Judith Kerr Obituary by Janie Hampton

photo: Rex Shutterstock

Judith Kerr, esteemed writer and illustrator of children’s and young adult books, died last week aged 95. I had two memorable phone conversations with Judith. The first was when I was researching my book on Girl Guides and the Second World War, which included Jewish Girl Guides coming from Nazi-occupied Europe to Britain. Judith told me about her arrival from Germany in London, aged 13 in 1936. She was born in Berlin, where her father was a well-known German-Jewish journalist who openly criticized the Nazis. In 1933 he was warned that his passport might be confiscated, and he fled Germany, just a day before he would have been arrested. Shortly afterwards his wife, Judith, and her brother followed. The family travelled via Switzerland and Paris and settled in London.

Judith had left school when the Second World War began. By now speaking perfect English, she worked first as a secretary and then volunteered for the Red Cross, before being awarded a scholarship at the Central School of Arts in London. Later, she described an air- raid in London as vividly as a picture: ‘The sky was red, reflecting the fires on the ground, and in it hung clusters of orange flares which lit up everything for miles around. They looked like gigantic Christmas decorations floating slowly, slowly down through the night air. In the distance, yellow flashes like lightning were followed by muffled bangs – the anti-aircraft guns in Hyde Park. Suddenly a searchlight swept across the sky. It was joined by another and another, crossing and re-crossing each other, and then a great orange flash blotted out everything else.’ Judith met her future husband, television scriptwriter Nigel Kneale, in the school canteen where she was teaching, and he suggested she join the BBC as a scriptwriter.
The second lively conversation I had with Judith was when I was writing about the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. I was searching for other cultural events that year, and Judith told me about her work at the BBC television studios in Lime Grove. Nigel Kneale, known as Tom, was writing a science-fiction television serial when he, Judith and their colleagues watched the coronation on a black and white television. The Quatermass Experiment was to be about an alien arriving on Earth, but Kneale could not decide where the alien should land. As the coronation reached its climax, he realised that most television viewers had now seen inside Westminster Abbey: this would be the perfect place to first see the alien. ‘There was neither a budget nor the possibility of filming in the Abbey, so we bought a guide book, which included a photo of Poets’ Corner,’ Judith told me. Making television drama in 1953 required ingenuity and imagination. They photographed the guide book’s photo, blew it up and pasted it onto a canvas panel. ‘Then I put on a pair of wash-leather gloves, while Tom stuck bits of curled wire and twigs onto them. We cut a slit in the backdrop, and Tom put his hands through, wearing the gloves. He waggled his fingers very slowly. That was the scariest moment of the drama – when ‘the vegetable’ first appeared, this creep-crawly alien thing with tendrils which had absorbed the bodies and souls of two astronauts. The cameras could not move, and the cameraman saw everything upside down and back to front. It was all filmed live for the television, while another camera showed the actor in terror.’

Mog the Cat. copyright HarperCollins

Judith and Kneale were married in 1954 and had two children. When they complained that children’s books were boring, Judith told them stories about ‘Mog’ the cat. Later she wrote and illustrated the stories, and the series of 18 titles about Mog were published from 1970 to 2015. ‘Cats are very interesting people,’ she later said. After 30 years she wrote Goodbye Mog in which the cat died, a brave step for a children’s writer.

The Tiger who Came to Tea. copyright HarperCollins

Probably her best-known book was The Tiger Who Came to Tea, which also began in order to liven up her children’s day. Asked by BBC presenter Emily Maitlis if the tiger symbolised the the overturning of suburban life during the 1960s sexual and social revolution, she simply replied, ‘No, it was about a tiger coming to tea.’ Kerr’s ability to see the world from a child's perspective enabled her to write and draw exactly what a child wants to see, not what an adult thinks they should. She never wasted their time by repeating in words, what was already in the illustration. The illustrations were clear and simple, with only the essential people and objects in them. Published in 1968, the book has never been out of print. 

Judith Kerr at work

Judith’s son was eight when he saw the film The Sound of Music and commented, 'Now we know what it was like when Mummy was a little girl.' Judith was determined that he, and other children, should know what life was really like and so wrote the semi-autobiographical Out of Hitler Time trilogy. When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, Bombs on Aunt Dainty (originally published as The Other Way Round) and A Small Person Far Away, describe childhood among of the rise of the Nazis in Germany, life as a refugee in Britain during World War II, and the post-war years. When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit won the state-funded Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis (German Children's Literature Award) in 1974 and became a set text in German schools. In 2004, she said, 'I think of the business of the Holocaust, and the one and a half million children who didn't get out as I got out, in the nick of time -- I think about them almost every day now, because I've had such a happy and fulfilled life and they'd have given anything to have had just a few days of it. And I hope I've not wasted any of it: I try to get the good of every bit of it because I know they would have done if they'd had the chance.'
After the death of Nigel Kneale in 2006, Judith found writing and drawing even more important and continued publishing books into her ninth decade. Over 50 years, she published more than 30 books. Her publisher at HarperCollins, Charlie Redmayne, said she was 'a wonderful and inspiring person who was much loved by everyone. She was a brilliantly talented artist and storyteller. Always understated and very, very funny. She loved life and loved people - and particularly she loved a party.'

