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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Really weird kids’ books from the past

361 replies

aweebitlost · 11/01/2022 21:30

I was reading the DC The Elephant & the Bad Baby tonight and it struck me how very odd it is.

An elephant takes a baby for a joyride to nick a load of food and then everyone is cross with the baby for not saying please?!

Then there’s the Long Slide with the 3 stuffed animals that climb a giant slide, vomit, meet some witches etc and don’t seem to get any pleasure out of the experience.

AIBU or were some kids’ books from the past plain bizarre?! Any other good ones people can think of?

OP posts:
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9
5foot5 · 14/01/2022 20:33

@RainbowCrayons

My contribution would be 'fatty-puffs and thinifers'. I was a non-NT girl and loved reading and it seems one of my teachers tried to put me off reading to make me less weird. She took away all the books that were 'too hard' including 'around the world in 80 days' while I was half way through reading it. We ended up in a standoff when I got half way with fatty puffs and thinifers and wanted to change it but she wouldn't let me read anything else until I finished it. I ended up in a bitter standoff staring at the same page in reading time for the rest of the school year and reading what I liked at home.

I probably remember my personal war with that teacher far better than the book itself but it was about fat people having fun and eating and thin people being strict and boring, going to war with eachother. Apparently it was about French vs Germans in ww2 so some casual racism thrown in with the body shaming.

@RainbowCrayons I remember reading "Fattipuffs and Thinifers" and it was one of the first weird books I thought of when I saw this thread.

However having read your post I am now more gripped by your stand off with that horrible teacher. What happened? Did your parents ever find out?

itsnotmeitsu · 14/01/2022 21:02

Der Struwwelpeter > Haunted me all my life, after I was introduced to it in primary school Shock.

CaterpillaNavilla · 14/01/2022 21:38

Doctor Dog - aimed at 3/4/5 year olds (picture book). A dog doctor treats a family for various ailments - the oldest boy gets smokers cough from too many fags behind the bike sheds at school and the youngest gets told, ‘never pick your bum then suck your thumb’ as prevention against future worm infestations.

Needless to say my children were delighted to find a copy at my mums house and think it’s hilarious!

whatth · 14/01/2022 22:18

My grown up DC is still disgusted with me for inflicting a children's book about neglect and emotional abuse on her. Not Now Bernard of course!

DelurkingAJ · 14/01/2022 22:34

@TheSpiral - I love I’m a Prisoner in a Toothpaste Factory…with the message coming out in toothpaste!

Weird one for me was called Chocolate Fever about a boy who eats so much chocolate that he develops chocolate measles.

Tabbypawpaw · 14/01/2022 22:59

Great thread. Mine live elephant and the bad baby but I agree it is strange, and the elephant complains twice about the baby not saying pls. Marianne Dreams is a v dark book, I could only read it when I was older because of the terrifying stones that follow the children.
So many kids books are reallly odd. We have one called Alfie’s Anger or something like that, 1980s book about a boy whose tantrum is so bad he breaks the world and ends up on his own on a bit of rock in space.

winewolfhowls · 14/01/2022 23:06

I love the art work in the giant jam sandwich and the end bit where the birds have a feast for a hundred weeks or whatever is really satisfying the way it rolls off your tongue

There was a Dutch, maybe translated book about a cow in Holland that was so greedy it went on a barge into the city and it was so rectangular it used to really disturb me.

FurryAntiWaxer · 14/01/2022 23:38

I haven't read the full thread, but there is a really popular vintage Australian illustrator and writer called May Gibbs. Her illustrations are iconic and on everything nowadays. But the stories...Shock
So many characters are eaten alive, torn from their parents, caught in steel traps, abducted by various villains.

And my favourite line...'good root, said the old shag'. Cracks me up every time.

FurryAntiWaxer · 14/01/2022 23:42

@Grendalsmum

DS1 loved Squirrel Nutkin which is pretty out there - Non-neurotypical riddle obsessed squirrel gets his tail bitten off by an owl ...
Funnily, Tolkien and CS Lewis both listed squirrel Nutkin as a childhood favourite.
SantaClawsServiette · 15/01/2022 02:44

Caleb and Kate is one I loved. It's about a man and his wife, they love each other but are quite feisty. One day they have an argument, he goes into the woods to cool off, and a witch turns him into a dog. He goes home to Kate, desperate that she will think he's left her, which she does. They live like that for several years, he tries always to show her how much he loves her, she is sad but loves the dog and tries to live with it. In the end robbers try to break in, he stops them and they accidentally break the spell.

My very favorite as a child was called Higglety PIglety Pop, or There Must Be More to Life. It is about a dog who has everything but runs away to find out if there is more to life. It's a bit creepy, there is a creepy baby who won't eat and whose parents have moved away, and if the dog can't get her to eat, she (the dog) will be sent to the lion in the basement. The dog is constantly eating everything - a plant she is talking to, all the contents of the milk-man's van, and then the baby's lunch. In the end she becomes an actress.

