As VisitEngland celebrates its Year of Literary Heroes in 2017, the Shotley Peninsula in Suffolk will be hosting The Arthur Ransome East Coast Celebration, to commemorate the life of the English author and journalist who moved to the county in 1935.
Swallows and Amazons author Arthur Ransome also has connections with the area. Ransome (1884–1967), whose books launched a million childhood sailing dreams, enjoyed regular visits to Ramsgate Royal Harbour and during one trip he saw a picture of a child in a red cap – inspiring the famous headgear of Amazon pirate girls Nancy and Peggy Blackett…
It might be hard to be believe, but Arthur Ransome’s Nancy Blackett celebrated her 86th anniversary yesterday (30th March), receiving lots of birthday wishes on social media. Born in 1931 at…
A REPUBLICATION of some of the works by the famous author of Swallows and Amazons has been released. ‘Old Peter’s Russian Tales’ and ‘The Battle of the Birds and the Beasts’ have been brought together in a centenary reprint to create the first …
A NEW book offers a critical overview of a famous series of stories set in the Lake District. Julian Lovelock, a former lecturer of English literature at Buckinghamshire University, has produced an in-depth sturdy of Arthur Ransome’s 12 Swallows and …
This new year, 2017, will not only see the 20th anniversary of the Nancy Blackett Trust, but it will also be 80 years since the publication of “We Didn’t Mean to Go to Sea“, and on a more sombre note, 50 years since Arthur Ransome died…
It is autumn 1919. Moscow is surrounded by counter-revolutionaries. Arthur Ransome is known to be a Bolshevik sympathiser. He’s fallen in love with Trotsky’s secretary. They both know they’ll be lynched or shot if Moscow falls. Somehow they must escape. On Ransome’s desk is a stone from Peel Island on Coniston Water. Is it a powerful enough talisman to get him home?
Arthur Ransome’s tales of boats and adventure – many of which were set in Suffolk – changed the course of children’s literature. But, says Julian Lovelock, who has written a book about Arthur Ransome’s Swallows and Amazons series, the author was a complex character whose novels were inextricably bound up with the times he lived through and the sadnesses of his own life.
As part of their #LoveToRead campaign the BBC visited the Lake District to explore the landscape that has provided inspiration for some of the best-loved children’s authors of all time. Gabrielle Rowley caught up with TV presenter Simon O’Brien to find out more about the Books That Made Britain documentary.