Rereading Our Childhood

We celebrated the 100th anniversary of the publication of A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh by revisiting Pooh, Christopher, Robin, and their friends in the Hundred Acre Wood. We talked about how Winnie-the-Pooh permeated our childhoods, about Milne's career beyond his most famous creation, and about the real Christopher Robin Milne's complicated relationship with his fictional alter ego. 

Mentioned on this episode:

Books featuring Winnie-the-Pooh and Christopher Robin:

Winnie-the-Pooh (stories, 1926, Simon and Schuster 100th anniversary edition)

When We Were Very Young (poems, 1924)

Now We are Six (poems, 1927)

The House at Pooh Corner (stories, 1928) 

Short movies and records: Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree (1966), Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day (1968) 

Somewhere, a Boy and a Bear: The Remarkable Life of A.A. Milne and the Legacy of Winnie-the-Pooh, by Gyles Brandreth (2025) 

BBC article with a pictures of Christopher Robin next to Winnipeg, aka Winnie, the real-life bear at the London Zoo that Winnie-the-Pooh was named after

Story in The Times about the first appearance of Winnie-the-Pooh in the Evening News on December 24, 1925, with an illustration of the front page featuring the story

Article in The Guardian about the 100th anniversary of Winnie-the-Pooh, discussing Winnie-the-Pooh and Paddington the Bear 

Recommended by Deborah: A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond

Recommended by Mary Grace: The Peanuts comic strip by Charles M. Schulz 

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

Writer Ginny Kubitz Moyer joined us to discuss Maud Hart Lovelace's Betsy-Tacy, the story of two five-year-old friends living in the small Minnesota town of Deep Valley in the late 19th century. Published in 1940, it's the first in a series that ends with Betsy's marriage.

Discussed in this episode:

Ginny's books: The Seeing Garden, A Golden Life, and The World at Home. (You can find Ginny at ginnymoyer.org.)

Deborah's interviews with Ginny on The Seeing Garden and A Golden Life

Other Betsy-Tacy and Deep Valley books: Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill , Emily of Deep Valley, and Carney's House Party and Winona's Pony Cart (combined in one volume)

Also discussed: 

William Wordsworth's poem "Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood"

The Betsy-Tacy Society

New York Times article by Perri Klass about the Betsy-Tacy Society (2012)

New Yorker article by Jia Tolentino about Emily of Deep Valley (2017) 

Emily of New Moonby L.M. Montgomery

Recommended for Betsy-Tacy fans: 

Ginny: The All-of-a-Kind Familyseries by Sydney Taylor; The Lemon Jelly Cakeby Madeline Babcock Smith; Maud Hart Lovelace's Deep Valleyby Julie A. Schrader

Mary Grace: Ramona the Pestby Beverley Cleary; The Moffatsby Eleanor Estes

Debby: "B" is for Betsy by Carolyn Haywood

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading "B" is for Betsy by Caroline Haywood

Reading Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary

Rereading The Moffats by Eleanor Estes

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago. 

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

Keiana Mayfield, an assistant professor of social work at George Mason University and the Diversity in KidLit Advocate for East City Book Shop in Washington, D.C., joined us to discuss Gone Wolf by Amber McBride, which was published in 2023. Gone Wolf is the story of two girls named Imogen, one in a future racist dystopia and one in current-day Charlottesville, Virginia. We also talked about reading diversely: what it means, why it matters, what the publishing industry is doing well, and what it could be doing better.

Discussed in this episode:

Other books by Amber McBride:

The Leaving Room (Deborah’s interview with McBride about this book is here)

Onyx and Beyond

Also mentioned.

East City Book Shop in Washington, D.C., where Keiana hosts the W(h)ine and Angst book club for adults and several book clubs for children

The Xenogenesis series by Octavia Butler, including Book 3, Imago

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

Interviews with Amber McBride in Publisher’s Weekly and Virginia Living

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

We Need Diverse Books, an organization promoting diversity in children’s literature

About the B’Nai Bagels by E.L. Konigsberg

Recommended for fans of Gone Wolf:

Keiana: The Last Cuentista by Donna Barbra Higuera, winner of the 2022 Newbery Medal; Candace, The Universe, and Everything by Sherri L. Smith; Other Words for Home by Jasmine Warga; The Extraordinary Orbit of Alex Ramirez by Jasminne Paolino

Deborah: Candace, The Universe, and Everything by Sherri L. Smith (seconding Keiana’s recommendation; Deborah’s interview with Smith about this book is here); other books by Amber McBride

Other recommendations from Keiana: Rainbow Shopping by Qing Zhuang; The Village Beyond the Mist by Sachiko Kashiwaba; How to Walk a Dog by Joanne Levy

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

Rereading From The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsberg

Our Favorite Picture Books

You can find Keiana at keianamayfield.com, Deborah at deborahkalb.com Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago. 

