Posted by Alan Hakim on July 10, 2003 at 18:40:11 from 212.137.232.142 user awhakim.
The UK Daily Telegraph Saturday Books section has a regular column when an established author writes about a childhood favourite book.
Last week's read:
I have never been so entirely lost in an imaginative world as I was when I read Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons. From the moment the children first sailed across the lake to their uncharted island, I was hooked, alive to the sound of water slapping against the boat and the smell of the campfire. The way they elaborated everything into a vividly imagined adventure turned my whole world into a daydream for years, And although all the ginger beer and gender stereotypes seem a little old-fashioned these days, there can still be no better licence for living than the immortal telegram that begins their adventures Better drowned than duffers. If not duffers won't drown.
The article says Jon's most recent book is If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things.