April 2012 Guest Editor Charlie Higson: "These stories are about a mad inventor and are madly inventive as well as very funny. I had forgotten all about the absent-minded Professor Branestawm until I rediscovered one of the stories in an anthology of kids fiction I was reading to one of my boys. We both found it absolutely hilarious – no mean feat for a book written in 1933 (let’s face it, most ‘classic’ children’s books are utterly mystifying to modern kids). As a result I tracked down this book and shared it with my son. I remembered how much I’d loved these books as a boy, particularly the first two with their lovely Heath Robinson illustrations."
The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm Synopsis
Chosen byApril 2012 Guest Editor Charlie Higson: Still one of the immortals of children's literature - Professor Branestawm's continues to amuse generations of young readers. The wonderfully nutty, fabulously entertaining mishaps of Professor Branestawm. He's madly sane and cleverly dotty. Professor Branestawm is the most absent-minded inventor you'll ever meet and no matter how hard he tries his brilliant ideas never seem to keep him out of crazy scrapes.
Norman Hunter was born in 1899 in Sydenham, London. After leaving school and finishing what he described as a 'course of all-in wrestling with typewriters', he became an advertising copywriter. He also began, in 1915, giving performances of conjuring, and made over two hundred appearances at Maskelyne and Devants. His first Branestawm book was published in 1933. After the Second World War, Norman Hunter moved to South Africa, where he continued to work in advertising. Conjuring was still one of his spare time occupations. He returned to England in 1969 where he lived near the river at Staines until his death in 1995.