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

For this episode, we revisited The Borrowers, Mary Norton's 1952 novel about a family of tiny people who live under the kitchen of a house in the British countryside. We were as charmed as ever by the ingenuity of the Borrowers, who have a dresser made of matchboxes and a teapot made of an acorn shell, but there was a layer of darkness in the story that we hadn't remembered. 

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books in the series:

The Borrowers Afield

The Borrowers Afloat

The Borrowers Aloft

The Borrowers Avenged

Also by Mary Norton:

Bedknob and Broomstick

Film adaptations:

Bedknobs and Broomsticks, 1971 movie (trailer here)

The Borrowers, 1973 Hallmark Hall of Fame TV special (IMDB entry here)

The Borrowers, 1997 live-action adaptation (trailer here)

Arietty, 2010 Japanese anime adaptation (trailer here)

Also mentioned:

Gone-Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright, illustrated by Beth and Joe Krush, who illustrated the American edition of The Borrowers

All-of-a-Kind Family Downtown by Sydney Taylor, illustrated by Beth and Joe Krush

The English Bookshop, in Uppsala, Sweden and other locations

Independent obituary of Mary Norton

Independent obituary of Mark Norton, Mary Norton's son

Recommended by Mary Grace: The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Recommended by Deborah: Stuart Little by E.B. White

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

Nancy Hudgins joins us to talk about I'll Get There. It Better Be Worth the Trip, John Donavan's groundbreaking 1969 novel about a romance between two thirteen-year-old boys. Nancy is the author of Books Good Enough for You, a children's biography of legendary children's book editor Ursula Nordstrom, who edited I'll Get There.

Mentioned on this episode: 

Nancy's childhood favorites:

Charlotte's Web by E.B. White (an Ursula Nordstrom book)

The Pink Motel by Carol Ryrie Brink

The House of Sixty Fathers by Meindert De Jong, illustrated by Maurice Sendak (an Ursula Nordstrom book)

More Ursula Nordstrom books:

Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

It's Like This, Cat by Emily Neville

Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

William's Doll by Charlotte Zolatow

Stevie by John Steptoe

The Secret Language by Ursula Nordstrom

Little Bear by Else Holmelund Minarik, illustrated by Maurice Sendak

Freaky Friday and A Billion for Boris by Mary Rodgers

In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak. (You can read an excerpt from Books Good Enough for You about In the Night Kitchen, published in Publisher's Weekly, here.) 

Also mentioned:

Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom, edited by Leonard Marcus

Time magazine's 2021 list of the top 100 young adult books of all time, which includes I'll Get There

2009 Publisher's Weekly article about the 40th anniversary reissue of I'll Get There

2014 Los Angeles Review of Books article by Rumaan Alam about I'll Get There

Born Free (movie trailer here)

The audiobook of Books Good Enough for You, narrated by Barbara Rosenblatt

Recommended for fans of I'll Get There. It Better Be Worth the Trip:

Nancy: Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden; A High Five for Glenn Burke by Phil Bildner

Deborah: The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger; Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

Mary Grace: Bertram Cope's Year by Henry Blake Fuller

Recommended Ursula Nordstrom books:

Nancy: All sixteen books discussed in Books Good Enough for You, especially A Hole is to Dig by Ruth Krauss

Deborah: Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh; Charlotte's Web by E.B. White

Mary Grace: Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes: Rereading Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink; Rereading Charlotte's Web by E.B. White; Rereading Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh; Rereading Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Nancy at nancyhudgins.com, Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

Writer Alex Poppe joins us to talk about Deenie, Judy Blume’s 1973 novel about a girl, pigeonholed as the pretty one in her family, whose life is thrown off track when she’s diagnosed with scoliosis. Alex is the author most recently of the memoir Breakfast Wine.

