Select bibliography

NOVELS
Minnow on the Say (1955)
Tom’s Midnight Garden (1958)
A Dog so Small (1962)
The Children of the House, re-issued as The Children of Charlecote, in collaboration with Brian Fairfax-Lucy (1968)
The Battle of Bubble and Squeak (1978)
The Way to Sattin Shore (1983)
The Little Gentleman (2004)
A Finder’s Magic (2008)

SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS
What the Neighbours Did and other stories (1972)
The Shadow Cage and other tales of the supernatural (1977)
The Elm Street Lot (1979)
Lion at School and other stories (1985)
Who’s Afraid? and other strange stories (1986)
Here Comes Tod! (1992)
The Rope and other stories (2000)
PICTURE BOOKS
Mrs Cockle’s Cat (1961)
The Squirrel Wife (1971, re-illustrated and republished 2007)
Beauty and the Beast – a re-telling (1972, re-illustrated 1996)
Emily’s Own Elephant (1987)
The Toothball (1987)
Freddy (1988)
Old Belle’s Summer Holiday (1989)
The Little White Hen (1996)
Amy’s Three Best Things (2003)
SHORT STORIES PUBLISHED AS SINGLE VOLUMES
The Ghost in Annie’s Room (2001)
The Pedlar of Swaffham – a re-telling (2001)
TRANSLATED/ADAPTED FROM THE FRENCH BY P.P.
Wings of Courage (1982) from George Sand’s Les Ailes de Courage (1872)
EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY P.P.
Dread and Delight: a century of children’s ghost stories (1995)

Publishing Histories

PUBLISHING HISTORIES
P.P.’s full length fiction books are: Minnow on the Say O.U.P. l954; Tom’s Midnight Garden (awarded the Carnegie Medal) O.U.P. 1958; A Dog So Small (Constable/later Kestrel Penguin 1962); The Children of the House in collaboration with Brian Fairfax-Lucy (Longman/Kestrel l968), later republished as The Children of Charlecote; The Battle of Bubble and Squeak (awarded the Whitbread Prize) Deutsch 1978;The Way to Sattin Shore Kestrel/Penguin l983;The Little Gentleman Puffin 2004; A Finder’s Magic Walker 2008

P.P. liked writing short stories. Eight stories for older children were collected into What the Neighbours Did and other stories (Kestrel/Penguin 1972; chosen as the British Honour Book for the Hans Christian Andersen Award). Another collection, The Shadow Cage and other tales of the supernatural was published in 1977 (Kestrel/Penguin), and another, Who’s Afraid? and other strange stories was published in l986 (Viking Kestrel). Another collection, The Rope and other stories, was published in 2000 (Penguin Children’s Books). In the U.S.A. all these stories for older children were published in a collection called Familiar and Haunting (Greenwillow 2002).

Stories for younger children (some first told on radio) were collected in Lion at School and other stories (Viking Kestrel 1985). In 1992, Here comes Tod!, a collection of linked stories for the under fives, was published by Walker Books.

Several short stories have been separately published. Mrs Cockle’s Cat was published as a picture book in l96l (Constable/later Kestrel), and for his illustrations Antony Maitland was awarded the Kate Greenaway Medal. This was re-issued (1987) in a format for slightly older children (Viking/Kestrel). The Squirrel Wife was published in l97l (Kestrel) and, re-illustrated, by Walker in 2007. Beauty and the Beast (a picture book re-telling) came out in 1972 (Kestrel); and the text was abridged by the author for another picture book edition in 1996 (Macdonald); another (illustrated) re-telling was The Pedlar of Swaffham (Scholastic 2001); Emily’s Own Elephant, illustrated by John Lawrence, appeared in 1987 (Walker); and, in the same year, The Toothball (Deutsch). This last was originally written for BBC Schools radio. In 1988 Freddy, and in 1989 Old Belle’s Summer Holiday were published , both by Deutsch. Another picture book, The Little White Hen, was published in 1996 by Deutsch/Scholastic, and Amy’s Three Best Things in 2003 (Puffin). The Ghost in Annie’s Room appeared in 2001 (Walker). Other short stories have so far been published only in anthologies e.g (for older children) Face to Face in A Sporting Chance (Bodley Head 1985); The Odd Glove in The Sea-Baby and other magical stories to read aloud (Collins 1996). Motorway Dog was published in 2002 in an anthology: BBC Children in Need Story Collection.

