“Heard melodies are sweet,” Keats wrote, “but those unheard are sweeter,” and for Joan Aiken they often provided the inspiration for stories full of music which the reader can hear only in his imagination. She invented some marvellous musical creations, like a tune which when whistled or sung brings a cardboard cut-out garden to life, […]
However badly he behaves Mortimer is still finding friends… Some readers will always remember Joan Aiken for The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, or her heroine Dido Twite in later books in the Wolves series, but many of the letters that still arrive from her fans are about Mortimer – the ‘feathered fiend’ who worries the […]
What if you could have ‘All You’ve Ever Wanted‘? In Joan Aiken’s fertile imagination this is exactly the sort of wish that could go wildly wrong; in fact she had such fun with the idea that it led to a collection of stories, this particular one providing the title of her first book, published nearly […]
What if you could have ‘All You’ve Ever Wanted‘? In Joan Aiken’s fertile imagination this is exactly the sort of wish that could go wildly wrong; in fact she had such fun with the idea that it led to a collection of stories, this particular one providing the title of her first book, published nearly […]
Joan Aiken enjoyed some very happy relationships with her illustrators, notably Pat Marriott, who illustrated her first story collections from 1953 onwards, and was responsible for the first ‘Wolves Chronicles’ covers and pictures, and so helped to create some of the best loved ( and scariest!) characters in the series. Pat became so familiar […]
Wishes have been at at the heart of story telling for as long as there have been stories…they are in themselves the first breath of the creative imagination that introduces a new life, or a fantastic world, or they can be the dangerous stirring of unease, the first creak of discontent that creates a landslide […]
Unfortunately for Mortimer, when Great Aunt Olwen comes to stay, it means just one thing… Spring Cleaning… Mortimer has other ideas and makes a determined break for freedom…much chaos ensues, but Great Aunt Olwen has never been defeated yet… “If there had been a prize going for the most miserable bird in Rumbury Town, Mortimer […]
It is great news that “The Wolves of Willoughby Chase” which is currently celebrating its 50th birthday with three new editions and a new audio read by Joan’s daughter Lizza, has been chosen for this year’s Summer Reading Challenge – the theme is “Creepy Houses” and the great house of Willoughby Chase is certainly a […]
Joan Aiken writing at her very best was a perfect companion. Well travelled, cultured, with a wealth of personal experience, and the ability not just to tell a gripping story, but to draw the reader in to the very process of writing. What she loved was to hold her audience in a […]
This famously haunting picture, and its resonant title, which some have taken as the manifesto of the Spanish painter Goya, was the inspiration for Joan’s science fiction fantasy The Cockatrice Boys. Her magpie mind was constantly on the alert, moving between the news of the day, the scientific discoveries that were changing the world, […]
What if you could have ‘All You’ve Ever Wanted‘? Joan Aiken liked to imagine just this sort of dangerous wish going horribly wrong, and it became the title story of her first book. The wishes in question are not made by her sensible heroine, the ill-starred Matilda, an orphan of course, who is brought […]
One of the very worst things you can hear as a child coming home to find that your room has been ‘Spring Cleaned’ must be: “Oh you didn’t want that did you? I thought you’d finished with it.’ This was clearly a memory from Joan Aiken’s own childhood, and she turned it into one of [...]
This marvellous moment of realisation occurs to Mori, the heroine of Jo Walton’s Among Others but could be a life saving discovery for any lonely child – and every child is in danger of loneliness as soon as they start to wonder about the world they have been born into. Joan Aiken was a lonely [...]
Lovely extracts you’ve included here, Lizza! As a musician I’d heard about the recommendation for rationalising the inefficient duplication of instruments and themes in orchestral music, though I hadn’t realised it was Joan who had written the parody.
By the way, whole tone music, even fugues, should sound inoffensive to the ear, Debussy-like in fact, rather than an awful cacophony: dodecaphonic compositions would have been more apt. But I expect Joan knew that, really!
Thank you for your informative musical response, I’m way out of my depth here, and can only assume Joan was employing her mischievous sense of humour!