#reading autobiography

[karinlibrariansketchnotes]

Have you thought about how you became the reader you are today? Create a Sketchnote reading autobiography.

[childrenliteracies]

Reading Autobiography and Related Thinking about Literacy

This is the task of another course, my Reading Autobiography. For writing it, I went back my childhood and remembered many things detailed. After cleared up the memory, I found that literacy is really the thing influenced by families, cultures, the environment of times and even the politics.

I still kept my first book though I have not held the related memory. It is a cute book with a hard cover, for my first birthday. There are different kinds of animals on every page. I grew up with my grandparents before 6 year old. At that time, my grandfather was a famous poet and dramatist in China, and my grandmother was working in a library. That means there were a lot of books in both of their home and workplace, though a few for children in that period. My earliest memory of reading book was at about 3-4 year old, just as I said in the last post. Every day after kindergarten, my grandmother took me to the library, gave me some books or magazines which had pictures and left me alone. I played with the books. I ‘read’ the pictures and guessed the stories and meanings of the words around them. By degrees, I began to understand the meanings of more and more words, earlier than most of other children, though I still did not know their pronunciation.

I also remembered the feeling when I stood between the bookshelves in the library: curious and awestruck. I was just as tall as the bottom level of those bookshelves. The books were as the universe. I think maybe the children today difficult to imagine that feeling because most libraries have special bookshelves for them. But it was amazing. I believe that the environment really has significant influence on children’s hobbies.

Another ‘tool’ used by most Chinese parents (including my grandparents) for children’s literacy is Chinese traditional poems. Most of them have stories and rich cadence, easy to remember. That is also a key for Chinese people to continue Chinese traditional culture generation by generation.

In the early 1980s, Disney Cartoon was introduced into China and became very popular. So there were many little ‘Disney’ picture books published (without copyright at that time). I was crazy about them and still keep some of them now. They were also the way of my early literacy. The size of these little picture books was about 1/4 of A4. Each page had 1-2 pictures. The pictures structured the stories and words mainly appeared in the dialogs of roles. In the later 1980s there were little picture books of ‘Adventure of TinTin’ (Les Aventure De TinTin) and ‘Popeye’ appeared.

When I was 6 year old, one day I saw the daughter of my mother’s colleague reading a series of children’s books, which named ‘The World Fairy Tales’. They seemed so attractive and I badgered my mother to buy for me. At last I got my wish and these books became my favorite books. The series included most famous stories in the world such as some of Green Brother’s and Andersen’s stories, Wilhelm Hauff’s stories, Pippi Longstocking, James and the Giant Peach, The Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor, the Fox Reynard (Reineke Fuchs), Puss in Boots, Mr. Wind and Mrs. Rain, The Wonderful Adventures of Nils, Wind in the Willows, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe, The Water-Babies…It also included some tales from Italy, Arabia, Japan and Soviet (Russia) and other countries. I read these books time by time. It can be said they were the most important books in my primary school, mixing the contrast of different cultures. In fact, they were also a landmark on Chinese children’s books publishing industry.

My father was a physics lecturer. When I was 10, he said to me, ‘Now you can start to read science fantasy novels.’ and then he gave me 2 Si-fi books. They opened a new world to me. Since that, I keep my reading habit and favor of this kind of books till now. There is a famous SF magazine in China named ‘Science Fiction World’, which has introduced a huge number of famous SF and fantasy novels in the worldwide (most were from USA and UK) in past 23 years and effected many Chinese young people. I have kept most of them. Its peak circulation has reached 100,000 one month.

On the other hand, after 1989, most Children’s books and cartoons from Western even including Disney’s were disappeared in about 5 years (I couldn’t remember exactly). Due to that, the only western children’s novel during that time I can remember was ‘The Famous Five’. Meanwhile many Japanese cartoons and YA novels began to land onto China. These Japanese cartoon books, animations and novels have deep influence on 1980s and 1990s Chinese children (including me). Some children even learned Japanese by themselves through them. They are the window through which children could realize Japanese and other developed countries’ cultures. I think most of them are positive more than negative on widen children’s knowledge, outlooks and imagination.

From late 1980s Taiwan romantic novels came into China mainland, as well as Kong-fu novels written by Hong Kong authors. And they were liked by many Chinese teenagers. The study in the schools was heavy for most Chinese children born in 1980s and 1990s because of the competition press taken by population (it has been better nowadays). So the teachers in schools nearly did not commend any additional book to students. Many parents even believed all books beside textbooks (especially Taiwan romantic novels, kong-fu novels and Japanese cartoon) were negative for their children’s study and took a variety of ways to insulate the children from those books. Nevertheless, children always had their ways to get the books they wanted to read. In 1990s, there was a special phenomenon in China: the popularity of ‘lending book shops’. Children and teenagers could borrowed the books by a very low price (≈0.01 pound/per book one day, and it would be much cheaper if you borrowed more). Most books in these shops were ‘rubbish’ in parents’ and teachers’ thinking but loved by the young people: the three kinds of the books above, and also including some foreign YA and fantasy novels. I have to say I also enjoyed by these books at that time.

I began to read adults’ classic literature and other variety books from 12 year old. I still remember I spent 5 days to read ‘Gone with the Wind’ and used a half of diary to write down my feeling about ‘Sophie's World’. Most of my reading habits since secondary school have continued till now, though I mostly focused on fantasy novels in recent years. However, my new favor of western children’s colorful picture books and YA novels just since about 8 years ago, when they began to be introduced into China in force.

Reading is always a pleasure thing for me. As Martin Auer said, ‘A good book leads to the unknown, the unknown of one’s soul, for example.’ I keep reading for thinking, for exploring the world, for understanding the people and history, for relaxation, and now also for my work. As a matter of fact, the impact of those readings since my childhood has been reflected on many aspects such as my values, thinking way, living style and choice of job. It absolutely played a major role in making me who and what I am today.