Grimble
If you didn't grow up in the UK, or did not grow up in the 1970s (or heaven forbid, did neither), it is almost a certainty that you didn't read Grimble. In fact, even if you
did grow up in the UK in the 1970s you probably wouldn't have read Grimble. But I did, and I loved it. I loved Grimble's food related exploits (such as playing football with a coconut, knocking some paint off a door, and sticking it back on with banana sludge). I loved the fact that Grimble had a friend called David Sebastian-Waghorn, who owned a book called "How To Make Fudge, And Other Good Tricks" (which was the inspiration for
Indigo's latest set of pictures). In fact, I loved it so much that I wrote to Mr Clement Freud, its author (hairy ex MP, cookery writer and witty "raconteur", grandson of Sigmund, brother of Lucian, and father of Emma) to tell him so. Much to the surprise of an 8 year old me, he (or rather Grimble, his character) wrote back to confirm that Clement wouldn't be writing any more books on account of his "teeth falling out, and being a Parliament or something". It made a big impression on me. I was quite disappointed when I finally saw Mr Freud on television, a lugubrious character with big droopy eyes who would witter witticisms in a dismal, mumbly sort of way. Funnily enough, I quite like him now.
Anyway, it turns out that someone has gone and transcribed the complete
Grimble (and its only marginally less good bedfellow Grimble At Christmas) into electronic format, and published the whole shebang on the web. Hurrah! The world is a better place for it.
Posted by nikn