Michael Rosen

Former children’s laureate and author of We’re Going on a Bear Hunt Michael Rosen talks about a collection of socialist fairy tales and fables and a collection of radical writing for children that he helped to compile.

Workers’ Tales brings together a selection of socialist fairy tales, fables and allegories written in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The writers used conventional forms to entertain readers of all ages and challenge some of the conventional values found in children’s literature. Reading and Rebellion is a collection of radical writing for children between 1900 and 1960. They are the kind of thing that left-leaning parents would have wanted their children to read and include picture books, plays, novels and a Marxist retelling of Robin Hood.

Rosen was children’s laureate between 2007 and 2009. He has written more than 200 children’s books as well as adult books, hosts BBC Radio 4’s Word of Mouth and is a columnist for Guardian Education and New Humanist. He is professor of children’s literature, Goldsmiths, University of London, and went to Wadham College, Oxford.