Children's Books

My first dispute about authorship was over a playground rhyme. We all learn them as children. Some of them run the length of the country, others are specific to a certain area. In our playground, many were written by me.

I was playing with words from the moment I spoke my first sentence. I loved the way they sounded and the way they felt in my mouth. I loved it when they conjured up events that couldn't possibly happen. Cows vaulting lunar bodies, garden plants that sprout silver bells or cockle shells and love overcoming the class divide between a dish and a spoon. When imagination frees words from the every day world, that's when they take on a life of their own.

Walking back from school by myself or playing in my room, that's when I made the rhymes up. The next day at school I'd race round the playground before the bell went, telling them to everyone I could. Bands of older and younger kids would stop me to hear the latest, laughing and pushing each other as they joined in and repeated them.

Several days later someone would come up to me and repeat one of the rhymes. I'd smile with pride and tell them, "I wrote that". Then the same thing would always happen. They'd shake their head and look at me like I was an idiot. "No you didn't," they'd say. "That's been going round for ages. My brother heard someone hum it in the chip shop last year. That bloke said his Granddad used to sing it in the war, sitting in his tank when he beat the Germans."

No matter how many rhymes I made up, no-one would ever believe that I was the one who had written them. Even when I made them up on the spot in front of them.

One time it all became too much to bear and I ran to stop anyone seeing my tears of frustration. I hid in a far corner and punched the wall, angry at how unfair it was. That's where my friend Leo found me.

"You know you couldn't have made them rhymes up," he said. "Why not?" I said. "Why won't anyone believe that?"

"Cos that's not how they work," he said. "They're just around aren't they? Everyone knows 'em, so they can't belong to one person can they? Otherwise no-one else'd ever sing 'em. They don't work proper that way."

He was right of course, although it took me many, many years to realise that. Stories and rhymes aren't owned by the people who tell them, they belong to everyone who hears them, especially those we hear in our childhood. These are often the most important stories we encounter because they shape the way we view the world. The really good stories stay with us our whole lives because they contain the first truly great truths we're ever exposed to.

These days I make up playground rhymes with my daughters, walking back from school by ourselves, or playing in their rooms. The other day one of her friends repeated a rhyme back to us. My daughter Freya smiled with pride, "I wrote that with my Dad," she said. "No you didn't," her friend said. "That's been going round for ages."

"Actually," said his mum, who was walking with us. "I think I remember that from my childhood."

"Yes," I said. "You probably do."

Later on Freya confronted me. She was hurt and angry. "It's not fair," she said. "Why didn't you tell them we wrote that rhyme."

"They don't work proper that way," I said, and gave her a cuddle.

As a child, more than anything I wanted credit for my rhymes and stories. For people to remember my name. Now I'm old enough to put my name to them, more than anything I want people to remember the stories and rhymes.