photo Daniel Sambraus/AP

Judith Kerr was awarded an OBE in 2012 for services to children's literature and Holocaust education. A year later, the ‘Judith Kerr Primary School’ in London opened as Britain’s first German-English state bilingual school. Just a week before she died, Judith was nominated at the British Book Awards as Illustrator of the Year. She leaves her son Matthew Kneale, a prize-winning novelist and author of ‘The English Passengers’ and daughter, Tacy, who designs special-effects for films.

Anna Judith Gertrude Kerr, 1923 -2019. 

www.janiehampton.co.uk 

What's for dinner? by Janie Hampton

'Simple but appetising' minced meat pie. Woman's Own, 1964

When Mary Gallati wrote her Hostess Dinner Book in 1953, she thought her recipes were the height of modern cooking. Reading it nearly 70 years later, it has become social history. Mary Gallati was the daughter of Italian restaurateur Mario Gallati, who co-founded 'The Ivy' restaurant in London in 1917. Thirty years later he opened the equally famous ‘Le Caprice’ restaurant behind The Ritz Hotel in Piccadilly.

July by Raymond E Meylan

In 1953, food rationing in Britain had another year to go, making fourteen years of miserable meals. The restrictions on the sale and purchase of all types of food, including bread, meat and eggs became even stronger after the end of the Second World War. People were fed up with dried eggs, tinned Spam, limited fruit, and the expense of using the black market. They were ready for something new, and Mary was ready to show them how to entertain. She wanted to share her cooking skills with post-war Britons. Her recipes were designed to fit the seasons, so she offered roast woodcock and ‘fried éperlans’ (smelts, a small fish) in March; and ‘kid au romain’ and shrimp cocktail in April. Lobsters and ‘potatoes parisienne’ feature in May, as do copious eggs and butter in preparation for when rationing was over.

April by Raymond E Meylan

However, tastes and ingredients were not as culturally diverse as they are now. Even Gallati with her Italian background, only used garlic sparingly. Avocadoes were a rare treat reserved for dinner parties, not for every-day sandwiches. Other ingredients were available. Not many recipe books now would include gulls eggs, smoked eel or 'cannelloni stuffed with calves' brains'. Duck aux cerises froides (duck with cold cherries) involved crushing the cherry stones to retrieve the tiny nuts. Aspic appears often, an ingredient my mother used  50 years ago for parties. With aspic and jelly moulds, she could make one chicken and tin of peas feed 20 people. I remember being surprised by old men saying with glee, ‘Mmmm, aspic! I haven’t had that since the nursery!’ Egg en gelée is poached eggs in aspic. To achieve that special 1950s look, you could mix aspic with mayonnaise (homemade, obviously) before piping it artistically onto your fish. Remember ‘Russian salad’? Tiny cubes of carrots and turnips with peas, mixed into mayonnaise, served in tomatoes with their insides scooped out, and a touch more aspic. Don’t forget the sprig of parsley!

The days of tiny supermarket trolleys, trendy baskets
and kitten heels!  Photo by Tesco Stories, 1963.

Gallati also suggested which drinks to serve, including cocktails. In January, one could drink ‘Peter Pan’, made from equal parts of gin, French vermouth, orange juice and peach bitter. Shaken not stirred, as is August’s ‘Highland Cooler’ of whisky, bitters and lemon. Whereas July’s Pimms no.1 demanded No Shaking.

February by Raymond E Meylan

The illustrations by Raymond E. Meylan still look modern – stark black and white ink drawings adorn the start of each month’s recipes. They remind me of 1950s tiles or Heal’s fabric, and would work well as tapestry designs. Meylan also designed logos for chemical companies in the 1960s, when abstract corporate logos were all the rage.

