Posted by Magnus Smith on August 29, 2014 at 23:20:36 user Magnus.
Well, it has taken a "softly, softly" approach over the last 11 years, but finally my daughters are reading Ransome. I blame my wife for wading in, all guns blazing, with Enid Blyton books from age 7. I thought it better to take things gently to avoid the backlash that so easily comes from forcing your kids to try something.
In the past 3 years they have liked the film, wanted to come out in a boat, but only recently did they try reading the actual books. Three Million Cheers!
Whilst one daughter has raced through Swallowdale and declared herself eager to start Winter Holiday, and the other daughter has asked to go sailing a third time, I have had to put up with comments like this:
"Dad, I hate to break it to you but Arthur Ransome's drawings are rubbish."
(Cue discussion about why they are DELIBERATELY under-drawn...)
"When can we go rowing again?"
(Rowing? What?! I offered SAILING!)
"Is this whole book going to be about Dick and Dorothea? Where are the Swallows?!"
(The usual fears! "Just keep reading darling.")
"Why are there so many codes? I'm confused all the time."
(Winter Holiday seems to switch from semaphore to morse to the square-and-triangle-on-wall code quite a lot.)
Another thing that really annoyed my daughter was how the map in Swallowdale is the other way up to Winter Holiday. I don't know why this was such a crime! I was surprised to learn it myself, as I assumed all books were the same orientation (actually 3 have North to the right, and 2 have it to the left).
However, I also got such gems as:
"Which would you like best to live in; Swallowdale or Wild Cat Island?"
(Aww! Cue debate about whether living on an island is more exciting, etc.)