Tell us what books you read with your Grandparents to WIN a full set of The Owl and the Pussy-cat picture edition books

Goodness this has made me think. Both my father's parents were long gone sadly but if my maternal grandfather had read to me I think it would have been a gardening book! My maternal grandmother (they were separated) did send me books - all very religious - the only one of which I remember was Mary Jones and her Bible.

It was my father who gave me a love of reading which I am only to happy to pass on to my grandchildren. Like other posters I read what would seemed quite "inappropriate" books at the time for my age. I loved, and never stopped loving, The Water Babies but went through phases of reading my brothers books; Bulldog Drummond seemed to feature quite heavily at one point and then I had a phase of reading every Zane Grey in the Library. On the other hand, I had my own copies of Little Women, Jo's Boys, etc., and Anne of Gables and other "suitable" books.

When I am thinking about books for the GCs I am often surprised at how frightening some of the ones I know are. No wonder I had nightmares at times!

My maternal grandmother read her children's books to me. She earned them year on year by attending school with no absences from 1906 to 1916. They were children's novels with titles like 'The Secret of the Old House' by Evelyn Everett-Green and 'Gwendoline' by Agnes Giberne. They have pride of place on my bookshelves and I have the little coat pins that she received alongside the books. I remember the stories having strong moral and religious guidance and they went over my head as I was too young to understand the content before I could read them myself, but it was lovely to cuddle up to her and listen to her voice as she read to me. My mum said it was a regular thing, intended to persuade me to have a sleep in the afternoon!

I remember my grandpops reading me short stories but the first full length book we read together was Black Beauty when I was about 6. He had trained as a groom in his youth and had a great love of horses but the family he worked for went bankrupt after the first World War and he took a job down the mines looking after the pit ponies.

I've just finished reading this with my 8-year old GS and he cried buckets when Ginger died - just as I did.

I remember my grandmother buying and reading the traditional Ladybird story books, like Goldilocks and The Three Little Pigs. She was a rather vain woman and credited any modicum of intelligence I have to the fact she did this (which was best handled with the simply nod and smile response)!

I read so early that I don't remember not being able to...so I don't remember being read to!

I devoured the books my dad and uncles had had at my grandparents house - 'Boys Own' and similar tales, Jules Verne....exciting adventures!

At home I had less 'boy' stuff but I remember E. Nesbit, Wind in the Willows, later Swallows and Amazons....
Heidi, and a big American book of stories that must have been brought back in 1946 by my dad....Brer Rabbit and the like

The Wind in the Willows.

I remember sitting with my Grandad and reading Clement Moore's book 'Twas The Night Before Christmas. It was a hardback book with some lovely old fashioned illustrations. It was my favourite book at their house, and I got it out of the cupboard every time I visited. They also had a book of Fairy Tales which my sister liked.
They were read and loved so much that they eventually fell apart.
I tried to find a similar copy of 'Twas the Night before Christmas for my own Grandchildren, with the same old illustrations, but had to settle for a more modern one.

My grandma had (and still has) a very old bound hardback of Heidi. It had some coloured plates set into it at the beginning of every chapter, my favourite was the picture of Peter with his goats. The book was bought as a Christmas present to my mum and is clearly marked
to our darling daughter. Christmas 1948, love from mammy and daddy xx my mum would have been 7 at the time.
I remember my grandma reading it to me when I was a child lying in the very same creaky queen sized bed that my mum had slept in years before complete with a heavy grey army blanket and blanket topper of crotchets squares (that I still have). Happy memories.

I cant remember my nan reading to me , only reciting nursery rhymes , .. children were seen and not heard , shame as I love my snuff sniffing nan so much. I love reading to my grandchildren, even my little cheeky grandson comes to me for cuddles and a story, thank you gransnet for giving me the opportunity to read the latest books to my 5 grandkids.

I had a large hard back book of Fairy Tales with a beautiful front cover - I remember 'The Little Match Girl' and 'Little Red Riding Hood'. I don't recall any other books and was certainly not read to as often as mine are!

I think harrigran is right - it was not common for grandparents to read to grandchildren of our generation, certainly not in my experience. Maybe class came into it, as mine had not had much education and did not have books, but I'm not sure. I loved my paternal grandparents and saw a lot of them but they never sat me on their knees or read a book to me. I think this may be a sign of the generation gap between us and GNHQ - life was not the same 60 plus years ago.

Btw Galen my mother scrubbed her doorstep well into her old age. I'm afraid she was a snob about the state of her home. I have posted before that she tended to judge people on the state of their skirting boards. I'm afraid I failed dismally

In my childhood Grandparents did not sit and read to children. We were seen and not heard, sat still and spoke when spoken to.

