Hi all,
Has anyone else noticed that World Book Day has started to become “World Book Day… Week”? I’m thinking, how about World Book Day Month? Or, better yet, why not World Book Day Year, and hey, let’s have it every year, eh? Hooray for books! Onwards!
One of the reasons I write:
The WBD mood may be dampened with the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the start of another war. When I was a kid I noticed a lot more than adults realised, and I worried more about it than I let on, too. I wrote Glassheart about how it might feel to have to piece your life together again after war. And one of the reasons I wrote Nevertell - besides loving magic, fantasy, fairy tales and simply yearning to write - is that, way back when I learned about Gulags in Russian history, I had the tremendous urge to a) understand how it must have been for the people in that situation, and b) to put things right through make believe (in my case, writing fiction). Another way of looking at that is, I wanted to express my feelings about an injustice.
Message for World Book Day:
My message to anyone feeling worried or overwhelmed this World Book Day is this. Reading a book is a great way to escape from the worries of the world - brilliant! But reading a book can also be somewhere for our imaginations to go to find expression. Imaginations grow inside books. They get stronger, more vibrant and more powerful. Sometimes, ideas ripen out of them, like fruit from trees - and ideas can change the world. This is your world - our world - and standing up and saying so when you feel that things aren’t right - expressing yourself - is one of the most brilliant things you can do. There are so many ways to do that - reading and writing stories are just two out of billions. It feels good too - whether anyone is listening or not, you’ll still know you did it. And people are listening.
Activities for home or the classroom:
You may be feeling powerless and wondering what you can do at the moment. Well, as I’ve said, expressing yourself is deeply powerful. Writing, saying, singing, drawing, or expressing something, shows yourself - and the whole world! - how you feel. And it can let other people know that you support them, too. So why not try any of these, which would be suitable for home or the classroom:
1 - Write a poem about how you feel about war. I once woke up with this in my head: “War is like a blunt pencil - pointless.” At the time I was SO pleased with myself, because it perfectly expressed how I felt - but I’m sure you can do much better!
2 - Write a letter to someone - real or imaginary - who is fleeing from war. Or write your letter to someone who is being brave and standing up for what they believe in, despite the danger - like one of the people in Russia who is protesting against the war, for example. What would you like to say to any of those people?
3 - If it’s hard to put your feelings into words, you might like to try drawing a picture about either of the above instead, or try this: draw the world you want for the future.
If you’d like to share any of your work with me, either through my website or via Twitter or Instagram, I’d love to see, and will share it with your permission so we can show everyone what the children of the world think.
Some inspiring reading:
Here are just a few brilliant books I’ve read recently that touch on the human experience of conflict:
Boy, Everywhere - A. M. Dassu
On the Move: Poems About Migration - Michael Rosen
Nisha’s War - Dan Smith
The Midnight Guardians - Ross Montgomery
A Kind of Spark by Elle McNicoll - this one is about someone speaking up because of an injustice of the past.
Do you have any books on this topic you’d like to add in the comments?