Jo Cotterill reflects on the enduring magic of Joan Aiken's marvellous fairytales.
I don’t know how old I was when I read A Necklace of Raindrops. I only know that it caused a tremendous
longing in my soul for such a necklace. I was a girly child, fond of tutus and
fairy wings, and a desperate desire for my own unicorn. The Necklace fitted
perfectly into my romantic visions.
One dark and stormy night (yes, one of those beginnings!), Mr Jones, recently a father, finds the North
Wind, personified as a tall man, stuck in his holly tree. On helping him get
free, Mr Jones is rewarded by a necklace of three raindrops which the North
Wind hands over as a present for his new baby daughter. ‘I will be the baby’s
godfather’ he says imperiously. He promises to bring the girl a new raindrop
every year on her birthday (the necklace starts life with three raindrops) and
each raindrop will confer a new magic power. By the time she has the full set
of ten raindrops (on her seventh birthday) she will be able to swim any river,
go unharmed in the worst storm, and make it start and stop raining, among other
things.
But as always there is a catch. The little girl, named
Laura, is not allowed to take off the necklace, otherwise, the North Wind says
vaguely, ‘it might bring bad luck’. What kind of a warning is that?
Anyway, Laura grows into a nice little girl who loves her
necklace and dutifully wears it all the time – until she begins to attend
school. Another girl, Meg, is jealous of Laura’s pretty necklace and so she
tells the teacher that Laura is wearing jewellery. The teacher makes Laura
remove the necklace, but Meg steals it from its safe place and takes it home.
Laura is distraught – all the more so because it’s her birthday soon and her
godfather is due to bring the tenth and final raindrop. Meg soon finds that
crime doesn’t pay because the necklace doesn’t work for her, and her father
takes it away. He sells it and soon it is on a ship, destined as a present for
the princess of Arabia.
Laura cries desperately over the loss of her necklace, but
in a Disney-like fashion, birds and animals pop up and offer to help her find
it. Apparently, she has been kind to them in the past (though the story makes
no mention of it up to now – an editor these days would demand earlier
references!) and now they become her personal spies, sniffing out information.
Before long, Laura is on the trail of the necklace and has
to take a ride on a friendly dolphin (since she can no longer swim) to Arabia where she begs the princess to return her
necklace. In the ensuing argument, the North Wind arrives with the final
raindrop. Annoyed that his god-daughter has taken off his present (after nearly
seven years!) he lets the raindrop fall onto the grass where it is lost. The
princess takes pity on Laura and hands over the necklace, whereupon one of
Laura’s tears falls onto the necklace and becomes the final raindrop.
As a child, I was fascinated by the romance in Joan Aiken’s
stories. Magic was referred to in such a practical way that it was taken for
granted that buses could fly, unicorns could arrive on your lawn, and raindrops
could hang from a necklace without falling off. It was the fantastical element
that appealed, along with the stunning illustrations by Jan Pienkowski, my
favourite ever illustrator.
It is interesting to me that as a writer, I shy away from
fantasy now. It was such an enormous part of my childhood, and yet I don’t
write fantasy at all. I hardly read it now either, and again I can’t explain
why. Perhaps the practical, cynical side of me that says magic isn’t real has
shouted down the inner romantic?
And yet…and yet…as I grow older, I find myself seeking out
stories with magical elements. Not necklaces or unicorns, but real life
experiences that defy rational explanation. And I am more and more attracted to
fiction with a romantic edge: not necessarily a falling-in-love one, but a
slightly rose-tinted one where people get the happy endings they deserve.
I do think that having children has had something to do with
this. I have two young daughters, and for them, every day is magical in the
smallest ways. My eldest licks frost from the tree. My youngest echoes the
‘beep’ from the microwave. I have begun to look at the world in fresh ways,
noticing the beaded cobwebs in the garden and feeling so disappointed if there
is no one to share them with.
And now I am sharing the necklace of raindrops with my
eldest. At five and a half, this is the first story that she has eagerly wanted
to read for herself. I read it to her, and then she wanted to read it to me. It
took us four bedtimes to get through it, but she finished it in the end and the
delight on her face was beyond words.
As if I needed any more proof of the power of this
fairytale, she presented me with her Christmas list. Under ‘pink mobile
phone, Rapunzel Barbie and chocolate coin maker’ she had written ‘necklace of
raindrops’.
Here is the 'necklace of raindrops' that I made for my daughter this Christmas. She was very excited to find it in her stocking on Christmas morning!
Jo Cotterill has been an actor, musician
and teacher and now writes books at her home in Oxfordshire. She has published
21 books for young people and teenagers, including the critically acclaimed ‘Red
Tears’ (as Joanna Kenrick) and her light romance series ‘Sweet
Hearts’. Her new book, ‘Looking at the Stars’, a story of
inspiration and imagination among refugees, has just been published by Bodley Head.
Here is the 'necklace of raindrops' that I made for my daughter this Christmas. She was very excited to find it in her stocking on Christmas morning!