Other books by Judy Blume:

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret

The One in the Middle is the Green Kangaroo

Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great

Forever

Tales of a Fourth-Grade Nothing

Then Again, Maybe I Won’t

It’s Not the End of the World

Blubber (this is the book Alex couldn’t remember the name of)

In the Unlikely Event (this is the adult novel we couldn’t remember the name of)

Also mentioned:

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, the 2023 movie (trailer here)

Judy Blume: A Life by Mark Oppenheimer

New Yorker review of Judy Blume: A Life by Katy Waldman

Otherwise Known as Judy the Great by Selina Alko, children’s biography of Judy Blume

Michigan Daily article about Deenie by Rebecca Smith, a student with scoliosis

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Recommended for fans of Deenie:

Alex: Fight Night by Miriam Toews; “The River Nemanus,” a short story by Anthony Doerr from the collection Memory Wall

Mary Grace: Karen and With Love from Karen by Marie Killilea (MG)

Deborah: Braced by Alison Gerber

Previous podcast episode:

Rereading Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret

You can find Alex at alexpoppeauthor.com, Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

We had completely forgotten about Eleanor Estes's The Moffats until a friend suggested that we reread it. Published in 1941, it's the first in a series about four children growing up in small-town Connecticut in the 1910s. 

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books in the series:

The Middle Moffat (1942), a Newbery Honor Book

Rufus M. (1943), a Newbery Honor Book

The Moffat Museum (1983) 

Other books by Estes:

The Hundred Dresses (1944), a Newbery Honor Book

Ginger Pye (1951), winner of the 1952 Newbery Medal

Pinky Pye (1958)

Also mentioned:

Many Moons (1943) by James Thurber, with illustrations by Louis Slobodkin

"Eleanor Estes: Chronicler of the Family Story," by Claudia Mills, on the UConn Archives and Special Collections Blog. 

"Celebrating Children's Books Week--and a pioneering children's librarian," on Mary Grace's blog, My Life 100 Years Ago

Recommended by Deborah: The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright; Beverly Cleary's books

Recommended by Mary Grace: The All-of-a-Kind Family series by Sydney Taylor

Other episodes:

Rereading The Young Unicorns by Madeleine L'Engle

Rereading Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

Rereading Charlotte's Web by E.B. White

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

For the first episode of our fourth (!) season, we reread E.L. Konigsburg's Newbery Medal winner From The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, which was published in 1967. This book, one of our all-time favorites, has one of the best plot premises of all time: a suburban brother and sister run away from home and camp out at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by Konigsburg:

Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth

A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver

About the B'nai Bagels

Also mentioned:

Ban this Book by Alan Gratz

1965 New York Times article about the Metropolitan Museum's purchase for $225 of a statue that may be a Leonardo da Vinci

1996 New York Times article about a cupid statue at the French cultural center in New York that may be by Michaelangelo

Post on the Metropolitan Museum website about celebrating the 50th anniversary of From the Mixed-Up Files

2017 Smithsonian magazine article in which Johnny Doran reminisces about playing Jamie in a film version of From the Mixed-Up Files

Recommended by Mary Grace: Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth by E.L. Konigsburg

Rereading Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Rereading Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

For this episode, we reread Madeleine L’Engle’s 1968 novel The Young Unicorns, the third book in the Austin family series. We discussed 1960s New York, racial representation, family musical evenings, and how absolutely bonkers this book is.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by L’Engle:

A Wrinkle in Time (1962)

Meet the Austins (1960)

The Moon by Night (1963)

A Ring of Endless Light (1980)

Troubling a Star (1994)

A Severed Wasp (1983)

New York Times review of The Young Unicorns by Maia Wojciechowka

Blog posts on The Young Unicorns on Pickle Me This (this is the one where the writer thinks L’Engle wrote Dave as a Black character) and Lady Fancifull

Article on The Young Unicorns by Mari Ness on Reactor

2004 New Yorker article about Madeleine L’Engle

New York Times article on race in the Wuthering Heights movie (gift link)

Other episodes:

Rereading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com     

On this episode, Deborah introduces Mary Grace to A Bear Called Paddington, the first book in the beloved series about a bear from Peru who ends up living with a London family. We discuss Paddington’s timeless appeal to children, his status as a British icon, and how the book can be read as a refugee’s story.

Mentioned on this episode:

Paddington, the 2014 movie (trailer here)

“Paddington Bear, Refugee,” by Rebecca Mead, The New Yorker, June 28, 2017

Olga da Polga series by Michael Bond

Monsieur Pamplemousse series by Michael Bond

“Ma’amalade Sandwich, Your Majesty?” (video of Queen Elizabeth with Paddington on the British royal family’s website)

Article about the Paddington movie in the New York Times, January 9, 2015

Recommended for Paddington fans:

Mary Grace: Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers, Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne

Deborah: Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren, Stuart Little by A.A. Milne

Other episodes mentioned:

Rereading Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren

Rereading Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com, Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago, and Jean at jeanfreedman.com.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Podcast website at rereadingourchildhood.com