When I was very young, too young to read, my mother or father read some stories to me out of a book that has somehow lingered in my memory ever since. For years and years, I didn’t remember anything about the book except that the stories were filled with a sense of wonder and of fairyland and of something good just around the corner. As I grew up, I looked all over for that book. My parents didn’t remember what it was, and I couldn’t remember enough about it to describe it very well. All that stuck in my memory was the faint remembrance of golden pavilions and an old-fashioned charm that hung over the stories.
I became a librarian about 18 years ago, and that elusive book was still on my mind. But search as I might, I still didn’t find it. Then I discovered that the New York Review of Books was reissuing some old children’s classics. I ordered a dozen or so of the titles for my library, to replace well-loved copies and to add a few that we didn’t have anymore. When the books arrived, I leafed through all of them, as I usually do. As I opened one book, the story of a girl who was given a fortune by a pair of love-birds caught my eye. I read further in the book and found golden pavilions and fairyland and the enchantment I had felt back when I was a very, very little girl. This was the book I had been trying to find for so long! I had really found it!
Then I glanced over to the bookshelves near my desk. There, on the second shelf, not even ten paces away from me, was the old, tattered, much-loved book I was replacing. All these years it had been within arm’s reach! This taught me two things. First, that nothing is ever truly lost, if we can only look long enough. And second, if we are patient and wait with an open heart, the things we long for most are right within our grasp.
It is with great pleasure that I share with you two stories from that beloved book, The Little Bookroom, written by Eleanor Farjeon and published by The New York Review of Books. Today’s story is “San Fairy Ann.” This story will remain available on this podcast until December 31, 2021 and is shared with permission of Harold Ober Associates Incorporated, as agents for the Estate of Eleanor Farjeon.
Now sit back, relax, and listen to this story come to life!
Listening to audiobooks really does count as reading, and there's no better way to relax than to hear Stories Come to Life!
Let me know what you think! Please send an email to me at kluker@marshallpl.org. I'd love to hear from you!