大象传媒

In this gripping investigation of children鈥檚 fiction, award-winning author Katherine Rundell makes a passionate argument for a literature that is often underrated, yet whose magic can live on inside us for the rest of our lives. The best children鈥檚 books need to be good enough both for the hungriest child and the wisest, sharpest adult.

In the fourth of five original essays, Katherine Rundell asks what fantasy fiction is for. Writers have been inventing mythical creatures for centuries. Some serve as warnings to navigate our own terror, others are a vehicle for thinking about enchantment and power. Fantasy fiction opens a space for bold ideas and for feeding our imagination, which should never be considered an optional extra. And it鈥檚 children鈥檚 books that can keep that imagination alive, even in adulthood.

Katherine Rundell is an acclaimed writer for children, winning Author of the Year and Book of the Year for Impossible Creatures at the British Book Awards 2024 and winner of the Costa Children鈥檚 Book Award.

Written and presented by Katherine Rundell
Producer: Jo Glanville
Editor: Kirsten Lass
Production Co-ordinator: Heather Dempsey
Studio Engineer: Dan King

A Loftus Media Production for 大象传媒 Radio 4

Quotation credits:
Diana Wynne Jones: in Diana Wynne Jones: An Exciting and Exacting Wisdom, by Teya Rosenberg et al. Peter Lang Publishing, 2002, p170
Ursula LeGuin, The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction, Ultramarine Publishing, 1979, p. 204
Ursula le Guin, 'Some Assumptions About Fantasy', a speech by Ursula K. Le Guin, presented at the Children鈥檚 Literature Breakfast BookExpo America, Chicago, 4 June 2004

Photo credit: Nina Subin