It has been a delight to see my daughters enjoying the books as I did, weeping inconsolably at the deaths of Methuselah and Warbeak, as I did. This is something for children to read alone and have fun with, chunky slices of adventure they can lose themselves in. There is humour, but less wordiness than The Wind in the Willows. There is darkness in Jacques’ world, but it is less terrifying – and far less adult – than Watership Down. The whole saga continues for some two dozen books for my money, the first three are the best, and Redwall is definitely one for kids who love the talking animals of Dick King-Smith. Even the word “feast” transports me to his depictions of groaning tables laden with deeper’n’ever pies, Goody Stickle’s new yellow cheese, “bulrush and water-shrimp soup provided by the otters a large flagon of Skipper’s famous hot root punch”. Mattimeo continued the saga, following Matthias’s son as he is kidnapped by the slaver fox Slagar the Cruel (another excellent baddie Jacques does villainous animals very well).īorn in 1939, Jacques’ books were informed by the second world war, and his memories of rationing. (“Cluny was a God of War! Cluny was coming nearer!”) Heroism and sacrifice, comedy and evil – all of life is contained in Jacques’ anthropomorphic world.Īfter Redwall, Jacques told the story of how Redwall Abbey came to be, in the sequel Mossflower, as Martin the Warrior (another mouse, of course) arrives to save the creatures of the forest from the grip of the wildcats (Tsarmina Greeneyes is a particularly wonderful villain). The first novel, 1986’s Redwall, was my introduction to fantasy: Matthias, a young orphan mouse, seeks a lost sword to see off an evil rat army led by Cluny the Scourge.
Jacques’ bestselling stories of talking mice, squirrels and otters (the goodies) and rats, foxes and wildcats (the baddies) gave me so much happiness as a child. I f, like me, you are a fan of Brian Jacques, then the news that Netflix is working on an adaptation of Redwall will have you setting the abbey bells a-ringing in joy.
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