One of the participants in my memoir-writing class remembered reading Little Toot by Hardie Gramatky, a 1939 classic children’s book about a courageous little tugboat, to her four-year-old son. It became his favorite book, and he demanded that she read it nearly every night for about a year. “I guess it’s true that literature has great power,” she said, “because he was fascinated by boats from then on. In fact he made them his life’s work – he’s now the captain of a ferry boat!”
What did your mom read to you when you were young? How did that book affect you? Or … what are you reading to your children or grandchildren right now?
Technorati Tags: writing sharing history consequences children's literature memoir-writing Little Toot Hardie Gramatky tug boat ferry boat
one of the books my 2 daughters really seemed to enjoy was also one of my favs when I was young,
* The Secret Garden*…
back in Feb my Middlechild was married in Savannah
in a magical little walled, plant filled courtyard that had the feeling of a Secret Garden…
so much like the one we all pictured when we read that book.
I too loved The Secret Garden as a child, and read it to both of my daughters as well, & they too loved it. We also all loved Winnie The Pooh and Anne of Green Gables, and the Roald Dahl books. I’m looking forward to my 2 grandchildren getting old enough to enjoy these books too, and I can relive my own delight in discovery with them.