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Jacqueline Crooks: ‘Toni Morrison’s voice made me want to find my own’
The novelist on learning empathy from Charles Dickens, the playfulness of Irenosen Okojie and avoiding Jane AustenMy earliest reading memory I was eight when I was given The Water-Babies by Charles Kingsley, after being moved from my grandmother’s care to live with my mother and her husband, who I barely knew. The story is about leaving one world, adapting to another. Surviving. It gave shape to unnamed feelings and developed my survival imagination: imagining beyond my circumstances.My favourite book growing up David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. I followed David’s journey from exclusion to belonging. Dickens vivifies his characters; you grow alongside them. The novel taught me empathy, and that some relationships sustain us while others must be left behind. Continue reading...