it as interesting as I own pretty much everything in it, or have bought things as gifts for others.

Loveliness from other blogs

Although I was never into Where the Wild Things are as a child (I don't actually think I've even read it), I think this Max stocking by Pip from Meet Me At Mikes is absolutely gorgeous.

Has anyone ever seen 1001 Children's Books: You Must Read Before You Grow Up ?  Normally I shy away from books like that but Sweet Sweet Life posted about it earlier this week and it looks like a really interesting resource.  Forget being told what books you should read, if you just want to learn more about old favourites, see illustrations from previous editions or discover something new, this looks just the ticket.  Not available from Edinburgh Libraries but I'd definitely like to take a look at it.

On comics

Until a few years ago this pretty much summed up adults who read comics to me.  Before all Jon's comic-reading friends disown me, I will redeem myself by the end of the post.  I was wrong.  And yes thinking that is a bit rich from someone who likes buying children's picture books.

As a librarian I didn't really think a lot of the graphic novels we'd get in to entice teenage boys, I just dismissed them as something that wasn't for me.  Sure, I'd read most of the Raymond Briggs books (still not read Ethel and Ernest though), and I think I had a Maid Marian and Her Merry Men comic book.  I liked reading Hugh's Beano and Broons books.  Not forgetting the years I'd spent reading Bunty, Twinkle, My Little Pony, Barbie, Care Bears and Girl comics.  I also collected Alex books for a while.

Then I met Jon and lived happily ever after.  Oh, and rethought my stance on comics.  As well as being into Japanese animation (had a rethink on that one too), Jon also liked comics.  I just ignored them really, and to be honest, I've ignored most of the ones he owns.  But a few months into our relationship I got flu and Jon came over to see me with a rescue package.  One of the things he brought was the graphic novel Blankets by Craig Thomson.  It was just what I needed, easy to read, good illustrations and made me think - but not too much.  Later, when we moved into together, Jon introduced me to Box Office Poison.  It was the sort of novel I liked, only in graphic form.  I looked out the follow up and bought it as a birthday gift for him.

Maybe comics weren't that strange then?  We both got into American Elf, which is absolutely brilliant and can sum up human angst in just a few illustrations.  We've given the books as gifts a couple of times.  I was obviously wrong to totally dismiss this form of literature.

And then earlier this week the blog of one of my favourite shops/galleries in Edinburgh, The Red Door, posted about the Observer/Cape Graphic Short Story Award.  I followed through as the pages posted piqued my interest, and ended up reading a very lovely story by Vivien McDermid.  Moral of the story?  Careful what you dismiss as 'sad' or 'nerdy', you may just end up enjoying it.

Red Velvet and Chocolate Heartache

I can't remember which blog I first read about Harry Eastwood's Red Velvet and Chocolate Heartache cookbook, but I put it on library wishlist after reading about it and having a quick skim through in Waitrose.  I remembered to order it and it's been sitting at here at home for a couple of weeks. 

The recipes are all for cakes and puddings using vegetables.  I made the courgette cupakes on Sunday and added the naughty chocolate icing that also appears in the book.  They're very tasty, but nothing spectacular - although the lack of butter in the actual cakes makes them a bit healthier than most.

The book is beautifully styled, really beautifully styled, lots of cakes in gardens and, my favourites, full size cakes resting in doll's houses.  Love that.  But I won't be buying the book, because I cannot stand the writing style.  It's all a bit naughty schoolgirl, and whilst I can tolerate that for so long, I couldn't in this book.  What really annoyed me most was the little paragraphs personifying each cake: 'This fudge is a loveable boy of about nine...', 'This cake is a great-aunt...'.  I really took against those for some reason. 

It reminded me of was what I was expecting Sophie Dahl's Miss Dahl's Voluptuous Delights to be like.  I got that one out of the library too, months ago, expecting it to be total fluff and badly written.  It wasn't, it was so good that Jon bought it, and his fluff threshold is way below mine.

Red Velvet and Chocolate Heartache can stay on the bookshop shelves.  But I am intrigued by the syrup sponge made using turnip...

