Writing Worth Reading
Writing Worth Reading
I’ve picked the story of ‘The Elephant’s Child’. It’s pure nostalgia. It was the first book I was ever read and the first book I ever wanted to hear again and again and again simply because I just love the language of it, things like, ‘the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever trees’. I haven’t got a clue what any of it meant, but it didn’t matter. It was just a wonderful way of dropping richness into his language and it makes you smile and feel joyful to be alive.
Your next choice is from The Just So Stories.
Yes, I’ve picked the story of ‘The Elephant’s Child’. It’s pure nostalgia. It was the first book I was ever read and the first book I ever wanted to hear again and again and again simply because I just love the language of it. I love the music and the words and the way he writes, things like, ‘the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever trees’. I haven’t got a clue what any of it meant, but it didn’t matter. It was just a wonderful way of dropping richness into his language and it makes you smile and feel joyful to be alive.
It’s also enormous fun. It’s one of those books that are so silly and every child knows it’s silly too. It’s so wonderfully contrived and it’s also the dream of every child to get their own back on the world of adults. Here you have a naughty elephant who asks far too many questions and is always being slapped and hit by every relation that he has got. The elephant goes off and asks the question which he absolutely shouldn’t ask of a crocodile and gets a long nose. Then he comes back with his long nose and slaps every relative who has ever ticked him off. It’s payback time for the elephant.
Read full interview
Former Children’s Laureate and award-winning author Michael Morpurgo is widely recognised as a master storyteller and has won numerous awards for his work, including the Smarties Book Prize, the Writer’s Guild Award and the Blue Peter Book Award for Private Peaceful. Michael and his wife Clare founded the charity Farms for City Children and live in Devon. His novel War Horse was made into a highly successful play by the National Theatre and is now in its second year in the West End.
