![]() ![]() ![]() Nine-year-old Karl is a sickly boy, and is upset when he overhears a conversation in which it is mentioned that he is dying. More on that later too, and some spoilers. I was particularly keen on reading this book firstly because I hadn’t read it before and secondly because of the controversy it inspired. It was Ilon Wikland’s illustrations that did it, his hair looked so Swedish.įor me, Ilon Wikland is the true heroine of Lindgren’s 1973 book The Brothers Lionheart ( Bröderna Lejonhjärta), which I read in the translation by Joan Tate. I loved Pippi Longstocking struggling with her pluttification, and more than that even I loved mischievous Lotta, with her piggly bear Bamsie and her sister Mia Maria and her kind brother Jonas, on whom I probably had a bit of a crush. They were probably exotic because they showed a life that was recognisably like mine and yet intangibly different (same as the American books I loved like Maurice Sendak, Treehorn and Peanuts, I suppose). ![]() Lindgren was a big deal in my boyhood, her books having a peculiarly Scandinavian exoticism that they shared with Alf Prøysen’s Mrs Pepperpot (rechristened ‘Mrs Pepperbox’ by my ancient Austrian babysitter Lisl). ![]() Not that I haven’t enjoyed reading my way through the EU, but if I did this project again I’d choose exclusively children’s books. ![]()
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