Unecessary items

Barbara Trapido is one of my favourite authors.  I got The Travelling Hornplayer free with a magazine about ten years ago and read it on a trip to Orkney.  And loved it.  I don't know why I had never read any of her work before as my mum is also a big fan.  But that's beside the point here.

I collected up her other books, mainly through charity shops as I was a student at the time.  I don't own Frankie and Stankie because I just didn't enjoy it as much as the others.  Anyway, today I was reading the latest posts at Design*Sponge, and discovered that artist Alice Stevenson has illustrated the covers for the latest editions of Barbara Trapido's novels.  They're lovely and I want them.

But that's ridiculous and goes against my ideals of trying to spending less, especially on totally unecessary purchases.  I already own them and though they might be a bit battered they're battered because I love them.  When I see my copy of The Travelling Hornplayer I not only see a novel I love but it also reminds me of a great holiday.  I wouldn't get that with a new book, however attractive.

So I won't fritter away my money on them.  I might reread them though, especially since my sister Ellen quoted a passage to me at the wedding.  But those new editions are pretty aren't they?

Anne-with-an-e

I was a massive Anne of Green Gables fan when I was a kid (I reread the first book last year when I was off sick, it was as good as I remembered).  I'm sure I went through phases of longing for red hair (properly red hair, not just the few coppery strands I have in with all my blonde hair, actually the Anne phase probably coincided with my obsession with Sarah Ferguson and her red hair and the royal wedding and all that kind of stuff you love when you're eight), a dress with puffed sleeves and maybe even being called Anne-with-an-e.

So when a scarf inspired by and named after Anne appeared on last autumn's Knitty it went straight on my Ravelry queue.  It remained there until a few months ago when I started knitting it down at my mum's.  I didn't work much on it after then but decided it would be a great honeymoon project (I'll blog about that soon).  I used some yarn I bought at the Handspinner Having Fun in Skye last year, I never noted down what it was but I think there is some bamboo involved.  It's a lovely soft scarf and will be very cosy come the cooler days of autumn and winter.

The faces of poetry

Jon and I currently feature on the homepage for BBC Radio 3's Poetry Season.  If that seems completely random, let me explain.  The photo was taken about 10 minutes after we got engaged and I titled it using a quote from Edwin Muir's The Confirmation.  This was one of the poems selected by presenter Mary Anne Kennedy for the season, and when someone from the BBC searched for images using the same quote I used as a title, they got our photo.  I thought the photo might appear on a page about the poem, rather than the general one as it's not really clear why we're there.  Not that it matters, we (and you) know why.

I am finding it very surreal that people start arriving in Edinburgh tomorrow for our wedding.  I'd blog more about it all but I'm finding it all pretty tiring.  Nearly there though when all our hard work will be worth it.

Quirky travel books

Via a couple of the too-many-design-blogs-I-read, I saw a new guide book for Paris yesterday, Paris: Made by hand.  I ended up having a little explore around the publishers (The Little Bookroom) website and they seem to have a good selection of slightly quirky travel books.  I've already had Chic Shopping Paris down as one to look out for, and The Patisseries of Paris sounds like something we should check out (no actual plans to go to Paris, but we probably will in the next few years).

The books aren't all for Paris and France though, The Civilised Shopper's Guide to Edinburgh and Glasgow sounds like my kind of thing, and I think Jon and Hugh would both enjoy The Traditional Shops and Restaurants of London (as an aside, do other Edinburgers remember that shop on Victoria Street that seemed to sell brushes and broom handles?).

If you're looking for more travel book suggestions for the UK, Anne at I like has a very interesting Amazon store.  As well as a very interesting blog of course, that I found via Amateur Ramblings a couple of years ago.

Sea change

Just going through my pile of magazines to see which ones I can live without (and give to Jon's mum and sister to read on the train).  One of them is the October 2008 edition of Coast, which has got to be one of the most self-indulgent magazines out there, but I like it.  There's a photo shoot that's themed around a lovely poem by Cromarty poet Jane Verburg, Sea Change.  You can read it over at Cromarty: Living by the sea.  I think it sums up living by the sea very well.