This was published 2 years ago
The secret to turning my children into voracious readers? Selfishness
As Melanie La’Brooy undertakes a bedroom makeover, she uncovers the books – and memories – of her children’s younger years.
By Melanie La'Brooy
Reading is what I love, so that’s what I did with my children, beginning when they were babies, writes Melanie La’Brooy.Credit: Stocksy
The nine-year-old declares that her bedroom is babyish and embarrassing. Together we survey the pink walls, the boxes heaped with toys – which, come to think of it, haven’t been played with in a long time – and the wall frieze of leaping ballerinas. She still does ballet but now prefers her hip-hop dance lessons. I agree to a room makeover.
The leaping ballerinas are consigned to the bin, the pink walls are repainted white and the polka-dot doona cover is replaced by a Harry Potter-themed cover in grey, with spell books and owls. The toys are sorted to be donated. I’m expecting to experience a Toy Story 3-style pang at parting with the most beloved toys, which have passed through the hands of all three of my children, but, oddly, it doesn’t come. It’s waiting for me in the piles of children’s books.
“You’re giving away those? All of them?” I ask, aghast. My daughter nods, spins on her heel and heads back into her room to practise a song on her guitar. She doesn’t look back.
I am left alone with a small mountain range of children’s books. All of my children are voracious readers. I have always loved how the word “voracious” is often used to refer to a reader: equating reading with appetite, as though reading is a vital act needed for survival.
I have sometimes been asked how I got our children to become readers: as though it was my doing. It was selfishness, I’ve considered replying. Reading is what I love, so that’s what I did with my children, beginning when they were babies. I would pile up a stack of books on the floor, settle them on my lap and read. It was serious business, the then two-year-old taking on the job of carefully putting down the finished book and choosing the next one from the pile.
The real answer is that I played only a small role. The spell was cast by the gifted authors and illustrators who spun words and pictures into book magic. I sit on the floor and begin to sort the books; baby picture-books, early readers, grand hardcover illustrated tomes that were received as presents. There is the small, blue book of nursery rhymes that fit easily into the nappy bag and accompanied us on aeroplanes and trains. Even now I associate its rhymes with the rhythms of travel: the hushed darkness of an aeroplane filled with sleeping passengers, my toddler son on my lap as I murmured words from centuries ago, composed in a faraway land: “Lavender’s blue, dilly, dilly…”
As mandated somewhere in the Families Who Love Books law, our beloved copy of Dogger by Shirley Hughes is falling apart from constant use. The same law decrees that every family with young children must have a favourite Julia Donaldson book. Ours was Room on the Broom. I still remember the funny voices I used for the animals.
I can’t recall my eldest son’s first word but when I pick up Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell, the memory of his first half-word comes flooding back. He had excitedly stabbed at the illustration of the lion, gleefully yelling, “Li! Li!” , linking a word to meaning for the first time. Digging deeper into a pile, I unearth Captain Flinn and the Pirate Dinosaurs by Giles Andreae, with illustrations by Russell Ayto, and wonder how I ever forgot about it, given that my youngest son reread it approximately three billion times.
When I pluck the gloriously funny and clever Olivia and the Fairy Princesses by Ian Falconer from a pile, I actually whoop with joy. This picture book, aimed at ages three and up, contains a reference to modern dance choreographer Martha Graham and the words “corporate malfeasance”. This filled my heart with joy eight years ago and still does. I can remember my children asking what corporate malfeasance meant. I explained, they listened, nodded – and we continued on with the story.
The best children’s authors know that kids are smart and love difficult words and ideas, which is why their books bear up under endless repetition. It is an extraordinary, generation-spanning balancing act: entertaining the youngest while simultaneously pulling on the adult reader’s heartstrings or finding a way to make us all laugh together.
The best children’s authors know that kids are smart and love difficult words and ideas, which is why their books bear up under endless repetition.
Despite their status as essential childhood classics, some well-known books went oddly unloved in our house. They disappear into the donation boxes, their pages still crisp, their covers unmarked. Then there is the book that was picked up from the sale table at our local shopping centre, the book that is a true classic, if only in our house. Smelly Bill by Daniel Postgate is a delightful romp of a story about a smelly dog trying to avoid a bath. I paid about $5 for it, not knowing at the time that I would have happily paid 50 times that price for the amount of joy it would bring us over so many years.
Even if you know it, our Smelly Bill is not the same as your Smelly Bill. Repeatedly reading aloud a story becomes a deeply personalised act; there is the way we all shrieked, “Great Aunt Bleach!” upon the dramatic entrance of Bill’s nemesis and the pause that had to come before the line, “And live to stink another day!”
On the opposite end of the scale to the riotous fun of Smelly Bill are the “serious” kids’ books, the ones that tackle difficult issues. There has been some pushback against these books, with complaints that the publishing industry is bombarding kids with too many books about grim problems. But when young kids are struggling, the combination of words and images can be a powerful protective shield against fears and sadness.
My children moved houses, schools and countries so many times. I still remember the nights when books helped when nothing else could, such as the achingly beautiful Amy and Louis by Libby Gleeson, with illustrations by Freya Blackwood. Amy and Louis are best friends who are separated when Amy moves to another country. We used to read Amy and Louis lying in our unfamiliar beds in yet another new country. We’d finish reading and then loudly “cooee” to the ceiling, just like Louis did in the book, hoping that grandparents and friends, far across the oceans, would hear us in their dreams. Holding Amy and Louis in my hands again, the memory brings me to tears.
“Why are you crying this time?” the teenager asks from the doorway, with the weary resignation of one who has seen his embarrassing mother sob through every Pixar movie. His favourite writers are now Terry Pratchett, Philip K. Dick and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
But I know that the path that led him to these revered literary authors began with Hippos Go Berserk!, Hairy Maclary and Library Lion. I show him Smelly Bill and his face lights up. “I remember that book!” I open it but his nostalgia doesn’t run as deep as mine and he’s already disappeared. So I sit on the floor alone and read it aloud one last time: “Bill the dog loved smelly things like muddy ponds and rubbish bins. Disgusting stuff he’d stick his snout in, sniff and snort and roll about in.”
When I’m finished clearing out, there are several boxes of books to give away – and two shelves filled with children’s books in my bedroom. I can’t give away Smelly Bill or Amy and Louis. Their pages hold the memories of words whispered into the darkness on sleepless nights, the wonder of a first half-word and the echo of our family’s laughter. They were our talismans against sadness and are a reminder of quiet moments snatched between the seemingly endless frantic churn of those early baby and toddler years.
These books mark the beginning of two journeys: of mine into motherhood and my children’s into a lifetime of wonder as readers.
Book magic is true magic and that’s something that’s scarce in this world. I intend to hold onto it for as long as I can.
The Wintrish Girl (UQP) by Melanie La’Brooy is out now.
Make the most of your health, relationships, fitness and nutrition with our Live Well newsletter. Get it in your inbox every Monday.