Book Alert: The Granny Alphabet by Tim Walker, Kit Hesketh-Harvey and Lawrence Mynott (Thames & Hudson) |

Alphabet books may be designed for children to allow them to learn the letters through images, corresponding words or sentences. Yet, even as a grown up, it is difficult to resist the allure of their illustrations conjuring up childhood memories, or not to be fascinated by the simplicity of hilariously dark revisitations of this book format (think for example about Edward Gorey's The Gashlycrumb Tinies).

The Granny Alphabet (Thames & Hudson) moves from the same principle, it is indeed an A-Z of grannies and all things granny divided in two volumes, one featuring photographs by Tim Walker and rhymes by award-winning perfomer, writer and translator Kit Hesketh-Harvey, the other including delicate and ironic illustrations by artist Lawrence Mynott, portraying Adventurous, Chic, Elegant or Quirky grandmothers.

There is a lot of talk about "advanced style" in fashion, and, though the section curated by Walker hints at this trend through photographs of stylish elderly ladies, the images mainly approach the subject with a sense of playfulness, humour and sweet nostalgia.

Walker doesn't employ his elaborate trademark sets that appear in his fashion images, but focuses on his subjects (some of them almost reproducing through their poses the shape of certain letters of the alphabet), or celebrates them through objects relating to them, from bingo balls to knitting needles, false teeth, walking sticks and a cup with a saucer imaginatively doubling as a flying saucer, an ideal means of transport for a granny on her way to Mars.

In the book introduction Walker recounts episodes from his childhood involving his grandmothers and makes an important point – all children have a special bond with their grandparents. Indeed, as Walker highlights in the introduction: "Old age brings back this childlike clarity of vision, and so children and the elderly have an agreement, a bond, united by both a sense of being out of time and by the brilliantly reckless lack of responsibility that bookends adulthood and allows them to see things as they really are".

This is the key to the purpose of the book: if there is a special bond between children and grandparents, why not creating a book that somehow homages grannies in the style of a children's book? While the two volumes retain all the non-threatening characteristics of alphabet books, they are not a parody of alphabet primers, but a tribute and a homage to all grannies, in a nutshell "a love letter to the elderly and documentation of the dying breed of little old ladies who live down the lane", as Walker states in the introduction.
The Granny Alphabet by Tim Walker, Kit Hesketh-Harvey and Lawrence Mynott is published by Thames & Hudson. All profits from the sale of the book will go to Friends of the Elderly.