HAPPY BIRTHDAY

John Rowe Townsend seen here with his wife Jill Paton Walsh threw a big party for friends in Cambridge this week to celebrate his 90th birthday. In the photo, John was about to tell us all about his life going back to his wartime years. I was interested in the late 1950s when John was working as a journalist on the Manchester Guardian. While reviewing children's books, he saw how privileged and middle class the main characters were and decided to change all that by writing for children himself; stories like Gumbles Yard where there wasn't much privilege. It was all quite revolutionary at the time.