This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/22/woman-reunited-with-childhood-book-in-museum-reading-the-secret-garden
The article has changed 3 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| 'Only a quid': woman reunited with childhood book in museum shop | |
| (about 3 hours later) | |
| A woman has been reunited with a copy of The Secret Garden she owned as a child, serendipitously discovering it for sale on the shelves of the Museum of English Rural Life shop. | A woman has been reunited with a copy of The Secret Garden she owned as a child, serendipitously discovering it for sale on the shelves of the Museum of English Rural Life shop. |
| The MERL, which made news last year for sending an 18th-century schoolboy’s doodles of a chicken in trousers viral, acquired the Ladybird Children’s Classics edition from a charity shop in Wallingford for its collection of second-hand books. On Friday, it was picked up by its former owner, Zoe Andrews, who looked inside and saw it had her sister’s name in the front cover, written in characters that she’d dreamed up as a child. | The MERL, which made news last year for sending an 18th-century schoolboy’s doodles of a chicken in trousers viral, acquired the Ladybird Children’s Classics edition from a charity shop in Wallingford for its collection of second-hand books. On Friday, it was picked up by its former owner, Zoe Andrews, who looked inside and saw it had her sister’s name in the front cover, written in characters that she’d dreamed up as a child. |
| Eighteenth-century doodles of a chicken in trousers go viral | Eighteenth-century doodles of a chicken in trousers go viral |
| The MERL’s digital editor Joe Vaughan tweeted about the discovery. “Today, the past sent something back, in our museum, in our strange house of time, like a letter returned to sender,” he wrote. “It’s not every day that you pick up a book, open it, and, in the inside cover, find your sister’s name, in hieroglyphics … the ones you wrote when you were kids.” | The MERL’s digital editor Joe Vaughan tweeted about the discovery. “Today, the past sent something back, in our museum, in our strange house of time, like a letter returned to sender,” he wrote. “It’s not every day that you pick up a book, open it, and, in the inside cover, find your sister’s name, in hieroglyphics … the ones you wrote when you were kids.” |
| Andrews “couldn’t believe it when I found this book … Had to repurchase it. What are the chances?!” She couldn’t remember any details about the secret language her and her sister had written on the book. “I had a grid on a sheet of paper with a ‘key’ as to what symbols meant what. This is going back many years, probably 1993/94.” | Andrews “couldn’t believe it when I found this book … Had to repurchase it. What are the chances?!” She couldn’t remember any details about the secret language her and her sister had written on the book. “I had a grid on a sheet of paper with a ‘key’ as to what symbols meant what. This is going back many years, probably 1993/94.” |
| MERL director Kate Arnold-Forster said: “One of the most unexpected yet fascinating aspects of libraries is discovering books that bear traces of their readers’ lives, moving us to speculate about how they were read and enjoyed. That it’s The Secret Garden – a novel that has survived generations and provided a magical escape for so many readers – makes this story all the more wonderful.” | MERL director Kate Arnold-Forster said: “One of the most unexpected yet fascinating aspects of libraries is discovering books that bear traces of their readers’ lives, moving us to speculate about how they were read and enjoyed. That it’s The Secret Garden – a novel that has survived generations and provided a magical escape for so many readers – makes this story all the more wonderful.” |
| The discovery prompted other readers to share on social media stories of unexpectedly discovering their former books. One person wrote that their “father-in-law unpacked a box of books one day and found a hardcover Biggles given to him by auntie Eva – 60 years before, 11th birthday in a totally different part of the country. Awesome roundtrip. His most treasured book now.” | The discovery prompted other readers to share on social media stories of unexpectedly discovering their former books. One person wrote that their “father-in-law unpacked a box of books one day and found a hardcover Biggles given to him by auntie Eva – 60 years before, 11th birthday in a totally different part of the country. Awesome roundtrip. His most treasured book now.” |
| Of her Secret Garden find, Andrews said: “When things work their way back to you, they were never meant to leave you in the first place.” She added on Twitter that “it feels right to have the book back”, and after all, it was “only a quid”. | Of her Secret Garden find, Andrews said: “When things work their way back to you, they were never meant to leave you in the first place.” She added on Twitter that “it feels right to have the book back”, and after all, it was “only a quid”. |
| Books | Books |
| Children and teenagers | Children and teenagers |
| Museums | Museums |
| Reading | Reading |
| Literacy | Literacy |
| news | news |
| Share on Facebook | Share on Facebook |
| Share on Twitter | Share on Twitter |
| Share via Email | Share via Email |
| Share on LinkedIn | Share on LinkedIn |
| Share on Pinterest | Share on Pinterest |
| Share on WhatsApp | Share on WhatsApp |
| Share on Messenger | Share on Messenger |
| Reuse this content | Reuse this content |