The authors you grew up with

[Taliesin]

Inspired by this thread (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=22861) where Bibliophile hAad the impression that everyone has read Dr. Seuss, we started thinking how different but at the same time natural one's childhood literature must seem.
Those of our childhood authors that we remember right at this moment (because there are so many of them) and who might be known to you too (since there would be really quite a number of Estonian children writers in that list) are Astrid Lindgren, Hugh Lofting, Tolkien, greek mythology and fairy tales.

But who were your childhood authors?

[Scheherazade]

Apart from the national authors of my native language, Enid Blyton and Charles Dickens.

[Pensive]

Before the age of eleven, I had hardly ever read any English novel. I was an avid reader when it came to Urdu stories: fairy tales, folk tales, detective stories, biographies and all that. I would read a lot of them. But in English books, I had only read works by Enid Blyton and RL Stine.

But when I turned eleven, I tried Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets which I immensely enjoyed and with the help of which, I got into reading English novels. Then very soon, I read all Harry Potter books that had been published at that time, and then I discovered George Eliot, Roald Dahl, Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte, Charles Dickens and Agatha Christie. I think these were the English authors I used to read in my childhood, and even am still not reluctant to read.

There were some tales like Goldilock and Three Bears, Red Riding Hood and Heidi too which I had read by the age of twelve, but I can't remember their authors' names. Actually, I remember the scene when I was in the hospital for an operation and when I recovered, my mother brought me Red Riding Hood which I liked a lot. :D

[papayahed]

My favorite author was Judy Blume (it saddens me that she updated some of her books to be more "modern"). She was very popular in Jr. High, along with SE Hinton.

I know I read more then that but those are the two that really stand out.

[liesl]

when i was very young i enjoyed all the fairy tales, i was also read part of my children's bible every night before i went to sleep.

i can remember enjoying Charlotte's Web, Roald Dahl and Jacqueline Wilson as i grew older. There were always constant trips to the library until i had exhasted most of their children's section.
Other than that i remember spending my time reading horrible histories and horrible sciences (i'm a sucker for knowledge! :p )

[zigzig20s]

I didn't read much as a child. Being a boy, I was expected to play in the garden while a girl would've been expected to read books inside the house...oh well
The only thing I read was probably excerpts from the Bible during religious class every Wednesday...which proved to be fairly useful later, as european/american literature is very much imbued with biblical references.
Then when I turned 10-11 I started reading books - mock-horror books for pre-adolescents. Bless.

[Vedrana]

I have memories of having read the Mallory Towers Series by Enid Blyton. I also enjoyed the "I Hate Fridays" series by Rachael Flynn (an Australian children's writer). I read Dr Seuss, Beatrix Potter, 'Heidi', Paul Jennings (another great children's writer from Australia), and of course the inimitable Roald Dahl.

I remember when I turned ten and my mother gave me a collection of abridged versions of classics, which I read and which spurred me on to try the original versions that I read today.

[mtpspur]

Prior to age 12 or so when Edgar Rice Burroughs began to dominate my reading I was reading Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew mysteries, my father had some of the old Bomba the Jungle Boy and original Tom Swift books, also Rover Boys--so my penchant for series reading was developed early. But Beverly Cleary was a favorite Henry and Ribsy, Beezus and Ramona, etc. Also remember. Literature started for me when I would see neat covers to Classics Illustrated comics and then seek the book out. (True confession--I skipped right to the end for Moby Dick thanks to the comic as I was way too young for Melville.

[Shalot]

When I was a child my mother read Dr. Seuss to me. They say that reading to your child is good for him/her intellectually, so my mother read my stories before I went to bed. The books I remember were:

Do you have the time, Lydia? (I loved the pictures in this one and the colors of the pictures)
Blueberries for Sal (I memorized the book and then pretended to read it)
Make Way for Ducklings

Then in grade school we had scholastic book fairs and the librarian encouraged us to read. Some kids were more into it than others. In the fourth and fifth grade, the teachers would read books to us aloud (books without pictures --- the kind that had chapters) and they kept bookshelves at the back of the room and we were aloud to read them when we were finished with our math and science.

