Posted by Andy Morley on April 14, 1999 at 18:26:42:
In Reply to: Re: other things a.r. never mentioned posted by Robert Dilley on April 14, 1999 at 02:10:46:
Robert :- "and, in any case, it's all rather dreary and who wants to read about it?" Is almost word-for-word what I wrote about the same two subjects in my one-and-only-ever article for Mixed Moss. But then, in those days I only had three children, they were all quite young and I naively supposed they'd soon grow out of it. But now the eldest will be a teenager in a couple of years and 'poo and wee' still fascinate as much as ever, appear in all the witches' spells she concocts for her younger siblings, and in many of the cartoons that they all of them draw. But I have long since ceased to wave an admonishing finger, having come to the conclusion that an interest in these things is preferable to such interesting activities as throwing frogs at crippled old ladies and tying straw to the tails of unfortunate cats that you would then set ablaze. These were the interesting pursuits of many of my own contemporaries.
Let's face it, it's adults who find these topics 'boring' (which translates into 'embarassing'). Children and teenagers find them endlessly entertaining, and far to be preferred to 'improving books'. Ransome, who was a with-it sort of a cove, probably had his eye on the parents who shelled out for the books as well as the children who would read them.