Michael Morpurgo: A Lifetime in Stories

Charming exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum of Childhood looking at the life and work of the children’s author, Michael Morpurgo.

Any show in which you are greeted by the wonderful War Horse puppet from the National Theatre production has to be a winner. I loved the show and get quite sentimental every time I see Joey. I loved the fact that the three puppeteers are called the Head, the Heart and the Hind.

This beautifully designed show started with a good biography of Morpurgo who came across as a lovely, loyal person. It looked at his time at Sandhurst and why he writes so many books about war. He wants children to understand war and be critical of it. It also looked at his City Farms project to give city children the chance to live and work on a real far.

The exhibition was in themes of books with nice sections of original manuscripts and examples of the different illustrators and book covers. There were also some touching objects such as the picture of Joey that Morpurgo commissioned for the village the story is set in as the book opens with the author seeing a picture of a horse in a pub.

I was a bit confused by objects from a local children’s project which are inspired by the books with the idea of creating a Museum of Artifictions. It would have been nice to see this explanation earlier in the show as they seemed a bit incongruous until you knew where they had come from.

Closed on 25 February 2018

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