SAM LEITH – THE HAUNTED WOOD, A HISTORY OF CHILDHOOD READING. CHAIRED BY SAVILIAN PAUL LAY.

ONEWORLD’S LEADING NON-FICTION TITLE FOR AUTUMN 2024

Can you remember the first time you fell in love with a book? Maybe you tumbled down a rabbit hole, or flew out of your bedroom window, or found the key to a secret garden? And in the silence of that moment, your whole life changed forever.

Stories written for children offer a glimpse into our deepest hopes, joys and anxieties. Indelible in our memories, they reveal our pasts, remembered and imagined, and invite us to dream up different futures. More vivid, more affecting than books we read mere months ago, our childhood reading might just be the making of us.

The Haunted Wood is a book to treasure; the first general history of canonic literature written for children through the ages, from Aesop’s Fables to Malorie Blackman. Authored by one of Britain’s leading literary commentators, it explores the magic of our most beloved stories, the lasting grip they seem to have on us and the ways in which they define and console entire generations.

‘One of the best surveys of children’s literature I’ve read…

The Haunted Wood is a marvel, and I hope it becomes a standard text for anyone interested in literature of any sort.’ PHILIP PULLMAN

SAM LEITH was a goody two-shoes as a boy, ‘sneak reading’ under the covers after bedtime his only rebellion. The Haunted Wood is bookended by tender memories of childhood reading within his own family, yet it spans the breadth of the British nursery bookshelf from Beatrix Potter and Maurice Sendak to Enid Blyton and Philip Pullman.

The current literary editor of the Spectator, Sam has written extensively for the Guardian, TLS, Financial Times, Telegraph and Daily Mail. He was a judge for the 2015 Man Booker Prize. His previous books include You Talkin’ To Me?: Rhetoric from Aristotle to Trump and Beyond, and Write To The Point: How to be Clear, Correct, and Persuasive on the Page.

‘Profoundly erudite and gloriously entertaining, this is the most purely enjoyable literary history I have ever read.’  TOM HOLLAND

‘Sam Leith has been encyclopedic and forensic in this journey through children’s books. It’s a joy for anyone who cares or wonders why we have children’s literature.’ MICHAEL ROSEN 

‘A wonderful book that rediscovers the magic of childhood reading and explores the complexity of some of our best loved authors.’ NINA STIBBE 

‘Seriously delightful, and delightfully serious… all of us who love to read started here, and Sam Leith does a wonderful job of reminding us how and why it happened.’  LEE CHILD 

‘A history as beguiling, peculiar and immersive as the field it describes.’ LEMONY SNICKET

‘A gorgeous, loving and, most of all, learned guide to the stories that make us who we are.’  HADLEY FREEMAN