Turn up for the books
WORLD Book Day is always a real occasion in my son’s school – last year, first thing in the morning, the headmistress and her deputy put on curly grey wigs and drove round and round the playground on a mobility scooter as Gangsta Grannies.
Some parents go all-out – 8ft cardboard BFG anyone? – but we’ve never felt the need to break the bank or call in the Jim Henson Creature Shop to make a costume look good.
Our first book day costume was recycled from Halloween, when a grim reaper cloak handily doubled up to clothe a dementor from JK Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (admittedly fairly dark for Foundation 2, but my son was going through an early goth phase).
Last year’s inspiration was Roald Dahl’s George’s Marvellous Medicine, for which we needed an apron, a spoon and a juice bottle filled with coloured water and glitter – the marvellous medicine.
This year, I combed the charity shops on behalf of my now Harry Potter-mad son.
Imagine my delight when, by chance, I saw the maroon and black Gryffindor colours on the costume rack on sale – in his size
– for the princely sum of £2.99.
World Book Day fires my imagination, and I enjoy thinking back to all my favourite childhood characters.
I cherished my story books and the illustrations still stick in my mind.
I loved the page on which the woodcutter rushes in to save Little Red Riding Hood from the Big Bad Wolf, who was wearing Grandma’s half-moon glasses and mop cap. I remember the beaky, warty nose of the witch who climbed up Rapunzel’s tremendous tresses, and also the weird, tricky little man called Rumpelstiltskin who could spin straw into gold. He looked so angry, stamping his spindly legs, cheeks glowing red, on the page when the hero guessed his name. Jeff Brown’s Flat Stanley was another of my favourites. He was so flat he could slide under a door and even post himself as a letter.
If I was at school now I’d dress up as Mildred Hubble from Jill Murphy’s The Worst Witch.
The stripy tights and black dress would be my costume, but the messy hair and nose for trouble would be all mine.