March by Raymond E Meylan

I love the mixture of French and English to give the recipes continental class, such as ‘carrots vichy’ and ‘crayfish a la russe’. ‘Moussaka á l’algerienne’ brought together Greece, France and North Africa. At my very first dinner party, cooked on my 13th birthday for six school friends, the menu I wrote by hand stated ‘Saucissons en toade dans une hole.’ Maybe Mary Gallati’s French was as bad as mine, and she just didn’t know the word for carrot or crayfish? Like Gallati, I also tried the latest pudding – Baked Alaska. Only I had never seen one, just heard about it. So the cake underneath was soggy, the meringue  chewy, and the ice cream completely melted. My friends claimed to be delighted by the glacé cherries sprinkled all over it.

'Three Course Dinner cooked in a pressure cooker'.
Why does it look so unappetizing? Maybe because it's served on school plates.
Woman's Own Cook Book, 1964.

If only I had used the Woman’s Own Cook Book of 1964 which has handy tips on ‘The etiquette of dining’, such as how to cut a grapefruit, and where to place the glacé cherry. I didn’t know that ‘the chief male guest sits on the hostesses right, and the chief woman guest on the host’s right.’ Woman’s Own usefully pointed out that if there were eight people round the table, the sexes couldn't alternate and ‘adaptations are made at the host’s end.’ How confused the hostess of the 1960s would be by same sex couples, and non-binary people. The ‘chief duties of the host are pouring out wine and carving.’ Thank goodness nowadays, we can pour our own wine, and carving meat is a rare occurrence at a dinner party.

An exciting dinner party in 1964.
Which side of the hostess will the chief guest sit? 

How do these colour photos make the food look clean but cold and dull? 
Woman’s Own Cook Book, 1964.  

The chapter about children’s food insisted that they needed bland, tasteless, preferably steamed, mush – what we used to call ’Nursery food.’ Oat or barley ‘Jelly’ was recommended to build up weak children, and raw beef juice ( i.e. watered down blood) for delicate and anaemic babies. Colour, experimentation and taste were not encouraged.

'All-on-a-level kitchen', Woman's Own 1964.
I've often dreamed of a tidy kitchen like this,
and to wear kitten heels for cooking. 

My favourite chapter, one that clearly demonstrates how things have changed, was ‘Routine for Putting on Weight’. ‘Plenty of rest and exercise, a good diet of fattening foods and no worries – those are the essentials.’ The underweight reader was encouraged to stay in bed after breakfast; eat plenty of cake and ice cream; avoid green vegetables, salads, vinegar and egg white; and drink more cocktails. That’s a diet to aspire to!

Here are some recipes from Mary Gallati’s Hostess Dinner Book:
August: Sweetbreads Maréchale Place 2 large sweetbreads (lamb’s pancreas) in water and boil. Cool and remove fat and sinew. Cut into slices, roll in breadcrumbs and shallow-fry. Garnish with points of asparagus. Pour melted butter over . [Note to reader: à la maréchale is a French phrase for cooking food à l'anglaise ("English-style"), i.e. coated with bread crumbs and fried.] 

December: Smoked Eel. Cut into 3 inch sections. Garnish with quartered lettuce and tomato. Pass round horseradish sauce separately. Horseradish sauce: 4 tablespoons fresh grated horse-radish. ½ teaspoon salt. 1 ½ tablespoons vinegar. ½ cup cream. Cayenne pepper. Mix, add cream beaten stiff.

May by Raymond E Meylan

 www.janiehampton.co.uk

The Queen of Tonga by Janie Hampton

Here’s a story to cheer you up on a miserable cold day at the end of January. On a June afternoon in 1953, a golden coach was pulled through the crowded streets of London in the pouring rain by eight grey horses.

