Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Clangers rule! Oliver Postgrate RIP

Especially given my fondness for this weird conspiracy theory expose on the Moon Landings*, I was much saddened by the death of Oliver Postgate whose work shaped my childhood (an ongoing childhood many would argue).

And don't get me started on the wonderfulness of Bagpuss...

*I love the feeling of scrolling through the images and yelling at the screen 'never mind the flag blowing, there's something else to spot!!!

2 comments:

Jane Henry said...

I know tragic lost to kids' entertainment. I have to fess up I never got into Bagpuss as a kid, because I think I was just that year too old when it came out, but I rediscovered it with my bunch and with my children ed's hat on just think it is a wonderful vehicle for storytelling. They all love it too.

My favourite was probably Noggin the Nog (which I still remember in black and white. Cripes showing my age) but I also loved The Clangers. I introduced my oldest to the Clangers when she was five and we were both up early one Christmas when I was very pregnant. I dozed on the sofa with her, barely conscious feeling like a really bad mum, but she still remembers it!

I think I loved most of all his voice, which was calm and wise and made me think of cosy comfortable things. He and Peter Firmin were genii of the highest order.

The world's certainly a poorer place today Oliver's gone but a richer place for him having been here.

Stuart Douglas said...

"In the Lands of the North, where the black rocks stand guard against the cold sea, in the dark night that is very long, the men of the Northlands sit by their great log fires and they tell a tale..."

Maybe the most evocative single sentence in television history...