Yesterday and today I’ve been helping the team at Letchworth Arts Centre celebrate their book “I Remember The War”. This, you might recall, is a project using real wartime memories, provided by Garden City residents, illustrated by children from six Letchworth schools. The workshops have been described before on this blog (click here), but in brief, the children used pen and ink (a good wartime technique) to bring the memories to life. The Letchworth Arts Centre team then had to squeeze as many of 300 illustrations into an 80 page book as possible. inevitably not everyone made it in. But I hope those children are not too disappointed; they still participated and that’s good. And some other images have been made into greetings cards and others are featured in a special exhibition at the Arts Centre.
Everyone has worked incredibly hard on the book and it seems to have been a big success. Yesterday a vintage celebration in the art centre invited first the children then later the people who were themselves children during the war and who provided the poignant and fascinating memories.Today in David’s Bookshop, our wonderful local independent bookstore, a huge signing session took place with dozens of children and pensioners finding out together what it’s like to be a famous illustrator and having to autograph books. A lovely event, a fantastic project and a brilliant way to celebrate 65 years since VE day. The book remains on sale around Letchworth; if you are remotely local, do go and see the exhibition and get a copy. At £3 it’s a war-time priced bargain!
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