I have read a few and they’re not bad, but they don’t compare to William. The story published in Home magazine in 1919 launched a juggernaut: 38 William books were published in total, and it was quite a surprise to me as an adult to discover she had also written ‘serious’ novels too – over 40 of them. Richmal Crompton was a Classics teacher, whose life became devoted to writing after serious illness. Of course what I didn’t realise until much later is that I also learned some quite complex vocabulary (such was my determination to absorb the wit and wisdom of William that I read with my dictionary by my side), and a lot about how good writing is structured. William was as real to me as my friends, and I tried to emulate him (as my long-suffering mother will remember).

The assumption that books about boys, in which girls are sometimes just an inconvenience (such as Violet Elizabeth Bott, who could scream and scream until she was sick) shouldn’t appeal to girls never occurred to me. I’ve written before about my love of William, and every time I was given money or a book token as a child, I’d go to the local bookshop to buy another Just William book, making up for those the library didn’t have. William is stoic, dignified, daft and with tortuous logic that serves his own noble aims of having fun with his friends, the Outlaws, and getting away from adult authority. The forever in trouble William was my hero throughout my childhood (a status shared with Jennings and, interestingly, Veronica Weston of the Sadlers Wells ballet books). How can the perennial eleven year old boy, with his tie askew and knees grubby, be 100? The first story of William Brown, by Richmal Crompton, was published in 1919, so I think this should be the year I share these beloved books with my son.

Just william original books