Mary Poppins Returns

When Mary Poppins Returns entered cinemas my twelve year old daughter was extremely excited to watch it, and utterly delighted after she had seen Emily Blunt play the infamous Nanny on the big screen. It got me thinking, could I take this brilliant, current film with a great cast and catchy songs throughout that children like mine are obsessing over and relate it directly to Mary Poppins the book, written by the extremely talented P.L.Travers and in doing so get children realising the films origin and potentially engage reluctant readers like my twelve year old, enjoying such a classic and iconic title.

We looked at the latest edition of Mary Poppins which features illustrations from Lauren Child, published by Harper Collins. The first thing that really catches your eye is the phenomenal illustrative work that features all the way through from cover to cover.

Underneath the dust cover of the hardback edition

The story within this beautiful book is that which was written by P.L.Travers in 1934 but modernised slightly by Lauren playing with the sentence layouts and displaying them in funny ways on the pages – much like within her Charlie and Lola titles. My children enjoyed the familiarity with those books we shared a few years ago and its similarity with our present book choice, Mary Poppins.

Of the twelve chapters originally written in the 1934 original Lauren has chosen seven to feature in this minimally abridged edition and those that have featured within this book were chosen because Lauren found them “particularly thought-provoking and joyful” and we enjoyed that this meant the book had some chapters that the film did not feature so we got to read something new that felt like we had gone ‘behind the scenes’ and allowed us to gain a more informed perception of life for the Banks family on Cherry Tree Lane.

My children were surprised to find that their latest favourite film originates from a book, but once I introduced them to the illustrated gift edition and we explored the treasures within it’s pages they are now proud fans of P.L.Travers, Lauren Child and all things Poppins.