The pouring rain did not dampen coronation spirits

A procession of soldiers, military bands, generals on horseback, bagpipers and foreign monarchs in horse-drawn carriages wound through central London on a five-mile route from Westminster Abbey to Buckingham Palace. Hundreds of thousands of people had been waiting all night and most of the day in the rain. Considering it was June, with the trees in full leaf and the days so long, the weather was cold and miserable. When it wasn’t damp, it was drizzling; and when not drizzling, it poured. But the crowds remained upbeat and excited. After the dark years of the Second World War and the austerity that followed it, at last there was a reason to celebrate. They had been waiting for this day for over a year: the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. ‘It was all organised by the Duke of Norfolk,’ said 12 year old Jane Roberts. ‘He had a face like a miserable dog.' The route was lined with policemen in capes, naval cadets, and soldiers from around the world, wearing the medals they had won in the war. As the procession made its stately way towards the palace, the roar of applause cascaded down the streets like a Mexican wave at a sports ground. The children cheered the Canadian Mounties in their red uniforms on their sleek dark horses. Scottish people cheered the bagpipers, with their swinging kilts. Older people cheered Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, stately and courageous, sitting in a glass coach with her glamorous daughter Princess Margaret. Others cheered the Life Guards in their pointed helmets with white plumes and shining brass breastplates. They all marched in unison to the thumping beat of the military bands playing ‘Waltzing Matilda’ and the Victorian marching song, ‘We’re the soldiers of the Queen, m’lud’. But the strongest image that remains with everybody who was there that day is not of the beautiful young woman in the golden coach. The loudest and longest applause was for a monarch nobody had seen before, a woman of over six feet in height and 300 pounds in weight. Waving and smiling enthusiastically from her open carriage, her dark skin glistening in the rain, was the large and joyful Queen of Tonga, 
‘We heard the roar of the crowds from a mile away,’ said Enid Brown, who had come down from Birmingham with her sister Joyce. ‘We thought it must be for our new queen. The sound like the roar of a storm, it made my spine tingle. When the black carriage appeared we could see why. There was the usual pair of lovely black horses pulling. All the other carriages had their hoods up and you couldn’t really see who was inside. But this one was different alright. The top was down and there was this big lady. When we saw her, oh how we cheered! It was her joyful disdain of the pelting rain. You could see she wasn’t going to let a small thing like that ruin the day. We didn’t know who she was, but we still loved her.’

Queen Salote Mafile‘o Pilolevu Tupou III  of Tonga

Word went round the crowd that she was the Queen of Tonga. 'Who’d ever heard of Tonga? Some said it was in Africa, others said it was in the Pacific Ocean,'said Enid Brown, 'Some said she had come in a canoe. Well wherever it was, it was her spirit, her style, that won us all over,'
  Queen Salote of Tonga was one of 129 heads of state who had come to London to witness the coronation of Elizabeth II. Her landau carriage, with facing seats over a dropped footwell and hinged soft folding top, was driven by two old coachmen in top hats and velvet coats. Bringing up the rear was an escort of four mounted military police. She had insisted on keeping the hood of her carriage down, so that she could see the crowds, and they could see her. The 53-year-old Queen was dressed in gold and crimson robes, topped off by a golden tiara with a tall, red feather. She laughed and waved, and the people laughed and waved back, and she became the star of the day.
   The Kingdom of Tonga is an archipelago of nearly two hundred islands between New Zealand and Hawaii, scattered over five hundred miles in the Southern Pacific Ocean, with only fifty-five thousand inhabitants. First settled in 800 BC, with the same royal family since 1600, it was named the ‘Friendly Islands’ by Captain James Cook after his first visit in 1773. In 1900 Tonga became a British Protectorate but remained a monarchy. As well as ruling, Queen Salote Mafile‘o Pilolevu Tupou III wrote songs, love poems and lakalaka – the traditional Tongan dance performed en masse with synchronised arm movements.

Queen Salote was six foot two inches tall, part of a royal dynasty far older than the British monarchy.

     John Douglas was an army officer on duty on The Mall. ‘I had a splendid view of all the procession. The loudest cheer was not for Queen Elizabeth but for the Queen of Tonga. This very large lady was in an open carriage despite the torrential rain and waving furiously at the crowds, who admired her fortitude.’ For many people it was the first time they had seen foreigners other than American GIs in the war. Cross-cultural tolerance was required in all directions. The Sheiks from the British Protectorate of Qatar thought it perfectly proper to bring their personal African slaves. Nobody had thought to tell them that slavery had been abolished in Britain a hundred and fifty years earlier.
       On his small black and white television at home, the playwright Noel Coward and his companion were watching the procession. Perched opposite the Queen of Tonga in her carriage was the diminutive Sultan of Kelantan in Malaysia, husband to three wives and father of twenty-three children. Coward’s friend asked him, ‘And who is that sitting in Queen Salote’s carriage?’ ‘Luncheon,’ he replied.

When singing The Queen of Tonga, the author of this blog drinks coffee from this coronation mug

 Jack Fishman, editor of the Sunday newspaper The Empire News, wrote a popular song about that rainy day in June, with a lilting ‘calypso’ rhythm and catchy tune. Sung by Edmundo Ros, ‘The Queen of Tonga’, soon caught on and was being whistled all over the country.
In the pacific Islands of Tonga,
They make their people stronger,
Oh it can rain or storm or squall,
But they don’t feel nothin’ at all.
Chorus: Oh! The Queen of Tonga Cross’d the ocean from far away.
Oh! The Queen of Tonga Came to Britain for Co-ro-nat-ion Day.
And when the people saw her on that torrential morn,
She captured all before her, took ev’ryone by storm.
 In every heart will always live longer,
That reign-in’ Queen of Tonga.