My earliest reading memory
I was seven years old and already drawn to distant countries when I read The Children’s Tales from Other Lands, retold by FH Lee. These were simple fables from countries that filled me with wonder: Arabia, China, Egypt, Russia. I still have my disintegrated copy of the book, scrawled with my child’s crayons.
My favourite book growing up
In my prep school library The Log of the Ark by Kenneth Walker was the one I loved, fascinated by its tale of Noah’s gathering the animals. Some of these were imagined creatures, such as the psychotically shy “Seventy-sevenses” (named after their cabin number), and a subversive creature named the Scub. Years later I realised the book was an analogy of the Fall. The animals embark in peace, but the Scub corrupts their minds, and after landfall they hunt down or flee one another.