SantaClawsServiette · 15/01/2022 02:51

Another one that is less weird but which I always ponderd as a child was The Story about Ping. It's about a duck living in China. It's late to go home, and doesn't want to be spanked so runs away, Then it sees weird fishing birds, and is caught and almost eaten by a family. In the end it goes back to it's home, where the boatmaster spanks it, and is happy to be back with his family. I always wondered, was Ping better off free, without the threat of being spanked, in the scary world? Or safe with his parents but under the boat-master? And was the boat master right to spank the ducks to keep them from wandering off at night? It was a bit unsettling but I liked it.

I work in a library, and I can say that the vast majority of the picture books now are dead boring.

RainbowCrayons · 15/01/2022 03:18

@5foot5 my parents were teachers at a different school so while they disapproved of me having books taken away and made to read books I didn't want to, they stayed out of it politely. Having talked to them about it as an adult they said the teacher was a insecure NQT who took out her insecurity on the odd kids and they were quite curious about whether I would win so they let me carry on. And to be fair I was a bit of an odd kid. When the Head teacher covered mean teachers science lesson I thanked him genuinely for a much more interesting lesson which I meant in a very heartfelt way but he did share with my parents as an amusing anecdote saying I 'didn't suffer fools gladly'. As an adult I wonder why he employed them!

everythingbackbutyou · 15/01/2022 06:43

If anyone knows what this picture book is called I will be so happy. All I remember is that at some point, the children walk past a lake made of lemonade with lollipop trees, and at some point later, they are going down a spiral staircase towards the centre of the earth...

everythingbackbutyou · 15/01/2022 06:43

It must have been available late 70s/early 80s

Original poster
aweebitlost · 15/01/2022 07:51

I work in a library, and I can say that the vast majority of the picture books now are dead boring.

Oh this is so true! How do they all get published? I find so many are either completely saccharine or over reliant on toilet humour. I do think some contemporary picture book writers are utterly brilliant though - Chris Haughton for example.

OP posts:
YourenutsmiLord · 15/01/2022 08:17

I work in a library, and I can say that the vast majority of the picture books now are dead boring.

OMG yes, some adult books too - all have a moral -and kindness pays off in the end hahaha--.
I bought a book of Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox Tales - they are fun, wicked and cruel by today's standards but what a relief.

CeratopsofthePharoahs · 15/01/2022 09:14

The Shrinking of Treehorn. That was just plain odd.

Anyone remember Flossie Teacakes Fur Coat? Every time she borrowed her sisters fur coat she'd turn into a teenager.

Earthrocknroll · 15/01/2022 09:32

@FurryAntiWaxer

I haven't read the full thread, but there is a really popular vintage Australian illustrator and writer called May Gibbs. Her illustrations are iconic and on everything nowadays. But the stories...Shock So many characters are eaten alive, torn from their parents, caught in steel traps, abducted by various villains. And my favourite line...'good root, said the old shag'. Cracks me up every time.
The Gumnut babies and the bad banksia men. They terrified me too.

How to Eat Fried Worms was another very odd one too.

Grendalsmum · 15/01/2022 10:40

What about the Mr Gumm books? My kids loved them but they were distinctly odd while being totally fabulous in a mad way. We got one free for World Book Day and l was laughing so hard at the boys laughing that l had to stop reading!

CounsellorTroi · 15/01/2022 10:47

Grinny by Nicholas Fisk. Little old lady arrives at children’s house, their mother tells the children she is their granny, but they’ve never seen her before. She smiles all the time so they call her Grinny. She’s an alien.

ArbleMarchTFruitbat · 15/01/2022 10:52

@CounsellorTroi

Grinny by Nicholas Fisk. Little old lady arrives at children’s house, their mother tells the children she is their granny, but they’ve never seen her before. She smiles all the time so they call her Grinny. She’s an alien.
Oh, yes, that was brilliant - also the sequel You Remember Me where Grinny comes back as a very right-wing celebrity.
CounsellorTroi · 15/01/2022 11:01

Nicholas Fisk was a cracking writer. Loved Space Hostages where a soldier lands a stolen very hush hush pspace ship on a village Green, the spaceship had been designed for a chosen few to make a fresh start somewhere else in the event of nuclear war. He invites some village children to look around then takes off. But it becomes clear he is dying from radiation sickness and the children must learn to work as a team and to fly the space ship and return to Earth.

Grendalsmum · 15/01/2022 12:12

councilertroi Oh god! I remember that one - it really freaked me out, there was a bit about one kid trying to fit a tooth back into his comb that stayed with me for ages ...

musicalfrog · 15/01/2022 13:38

Ooh Nicholas Fisk! There's a name I haven't heard since I was a young reader in the 80s!

MrsMadderRose · 15/01/2022 13:51

I loved Nicholas Fisk! A rag, a bone and a Hank of hair was my favourite. But I wouldn’t call his books really weird, more just imaginative sci-fi with all the otherworldly things that sci-fi is about.

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