On Childhood

Why is childhood so important to a Serious Literary Author? Well, as Julie Garland says in The Wizards of Oz, “It’s always best to start at the beginning”. Our childhood shapes us. It moulds us. It makes us who we are. In fact, I have a pioneering theory, which I am considering pitching to mental health researchers and therapists, that many of our struggles in adulthood are actually influenced by events from childhood.

I suspect that my ability to produce such brilliant Serious Literature stems from several challenging episodes from my formative years. Indeed, my early life is a story of survival, one that begins on the day that I was born. I was born five weeks premature, and emerged far below the average size of a baby. I was so small that my mother dressed me in dolls’ clothes. But I survived.

Five years later, In my first ever PE lesson, Mr Burton told the class he wanted to see us all, one by one, complete a forward roll. I had never even attempted a forward roll. When it was my turn, I walked up to the mat, leaned forward and fell on my face. Everybody laughed. But I survived.

I had my first fight at the age of eleven. A boy called Matthew Chadburn pushed me into the school’s brand new interactive whiteboard. It wouldn’t turn on afterwards, and I was given detention even though it wasn’t my fault. But I survived.

At age fourteen I was stung by a jellyfish while swimming in the sea in Barcelona. Panicking, I ran into a nearby bar and asked the bartender what to do. He pointed at my arm then pointed at the toilet. I rushed into the toilet and urinated down my arm. When I returned he told me he was pointing at a bottle of vinegar on the table by the toilets. On realising what I had done, he laughed. But I survived.

Each of these incidents left scars on my body and, more importantly, scars on my brain. (I am referring to emotional scars, not brain damage.) And it is these scars that have made me into the Serious Literary Author and adult I am today.

I believe that many of my contemporary struggles, such as my fear of physical exercise and large interactive screens, can be traced back to my childhood. Think back to your own childhood. What scars did it inflict on you? Which do you still carry today? To become an SLA, you will need to learn not to hide from your scars. Instead, you must confront them, then deploy them. Let them fuel your creative endeavours. You must turn your pain into art. Here’s how.