the very first booK you have ever read

[cacian]

the very first you have read by yourself that is. :)

[ennison]

Biggles Learns to Fly

[cacian]

Biggles Learns to Fly

''This is the story of the very beginning - of the Air Service and of Biggles. It's the First World War and Biggles is just 17; the planes are primitive; combat tactics are non-existent; and pilots and their gunners communicate by hand signals and have no contact with the ground. This is where Biggles learns his craft and finds he has a certain aptitude for flying in battle''

how old were you?

[ennison]

Six or seven

[PeterL]

The first one that I remember for sure was a biography of Robert E. Lee; that was when I was five of six.

Now, you cannot get away without confessing what you first book was. What was it? War and Peace?

[tonywalt]

catcher in the rye - j.d. salinger (11 yrs old) - not including hard boys books, or a couple silly mystery novels.

[Marbles]

There are books I remember reading fairly early (early teens) but I can't think of the first ever book I read. Can't remember. Must be one of those Jack-and-Jill-went-up-the-hill sort of children's books.

[cacian]

The first one that I remember for sure was a biography of Robert E. Lee; that was when I was five of six.

Now, you cannot get away without confessing what you first book was. What was it? War and Peace?

haha War and Peace was not the first i had read.
it was definetely a Standhal and could have been Rouge et Noir/ Red and Black but that was in my early teen.
earlier then that i cannot recall may be a Beatrice Potter or a Les Fables by Lafontaine.

[Poetaster]

I don't remember. The earliest I remember was George's Marvellus Medicine by Roald Dahl, I think I would have been about 6.

[Lokasenna]

There are books I remember reading fairly early (early teens) but I can't think of the first ever book I read. Can't remember. Must be one of those Jack-and-Jill-went-up-the-hill sort of children's books.

Same here. I simply can't remember a time when I wasn't an avid and individual reader.

[mona amon]

I think it was Little Black Sambo, or maybe my mom read it to me - I was very small and don't really remember. Incidentally I came across it decades later in a list of banned books!

[cacian]

I think it was Little Black Sambo, or maybe my mom read it to me - I was very small and don't really remember. Incidentally I came across it decades later in a list of banned books!

Little Black Sambo
that could not be 'correct' in today's world right?
the same with golliwog the reference to the black doll.

[free]

Fairy tales. I don't remember the exact title. I've liked them when I was a child, I still do. :)

[mona amon]

Little Black Sambo
that could not be 'correct' in today's world right?
the same with golliwog the reference to the black doll.

That's right. It's actually a very nice story about a smart boy who outwits a bunch of tigers. Nothing remotely racist about the story itself. It's the stereotype illustrations and the names of the characters that have caused offense.

[cacian]

Fairy tales. I don't remember the exact title. I've liked them when I was a child, I still do. :)

the same here.
free what does your avatar say? i cant figure it out it is too small :)

[cacian]

That's right. It's actually a very nice story about a smart boy who outwits a bunch of tigers. Nothing remotely racist about the story itself. It's the stereotype illustrations and the names of the characters that have caused offense.

indeed which brings me to think whether this book is still or sale or not.

[totoro]

Probably The Green Fairy Book by Andrew Lang, I always loved fairy tales and that was the first book I remember reading very clearly although I can't be exactly sure. I think for a lot of people it would be hard to answer just because so many of us don't remember that far back. Unless you're only like, 16 or younger. Then you might remember.

[romeoindespair]

green eggs and ham

“I will not eat them in a house, i will not eat them with a mouse,i will not eat them in a box i will not eat them with a fox, i will not eat them here of there i will not eat them anywhere, I do not like green eggs and ham i do not like them sam i am.

[stlukesguild]

Green Eggs and Ham was the first one I can remember as well.

[mona amon]

indeed which brings me to think whether this book is still or sale or not.

Yes, it is available on Amazon. Seems to be a classic of sorts, and I was totally unaware till now of its popularity and the controversy it has generated. You can also read it here, with the original illustrations - http://www.sterlingtimes.co.uk/sambo.htm

[MANICHAEAN]

A was give a lot of the "William" series books by Richard Compton. This is the earliest I can remember.
Followed by "War of the Worlds."

[free]

free what does your avatar say? i cant figure it out it is too small :)

:)

"I don't believe people are looking for the meaning of life as much as they are looking for the experience of being alive." Joseph Campbell

[Pompey Bum]

My reading had a sort of prehistory during elementary school, when I devoured as many "Scholastic Books" (from Scholastic Book Fairs) as possible. Of those, the earliest one I read on my own was probably something called The Shy Stegosaurus of Cricket Creek. The first British book I ever read would have been The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. I had two favorite books from those days: one (the name of which I have unforgivably forgotten) was about three pre-teenagers who got snowbound in an old house in upper New York State that was apparently haunted. It turned out to be just their handyman, though (oh sorry, SPOILER! :) ) If anyone remembers the book and knows its name, please remind me. I would love to read it (and all of these) as an adult. My other favorite was a mystery about a boy and his bulldog, called Sinbad and Me. I later learned that the author, whose name was Kin Platt, had been a second string animator for Marvel Comics in their glory days, but was reduced to such poor circumstances after his Scholastic Books gig fizzled that he eventually resorted to penning porn to survive. Sad story.

[Carousel]

The first book you’ve read? To be honest I can’t remember but the book that left a lasting impression on me even to this day was The Midnight People and the follow up The Box of Delights both by the English poet John Masefield.

Though to be more exact I read the books after listening as a child on the radio to a dramatized version of the Box of Delights. The introduction music was the Carol Symphony by Victor Hely-Hutchinson, which listening to it even today gets my goose bumps rising. The stories are that scary especially when read under the covers at night by the light of a smuggled torch, then, if you listen carefully, will Silvia Daisy Pouncher whisper ‘The wolves are running’ in your ear.

Unfortunately today it’s difficult to get the original copies; only abridged versions are available which actually means they have been sanitized for political correctness values.

[prendrelemick]

The first book I ever owned and read was Winnie the Poo. I got it for my 5th birthday, it turned me into a reader of books for pleasure rather than for education.

[qimissung]

The first thing I remember reading by myself was a Dick and Jane book, so I gather I was "learning" to read. We were in a reading circle in first grade, and I was reading ahead, as I went on to do throughout my early elementary school days. I remember that Sally was on the porch pretending that she was a bunny rabbit and eating a carrot.

[Snowqueen]

Tot Batot Poems by Sufi Tabassum. I also remember reading Oliver Twist . I think it was the first novel that I read in English.

[Dreamwoven]

I don't remember what book I read first of all, but it would have been as part of my school years in the late 1940s.

[qimissung]

Tot Batot Poems by Sufi Tabassum. I also remember reading Oliver Twist . I think it was the first novel that I read in English.

And how old were you, Snowqueen, when you read Oliver Twist in English? Six? All you overachievers make me sick. (:D)

[ennison]

Overachievers? But THEY started to teach me to read when I went to school and I would imagine most here were the same. By ten I'd read the Bible twice from Genesis to Revelation in two languages. Overachieving? Nah. I think you're pulling our collective legs.

[Marbles]

The first book that left a lasting impression on me.

I couldn't leave this thread without mentioning Khalil Gibran's Broken Wings, translated into English. The leading girl character in the novella became a lifelong romantic prototype for me that I have carried ever since.

[cacian]

The first book that left a lasting impression on me.

I couldn't leave this thread without mentioning Khalil Gibran's Broken Wings, translated into English. The leading girl character in the novella became a lifelong romantic prototype for me that I have carried ever since.

how do you mean prototype?
can you elaborate a bit more?? :)