My grandparents were all dead by the time I was four months old, so they never read to me.
However, I have got some books that my grandmother used when she was at teacher training college in Leeds, such as Thomas More's Utopia, and a copy of Palgraves Golden Treasury, as well as All's Well that Ends Well, annotated in her handwriting. There are also history and geography textbooks with her handwriting in the margins. I might not have heard her voice, but I do know what she thought about some things.

My grandparents didn't read to me either, but my paternal Grandad and maternal Granny sang to me, taught me songs.
Grandad: Scots w'hae; Gan on the 42nd; Wait for the Wagon etc
Granny: Indian love Lyrics (Pale Hands; Less than the dust etc) Bless this House.
And many others from both of them.
There weren't many children's story books around in those days. The first book I learned to read was "Little Black Sambo" - I expect it's banned now.

Hilda Boswell's First Treasury of Nursery rhymes! I kept it and read it to my own children. I loved it, apparently my own GCs don't have the same affection for it. That was Grandma on father's side. She was also responsible for the large book of The Children's Bible, which I loved purely for the illustrations. She loved poetry, so a fair few poems were read aloud at bedtime, both funny and serious. Also Aesop's Fables.

Other Grandma was seriously addicted to Beatrix Potter. I still have all those books, again, my children could probably recite them. That Grandma also bought me the records of the stories being read by Vivienne Leigh - I can see the red record now. I think it was to give herself a break... This grandma liked greek and roman mythology, so I had children's versions of the stories, plus The Arabian Nights read to me.

I stayed with them both a fair bit while my mother had my sisters, also she was always ill after each birth for quite a while so I spent whole weeks at a time with them. We would be split up and divided between the two of them. Reading and books were very important to both families, I was so lucky.

I don't remember my grandparents reading to me, or my parents, come to that. For my first birthday (in 1940) my grandmother found a book of nursery rhymes (no pictures ^at all^) which I'm sure must have been read to me before I could read it myself, but I have no memory of it. I have the book still.

There were always grown-up books in their houses, and everyone read. During the war and just after it, there was a shortage of children's books, so I was reading "Lorna Doone", unabridged, at the age of eight. However, in my grandparents' house there were a lot of improving books that had been won by them or by my great-aunts and great-uncles as Sunday School prizes in the late 19C. They were full of suffering heroines and virtuous moppets who melted the stony hearts of misers and misanthropes. I devoured all these, and I have many of them still.

I don't remember a time when I couldn't read for myself. I started school able to read anything and resented being expected to read out loud, particularly as we were put into groups who read aloud to the "group leader" (in my case an obnoxious girl with ringlets whose only qualification as "leader" was that she was the oldest - it was a very small school with only 20 or so pupils aged 4 to 8).

Woman's Own ? The local paper ?
There were 2 families and my Nanna living in a 3 bedroom house with no bathroom or outside loo.
I shared a bed with her until I was 6 and she read bits out of the paper to me.
It was the most happy and secure time for me.
Despite the lack of books, I learned to read very quickly when I started school.

I suspect our grandparents were too busy. Certainly both my grandads were in FT employment unti I was eleven years old.
The grans didn't have the laboursaving devices their sons and daughters did and couldn't have afforded to buy them even if they'd have approved of them, which in a lot of cases they didn't.
Can you remember your mother scrubbing the front doorstep? No way, but I remember my gran doing it and polishing the brass and black leading the grate.
I'm surprised my mother had time as she was very busy being the local doctors wife and lady bountiful!
See the thread on snobs. My mother was the original!

I don't remember being read to either but I loved to visit my Scottish grandparents once a year. I know they spent time talking to me and telling me family stories, playing dominoes, and cards. I think my grandmother taught me to play patience. I wish I could recall the details of those stories about my aunts and uncles as then my family tree would have been much easier to research!

I don't remember my grandparents reading to me either. They were both too busy with do,estic chores and knitting and crocheting to say nothing of rug making.
My mother on the hand read to me and taught me to read at age 3 1/2, she was an infant teacher herself and went on to be an extremely good remedial teacher.
The books I really remember were the Peter Rabit series and strangely Aesops fables.

Like Soutra I have no memory of being read to by my Grandparents - parents yes, and often. I am making up for this by reading to my own grandchildren whenever I have the chance. They love books and I love immersing myself in the stories and using different accents and funny faces to help them more enjoyable for us all.

I am now going to feel very sad.
My Scottish grandparents never read to me, in fact apart from going to their house for tea on a Sunday after a walk with my father, I have no recollection of spending time with them at all. I still don't know what my mother did on those Sunday afternoons. I wonder if she was included? But that's another story.
My other grandparents were German and only visited us every couple of years and again I have no recollection of story books although I did have a German version of "Struwelpeter" (Shock-headed Peter, I think it is in English) which my mother read to me as I was bilingual until I started school.
The close relationship I hope I enjoy with my DGC is not something I would have recognised in my childhood - so perhaps we learn not only by example but from what we would have liked to experience!