BOOK SMART
To celebrate World Book Day on March 4, CHARLOTTE HEATHCOTE asks some children’s authors to tell us about their favourite reads
NOT even a global pandemic can stop World Book Day. While kids may not be able to go into school dressed as their favourite characters, they can still get involved because all of this year’s events are taking place online.
To get you in the mood and find out why books are so important, we asked some World
Book Day authors about their own favourite reads…
Which book ignited your love of reading?
Katherine Rundell: I loved The Hobbit and longed for a magic ring. And reading Diana Wynne Jones’s books showed me that books for children could bew funny and wry and ironical and vivid and ambitious. She was a true genius.
Joseph Coelho: The Cat In The Hat by Dr Seuss. There was something very comforting in the idea that you can occasionally allow things to be chaotic and fun without everything falling apart.
Alexander Bellos: The Hobbit. Zanib Mian: Chicken Licken, a Ladybird First Favourite Tales book. I was drawn in by the silly rhyming names of the animals. Jonny Duddle: Where The Wild
Things Are by Maurice Sendak. I would draw the Wild Things myself, or make up my own, and now that’s my job.
If you could be a character in a children’s book, who would it be?
AB: Charlie Bucket from Charlie And The Chocolate Factory because I like chocolate. In moderation, of course. JC: Peter Pan so I could visit Neverland, annoy the pirates and fly!
KR: Moonintroll in Tove Jansson’s Moomin books. Moomintroll has some superb adventures and is endlessly curious about the world. ZM: I couldn’t get enough of the Dr Seuss books so it would probably be one of his zany characters.
JD: Max in Where The Wild Things Are. The biggest attraction would be a wild rumpus with the Wild Things, dressed in a wolf suit.
Why is reading important to you?
ZM: I was a bit socially awkward as a child. Reading was magical, it gave me an escape into worlds other than my own, full of possibilities and acceptance.
AB: Reading can help transport me to different worlds... and it makes me laugh.
JC: Reading opens up other worlds, it allows the chance to walk in the shoes of others, to take a stroll around someone else’s head, to see how they think and to discover new ideas.
JD: I drift towards books that help me escape real life, the fantastical and strange. So reading helps me relax, to get away from screens and the stresses of life.
Books are the closest thing we have to... real tangible magic Author Katherine Rundell
What’s your favourite aspect of World Book Day?
JC: You get to visit schools and experience teachers and students in fancy dress or involved in craft activities all celebrating books. And it’s a joy to know that one day each year many young people get a book for free. For many, this will be the first book they’ve ever owned.
JD: It’s a day for children to think about the books they love and discover new ones.
Each year, I get sent pictures of children dressed as my characters, clutching battered, well-read copies of the books I’ve written, and that is so rewarding.
KR: Books are the closest thing we have to telepathy, the closest thing that we have to time travel, to real tangible magic: with every book you read, the interior world you inhabit grows larger.