The fourth grade teacher read "The Dollhouse Murders" to us and we were all on the edge of our seats. And she also read The Rats of Nimph to us and I remember being mildly bored by that one.

And in the fifth grade, the teacher read Anne of Green Gables.

As far as books I read on my own I remember the following:

The Babysitters Club Series
The Entire Laura Ingalls Wilder series
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Various Judy Blume Books (including Deenie and Are You There God, it's me Margerite :sick: )
Where the Red Fern Grows
1984 -- this book rocked my world in the fifth grade


and that's all I can come up with right now. Good Night, sweet dreams!

[bouquin]

My parents never read to me when I was little. My mom though borrowed books for me when I was around 7 or 8 - they were mostly stories from the Bible and about legends and I really enjoyed reading them. I discovered the Nancy Drew detective series when I was 10 and was hooked on it for several years. I also read some Hardy Boys, loads of Charlie Brown, and comic books: Jughead and his friends, Sad Sack, Little Lotta, Richie Rich, to name some. I was maybe around 13 when I started reading Agatha Christie and Erle Stanley Gardner (Perry Mason stories).

[ennison]

Captain W E Johns
Daniel Defoe
R.l.S.
Blyton
Once it reached a certain stage it was like a dam had burst and whoosh it was anything and everything. We had a Sunday School library full of fantastic musty old Victorian and early twentieth century literature; a school library with more modern stuff regularly replenished by a man who came in a van and a little local library full of amazing non-fiction.

[Daizee]

I remember whiling away endless hours with a Roald Dahl book. I still have my copy of 'Matilda', which was always my favourite although my much loved edition of 'Charlie and the Chocolate factory' is coverless and has several pages missing! :bawling:

I loved the Horrible Histories series although the Horrible Science ones were a definite turn off for me (I am not a scientist, nor will I ever be).

Still have 'Spot' books too...

[manolia]

As soon as i was able to read my mother bought me volumes of greek mythology and also Aristophanes comedies and the greek tragedies in special editions for children. This proved very good for my development because i learned to love reading from an early age. Later on she intoduced me to the magnificent world of Vernes. As a child i read most of his books. Other books i read as a child was "The Hobbit", "Charlie and the chocolate factory", "Charlotte's web" and of course the Narnia series.

[Niamh]

Enid Blyton (twins at st clares book were my favourites!)
Roald Dahl
Oops forgot C.s.Lewis

[kathycf]

I still own most of my books that I had as a child. I was a huge fan of the Nancy Drew books. I also have the complete set of Laura Ingalls Wilder books, plus an associated cookbook.

My aunt also gave me some books from the 1940s and 1950s by Janet Lambert, those were very good reading. Also the Bobbsey Twins, Ramona the Pest...hmm the Narnia books, The Hobbit, books by Jack London. Lots of books.

When I was a bit older (maybe 11 or so I read several Judy Blume books as well as S. E Hinton. Teen angsty stuff.

[starbuck]

hmm that's hard. Probably Dr. Suess, Stan and Jan Berstein, and various disney based off the movie books. :idea:

[crisaor]

Homer.

My 2nd grade literature teacher used to read us pieces of the Odyssey. I was utterly captivated by it, to say the least. Both the Iliad and the Odyssey have been imprinted in my reader mind ever since.

Oddly enough, I never got into Tolkien until my last year in high school.

[Whifflingpin]

I can't remember any authors I read before I was about 8, except maybe Alison Uttley's Little Grey Rabbit series and Rev. W Audrey's railway series, "Thomas the Tank Engine" etc.

Between 8 & 11 there were E Nesbit, Violet Needham, Kenneth Grahame, Ballantyne (well, "Coral Island" at least,) Melville ("Moby Dick," skipping the boring bits - i.e. the bits I now find most interesting,) Ronald Welch, Rosemary Sutcliffe, and of course Kipling's "Jungle Book."

11-15, same again, + all the Kipling I could get, RLS, A C-D, Trease, Treece, Orczy, Percy Westerman, Alfred Duggan, Buchan, Rider Haggard, Conrad, Burroughs' Mars books & Russian short stories.

