I’m quite at one with Bill’s hatred of Harry Potter. I read the first chapter of the first book and had to be woken from my slumbers by an intravenous injection of adrenaline.
Bill’s diatribe, though, reminded me of something that he and I wrote together back in January 2002. Which just rubs in how long this irritating craze has been going on.
CHILDREN’S literature is undergoing a renaissance. Even disregarding the hype that has propelled Harry Potter to the top of the best-seller lists, sales of children’s books are booming. But herein lies the problem. Once your kids have rattled through JK Rowling’s latest, worked their way through all of Melvin Burgess and become bored with Jacqueline Wilson, how do you help them sustain a passion for the written word?
The trick, as always, is to build on your children’s existing enthusiasms. For example, the Potter books are chock full of magic, spells and broomsticks, so why not introduce your offspring to the occult proper? An early introduction to Aleister Crowley’s Liber Legis the Cabala and the works of Hermes Trismegistus can do wonders for the developing mind, and the scope for your little ones to get involved in practical work is almost unlimited. However, it pays to be cautious and to ensure that your children only attempt work that is suitable for their ages - for example, it is almost certain that Crowley had passed through puberty before he tried to make magic pills out of his own semen.
Of course, magic is not to everyone’s taste, and you may find that your young ones prefer to read about contemporary issues such as drugs, sex, divorce and broken homes. Again, Jacqueline Wilson and Melvin Burgess do a good job at introducing the young to these themes, but they too have their limitations. Fortunately, there is a wealth of literature out there that will expand your children’s horizons and equip them for their journeys through life.
Top of the ‘contemporary’ issues list is the multi-talented Scottish writer, Alexander Trocchi. Before his death in 1984, this much travelled man saw life from many angles - as a pimp, pornographer, heroin addict, forger and (more controversially) literary editor. Start your young ones off with the classic Helen and Desire, a delightful tale of self-realisation and the search for fulfilment, and pretty shortly they will find themselves at one with “a tingling pleasure which passed through my prostate frame in contented shudders.” Such is the power of the story in the hands of a master!
Sadly, school stories no longer enjoy the vogue of yesteryear; but, with a little imagination, your young ones will soon be lapping up tales of the classroom and playing field. One gem, Please Master, by the youth poet Allan Ginsberg shows children how an ideal love can exist between a pupil and teacher, spurring both on to new and higher things. Likewise, Stephen Fry’s Liar is an excellent handbook on how charm and a little panache can help a pupil steer a course through the choppy waters of a school, and emerge deeply loved by all at the very end.
Sensible as all these suggestions are, it is of paramount importance to begin your children’s education as early as possible - after all, didn’t John Stewart Mill start learning Greek and the tender age of five? Ensure that the young ones have a good library in the nursery at the outset - calfskin-bound copies of the Satyricon, Les Fleurs du Mal, A Rebours and Rochester’s poems are all likely to spark an early interest in the power of narrative. You can also go further, slipping a few grains of opium into the toddler’s milk, building the dose up until the youngster develops the sensibilities of a truly thoughtful reader. This has great advantages when the little one begins to show signs of philistinic rebellion - you can threaten to cut off supplies until they move you to tears with learnt-by-heart renditions of Une charonge, or possibly Femmes damnées
A final note of caution, however. Some young people will refuse to read unless they encounter stories of adventure, in which the protagonists are all children. Worrying as such behaviour may be, it’s normally just a phase that can be solved by a judicious whole-family reading of the works of the Marquis de Sade. These enchanting stories feature many adventurous kids taking part in all manner of adventures and red-hot action, all set in the most brilliant fantasy world. Indeed, a most valuable lesson for us all.
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Hi Quinkie
I don’t like the books because the writing’s poor but I do like the films because the stories are good. Kids are getting excited about books. Something’s going right. Perhaps they’ll find some different ones to read.
xxx
Pants
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