Wednesday 30 December 2009

2010 Feature

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I live in a big house. There I said it. In this big house we have a  library. Despite it being a big house and the library a big room we still can’t fit all our books in that room. We have books hidden away in cupboards, on ledges and in bedrooms. Today I went on an archaeological dig in one of the cupboards where we currently keep the children’s books (there being no children in the family right now). I was on a mission to find a certain children’s book. I didn’t find it, but I did find some other books. Some I had forgotten we owned. Some I didn’t know we owned (one I had planned on reading so that was good). And some I wanted to use for a feature I will be running on this blog during 2010.

I was buying books for my friends little girl earlier this year and I realised how many of the absolutely fantastic children’s books I read as a child are now translated to English, at the same time I feel that many don’t know about them. I intend to change that. Single handily if I have to! So during 2010 I will be featuring my favourite Swedish authors. Primarily authors of children’s books but I might also sneak in a couple of adult authors later in the year.

I will be starting out with Astrid Lindgren in January. She is the queen or possibly the empress of Swedish children’s literature. You cannot have grown up in Sweden and not have read or have had something by Astrid Lindgren read to you. Many of the books have also been adapted to film and television. Hope you’ll stop by and get to know and author who, undoubtedly shaped my world view.

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3 comments:

Kristen M. said...

What a fantastic idea! I learned this year about a few of the great British authors that I missed out on as a kid. I'm excited to learn more Swedish ones now!

Table Talk said...

I'm glad that more non-English speaking children's authors are finding their way into translation, but it is still disgraceful how few of the very great continental writers are to be found on UK bookshelves. Anything that you can recommend will go high onto my reading list.

Sheila (Bookjourney) said...

I had this "book opportunity" as well. The new shelves came this week.... LOL I had to do something!