Monday, June 24, 2013

I remember buying the first Sherlock Holmes novel — ‘A Study in Scarlet’ — at a Church jumble sale in East London when I was about 12 years old. I became hooked on Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories straight away, and I got as many of his books as I could out of my local library, and then started buying them. What I can’t remember now is why I bought the book. I must have known something about Sherlock Holmes already, and wanted to find out more, but I don’t know where that initial impulse came from.
What does your Sherlock collection contain? Do have any memorabilia items?

 Mostly I collect works of fiction which use Sherlock Holmes as a character, and I have several hundred of those, but I also have a sideline in collecting books of literary criticism which analyse the Sherlock Holmes stories. The ones that especially interest me are the ones which assume that Sherlock Holmes is in some sense a real person and then try to work out whether he went to Cambridge or Oxford University by analysing the attendance records between 1860 and 1880 looking for someone with the surname “Holmes”.
There are some criticism by conservative fans, what is your opinion about it? Is there anything you would like to tell them?
I understand the criticisms by conservative fans, and if someone else was writing this series then I would probably feel the same way. The
problem with conservative fans is that they want everything to be exactly the same as it was when Conan Doyle was writing, but the world and fictional styles have moved on. I would point out to them, however, that I am trying desperately not to contradict anything that Conan Doyle did, and that I am attempting to explain how Sherlock Holmes came to develop all of those skills that Conan Doyle told us he had – the boxing, the fencing, the martial arts, the chemistry, the violin playing… It stands to reason that Sherlock Holmes had to learn those things somewhere, and, more importantly, he had to have a reason for learning them all. Conservative Sherlockians tend to assume that Sherlock Holmes was either never a child or that he was like the adult version when he was a child. I just can’t see how that can be true.
ACTIVITIES

1.- Answer the following questions

1.- How did Andrew became hooked on Sherlock Holmes stories?
2.- Was Sherlock Holmes a real person?
3.- Why has Andrew been criticized by some of Arthur Conan Doyle’s fans?


Upload answers on your blog!

DH, Dinah and the Computer Club

Posted: March 17, 2013 by carlachavezs in Readers
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The Deamon Headmaster and the Prime Minister’s Brain is the second book of the series written by Gillian Cross. When these books were turned into a BBC series, the Prime Minister’s Brain was part of chapters 4 to 6. These are the first minutes of chapter 4. Watch them carefully to answer the questions below. After checking your responses, read chapters 1-3 and compare with the TV series.

1. What is the purpose of this SPLAT’S meeting?
2. What do they do at the computer club? Who likes it?
3. What is the name of the computing competition?
4. What is the name of the computer game?
5. Who invites Dinah to participate?
6. Was it easy for Dinah to win the competition? How do you know?
7. Who sent the card to Dinah? What does it say?
8. When and where will the finals take place?
9. What does Dinah need to go to the finals?
10. How does Dinah react when her mom says that she can’t afford the new laptop?
11. What are three solutions offered by Dinah to buy the laptop?
12. What did mom say?

Gillian Cross and the Deamon Headmaster

Posted: March 17, 2013 by carlachavezs in Readers
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Official Gillian Cross Biography Pt 1

Here are the basic names and dates and places. If you want something more chatty, try the next page. And if you want a list of my books, look under book details.
Born:1945, in London
Father:James Eric Arnold d.1988
Mother:Joan Emma Arnold
Educated:
  1. North London Collegiate School for Girls
  2. Somerville College, Oxford
  3. University of Sussex
Qualifications:MA (Oxford) Class 1
D. Phil (Sussex)
Married:1967 to Martin Cross
Children:Jonathan (born 1967)
Elizabeth (born 1970)
Anthony (born 1984)
Katherine (born 1985)
Prizes:WOLF – Library Association’s Carnegie Medal 1990
THE GREAT ELEPHANT CHASE – Whitbread Children’s Novel Award 1992
THE GREAT ELEPHANT CHASE – Smarties Prize Overall Winner 1992
Hobbies:Orienteering and playing the piano. (But I’m not very good at either of them.) I also read a lot.
Page 1 gives you the straightforward factual information – the things that get put on forms.
In between and alongside all those things, I’ve had quite a few informal jobs. I’ve worked as:
  • an unqualified teacher in a primary school (when I was 19)
  • an assistant to a village baker (when I was 23)
  • a childminder (when I was about 30)
  • an assistant to a Member of Parliament (when I was about 32).
For eight years, I was a member of the committee which advises government ministers about public libraries. I have always used libraries a lot, and I think it’s very important that public libraries should continue to be free and open to everyone. Reading and information are getting more and more important for everyone and libraries are essential for keeping in touch and keeping up to date.
I spend most of my time writing and looking after my family. I also edit the parish magazine in the village where I live, and I travel around quite a lot, talking to children and adults. (It’s pretty hard to stop me talking.)
I’ve done quite a lot of travelling abroad to speak about my books. I’ve been to Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Brazil, Australia and Mexico, among other places. Wherever I go, I like to talk to people (of course) and to look at paintings and sculptures.
I write because I love telling stories and finding out about things. My stories don’t have ‘messages’, but I like to write about people in difficult and dangerous situations. I’m interested in how they cope and the decisions they make.Telling Tales
If you want to know more about me and my life, you could consult the AuthorZone magazine which has interviews and information about a hundred authors. You can find out about that on http://www.peters-books.co.uk.
You can read even more about my life and what I’ve written (and see my family photos) in a book called Telling Tales, which is published by Egmont Children’s Books.
Taken from: http://www.gillian-cross.co.uk/

Task:

Read the author’s biography carefully. Complete the graphic organizer.
Biography organizer, click biography


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