I don't remember reading Greek myths or Grimm or Anderson or Malory or tales of Robin Hood, they were just part of the air we breathed, or were absorbed by osmosis or something.

[Kara Ortiez]

I read a lot of the Greek Myths when I was young, as well as the Arthurian legends. At around age 9 or 10 my favourite authors where Jules Verne, Emilio Salgari and Edgar Rice Burroughs which I read in Spanish. My brothers would give me the Hardy Boys to read and I remember enjoying them immensely, but now, after so many years, I remember little more than their titles. Dumas came into my life at around age 12, loved his novels ever since. In elementary school I remember really liking Shane, The Chrysalids and The Prisoner of Zenda.

[Annamariah]

Astrid Lindgren
Mauri Kunnas
C. S. Lewis
L. M. Montgomery
L. M. Alcott
F. H. Burnett
Enid Blyton

[Lyn]

The Redwall Series
Diana Wynne Jones, I still think Fire and Hemlock is the best kids book ever.
Robin Jarvis
Enid Blyton I read endlessly, but only bvecause everyone bought me them for christmas cos they thought I liked reading. I didn't like Blyton, but I read it anyway cos I read everything I could lay my hands on.
What Katy Did..... etc
Roald Dahhl like everyone.
The Children of the New Forest I remember liking a lot.
The first 'real' book I read as a teenager was Wuthering Heights, followed by Tess of DUrbervilles and Jude the Obscure. But I think I might've grown up by then, whatever that means.

[Annamariah]

What Katy Did..... etc

Oh, I completely forgot Katy books :blush:

[DeathAngel]

from a fantasy standpoint it was either The Magic Treehouse (can't remember the author) or of course Harry Potter

Sharon M Draper was pretty darn good and Walter Dean Myers

i've read too many books dagnabit
last i can remember was Nancy Drew n couple of Sherlock Holmes adventure books
yay mystery

[jon1jt]

Freud, Carl Jung, Adler, Wilhelm Riech. spooky stuff for an eight-year old, yes.

[Bakiryu]

I remember going to the library since i was very small. But in my house we had lots of books. My father used to read them to me because i was too small (or sick) to hold them :)

Jose Marti, Antoine de San-Exuperry, Jules Verne, Victor Hugo, Brother's Grim, Astrid Lindgren, Marx, Nietzsche, Greek Myths (Homer) and of course: Alexandre Dumas. I used to read a lot of classics and still do.

[jon1jt]

Jose Marti, Antoine de San-Exuperry, Brother's Grim, Marx, Nietzsche, Greek Myths (Homer) and of course: Alexandre Dumas. I used to read a lot of classics and still do.

i'm just curious why Marti fled to the US and wrote that opus. ;)

[Bakiryu]

I've no idea, back home reading Marti is obligated, they tell the kids that he came here to educate the yanks or something equally communistic.

[JJLuke]

A nice old lady, who lived in the same apartment complex as me, would read me stories from the bible and Dr. Seuss. Best part was the candy.

[Dark Star]

Depending on how we're defining 'childhood' I'd have to say that aside from a smattering of various odd series and books here and there it would have been Magic: The Gathering novels and novels by K.A. Applegate; the Animorphs series in particular.

[Bakiryu]

novels by K.A. Applegate; the Animorphs series in particular.

OOOOh I used to watch that in tv (in spanish) and still have a few books lying around! :blush:

[Dark Star]

I was an avid collector and still have most of the series lying around including the Hork Bjar or however the hell that was spelled chronicles, Andalite Chronicles and all the other big special books. I did have several gaps in the series, though, since my only source of books was Wal-Mart since my home town didn't have a book store (and when I got to go on a rare trip out of town a real book store was 'too expensive' so I had to plead to get one or two) which didn't always carry the latest copy in the series. But, fun times. I didn't watch the show that much, but I do remember it.

[Mortis Anarchy]

Animorphs!! I totallly remember those books/show...probably Brian Jacques and J.K. Rowling and quite a few...OH! Okay, in kindergarten, I had a teacher that hailed from London, she taught us how to read on the Puddle Lane series...the most amazing books on earth!:D