Various stories have been broadcast on radio and/or TV – Tom’s Midnight Garden several times. There is also a film and a play. P.P. wrote five linked stories especially for children’s TV (BBC). These (with one additional story) were published by Kestrel under the title The Elm Street Lot (l979). Another Elm Street story, Inside her Head, was published in Puffin Post (Vol.l4. No. 3 l980). It reappeared in The Rope and other stories (see above), and was adapted for the stage by Nick Warburton, with a first performance at the Philippa Pearce Lecture in 2022.

P.P. wrote a short story for adults, The Sins of Miss Halliday (in Writers of East Anglia Secker 1977). She has also made one translation (and adaptation) from the French: Wings of Courage (Kestrel l982; re-issued Hodder 1998) from George Sand’s Les Ailes de Courage (1872).

In 1995 OUP published Dread and Delight: a century of children’s ghost stories edited by P.P., and in 1996 this was re-issued (in paperback, under new title) with revised Biographical Notes.

P.P.’s non-fiction was mostly critical, or on her own work and its background. Her paper on The Writer’s View of Childhood, originally read to the Youth Libraries Section of the Library Association, was reprinted in The Horn Book Magazine February 1962. A radio talk on the writing of A Dog so Small was reprinted in the same periodical in June 1967, and later in The Thorny Paradise: writers on writing for children (Kestrel l975); and later still in The Cool Web (Bodley Head 1977). A piece on the writing of Tom’s Midnight Garden was included in Chosen for Children: an account of the books which have been awarded the Library Association Carnegie Medal (Lib. Ass. 1967); a similar account appeared in School Bookshop News Summer 1977.

P.P. made a short autobiographical/critical contribution to John Rowe Townsend’s survey, A Sense of Story (Kestrel l97l). She also contributed to Children’s Literature and the Media: Opinions in Bookmark 4 Summer l979 (Moray House College of Education, Edinburgh). Also to Spider’s Web: a magazine for Primary School Children about books No. 6, Autumn l985 (Faculty of Education, University of Ulster, Coleraine, N. Ireland). She also wrote explanatory Afterwords to two of her books: Tom’s Midnight Garden and Minnow on the Say, both published by O.U.P. in l989 in their Archway (educational) series.
P.P. contributed several entries to The Cambridge Guide to Children’s Books in English ed. Victor Watson (C.U.P 2001)
P.P. was interviewed on various occasions, and some interviews were published e.g. in British Book News (Children’s Books) Autumn 1983; in Books for Keeps (Authorgraph No. 23) November 1983.

She gave two accounts of her childhood reading: in Puffin Post Vol l4 No. l. Spring 1980; and in Children’s Literature in Education Vol.l6 no 3 whole no. 58 (sic) Autumn 1985. (also reprinted in Celebrating Children’s Literature in Education: a selection by Geoff Fox. Hodder 1995)

P.P. was invited to give a keynote speech at the IBBY Conference in Tokyo in August 1986. The text of this speech is in the IBBY archive; it was also reprinted in Australian Orana: Journal of School and Children’s Librarianship Vol 22 No.4 November 1986. She also read a paper on Time Present at the Summer Institute (at Newnham College, Cambridge U.K in August 1989) of Children’s Literature New England. This was published by Green Bay 1990 (together with many other papers) under the title Travellers in Time – Past, Present and to Come.

Other critical work includes: The Making of Stories for Children in After Alice: Exploring Children’s Literature ed. M. Styles, E. Bearne & V. Watson (Cassel 1992); The Writer, the Children and Box B in New Readings: a contribution to an understanding of literacy ed. K. Kimberley, M Meek, Jane Miller (A.& C. Black) 1992; The Shared Imagination in Literacy for Life ed. Alison B. Littlefair (U.K; Reading Association 1994).