Reading Aloud

In the 1961 book The Pace of a Hen, Quaker author Josephine Moffett Benton writes charmingly of the joyful beauty and fulfillment possible to women as they combine art, music, literature, science, and spiritual growth into the vocation of the housewife.

One of the joys she writes about is reading aloud together as a family:

"This deep appreciation and fervor for the pages of a storybook is the best way to teach children to read well themselves. REcently I heard a paper written for a master's degree in education on the subject "Reading for Comprehension." There was not one word in it about the joy of reading, about wanting to read on to see what happens next. It sounded as if reading were a dull labor, a bore that must be endured. Oh no, it is all the members of the family experiencing together delight in Mole and Ratty, Roo and Kanga, Uncle Analdus and Mother Rabbit who was such a worrier, Ola and Einar swapping all their belongings from pencils to cows, Jo and Beth given immortality again with rereading, and on and on, remembered hours of tranquil bliss. Mother can really come to be an authority on at least one type of modern literature, to the enrichment of herself and all her family.

From that reading there will spring up a family language. The more experiences, words, anecdotes, jokes the family have in common, the closer they are bound together. In their patter will be phrases from the books all the family have loved.

Any good time is "Song and dance and a gay life, tiddledy pom." Almost anyone, now and then, has the "brain of Pooh." Someone who is feeling sorry for herself is "Eyore." Someone who is boasting a little too freely is "Mr. Toad." Anyone who has so much to do she doesn't know where to begin is "The old sailor my grandfather knew."

Lovely, isn't it? We were able to spot all but one of the books. How many do you recognize? Can you name the one we cannot? Can you guess which one we didn't know? You can use a title or author more than once. Reply in the comments, and have fun!

1. Mole and Ratty
2. Roo and Kanga
3. Uncle Analdus and Mother Rabbit
4. Ola and Einar
5. Jo and Beth
6. "Song and dance and a gay life, tiddledy pom."
7. brain of Pooh
8. Eyore
9. Mr. Toad
10. "The old sailor my grandfather knew"