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'Walter Trier's deceptively innocent drawings are as classic as Kaestner's words; I never tire of them' Quentin BlakeMartin's school is no ordinary school. There are snowball fights, kidnappings, cakes, a parachute jump, a mysterious man called 'No-Smoking' who lives in a railway carriage and a play about a flying classroom.As the Christmas holidays draw near, Martin and his friends - nervous Uli, cynical Sebastian, Johnny, who was rescued by a sea captain, and Matthias, who is always hungry (particularly after a meal) - are preparing for the end-of-term festivities. But there are surprises, sadness and trouble on the way - and a secret that changes everything.The Flying Classroom is a magical, thrilling and bittersweet story about friendship, fun and being brave when you are at your most scared. (It also features a calf called Eduard, but you will have to read it to find out why.)Erich Kaestner, writer, poet and journalist, was born in Dresden in 1899. His first children's book, Emil and the Detectives, was published in 1929 and has since sold millions of copies around the world and been translated into around 60 languages. After the Nazis took power in Germany, Kaestner's books were burnt and he was excluded from the writers' guild. He won many awards, including the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award in 1960. He died in 1974.Walter Trier was born in Prague in 1880. In 1910 he moved to Berlin, where he would later be introduced to Kaestner, and began his career drawing cartoons for the Berliner Illustrated. He also contributed to the satirical weekly Simplicissimus, where during the 1920s, despite great personal risk, he ridiculed Hitler and the Nazi Party in a series of cartoons. In 1936 he fled to London, where he was involved in producing anti-Nazi leaflets and political propaganda drawings. He would go on to have a rich career, producing around 150 covers for the humorous magazine Lilliput. He died in 1951 in Ontario, Canada.Anthea Bell is an award-winning translator. Having studied English at Oxford University, she has had a long and successful career, translating works from French, German and Danish. She is best known for her translations of the much-loved Asterix books, Stefan Zweig and W.G. Sebald....
About the author
Erich Kästner was born in Dresden in 1899. He began his career as a journalist for the New Leipzig newspaper in 1922, but moved to Berlin in 1927 to begin working as a freelance journalist and theatre critic. In 1929 he published his first book for children, Emil and the Detectives, which has since been translated into 60 languages, achieving international recognition and selling millions of copies around the world. He subsequently published both Dot and Anton and The Flying Classroom, before turning to adult fiction with his 1931 satire Going to the Dogs. After the Nazis took power in Germany, Kästner's books were burnt on Berlin's Opera Square and over the period of 1937-42 he faced repeated arrest and interrogation by the Gestapo, resulting in his blacklisting and exclusion from the writers' guild. After the end of World War II, Kästner moved to Munich and published The Parent Trap, later adapted into a hit film by Walt Disney. In 1957 he received the Georg Büchner Prize and, later, the Order of Merit and the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award for his contribution to children's literature. Kästner died in Munich in 1974.
Walter Trier was born in Prague in 1890, but moved to Berlin in 1910. An acclaimed cartoonist and illustrator, he collaborated with Kästner on more than a dozen children's books and produced covers for Lilliput and The New Yorker, among others. He fled Germany in 1936, and eventually settled in Canada, where he died in 1951.
Report
"a memorable exploration of bravery, boyhood and friendships that last, albeit in a world that would soon vanish." - The Wall Street Journal
"Originally published in 1935 and charmingly illustrated by Trier, Kästner's (Emil and the Detectives) pleasingly sentimental tale of early 20th-century boarding-school life gets the opportunity to reach a new audience, courtesy of Bell's new translation." -- Publishers Weekly
'A little masterpiece... Read it and you will be happy' Maurice Sendak
'Marvellous' Philip Pullman
'My favourite book as a child... funny, exciting and very atmospheric' Michael Rosen
Praise for Emil and the Detectives:
'Walter Trier's deceptively innocent drawings are as classic as Kästner's words; I never tire of them' Quentin Blake
