Puddle Lane

Puddle Lane

"Puddle Lane" (or "Tales from Puddle Lane") was a 1980s British pre-school children's television programme written by Rick Vanes with animated stories written by Sheila McCullagh, author of Tim and the Hidden People. A long series of books based on said stories was produced by Ladybird Books, also under the title Puddle Lane. For a pre-school series, Puddle Lane attracted a large cult audience of adults and teenagers, and has been described as "a lunchtime favourite of students and truants alike".

TV programme

The programme was made by Yorkshire Television in Leeds for ITV and ran on from 1985 to 1989. The main characters were the Magician (played by Neil Innes, who also composed music for the program), and a Spell Dragon named Toby (voiced by Richard Robinson); the Magician told Toby stories by moving his finger around in a puddle, or a cauldron, or the water barrel outside (both the cauldron and the water barrel could talk) and producing images. The stories he told were presented as animations, narrated by Kate Lee (who also played a minor character, Aunt Flo). The Magician lived in a large house at the end of Puddle Lane, hence the name of the programme.

Books

:"See also: List of Puddle Lane books"A series of 54 books (plus two standalone volumes) was produced for Puddle Lane, published by Ladybird Books. The texts, based on the animated stories, were written by Sheila McCullagh. Illustrations for the books were provided by several different artists (Tony Morris, Gavin Rowe and others). There were five sets of books (different cover colour for each set), the first set (Stage 1) being the easiest to read and the last set (Stage 5) being the hardest. Since they were intended for children who are learning to read, the books with lower reading stages would present the text in two versions: the left page contained the full version, to be read aloud by the parent, while the right page contained a simplified version for the child. The books are currently out of print.

Miscellany

Other Puddle Lane merchandise included audio tapes supplied for the books, jigsaw puzzles, dominoes, picture word cards, and several educational products: "The Magician's Activity Book", "The Griffle's Activity Book" and "Puddle Lane Fun Frieze".

External links

* [http://www.thechestnut.com/puddle.htm Puddle Lane at Little Gems] General information, screenshots, complete list of episodes, title music sample available for download


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