the story of dr dolittle by hugh lofting

If I thought of the author at all over the years, I envisioned him living in a picturesque English village like his fictional Puddleby-on-the-Marsh and drawing inspiration for his books from the English countryside, like Beatrix Potter, another childhood favorite. It introduced me for the first time to the idea of being a naturalist, and planted the seeds of the idea that someday, I, too, could learn enough about the natural world to earn that title.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting was the first chapter book I ever read on my own. They were gentle, humorous stories about an English country doctor in Victorian times who learned to talk to animals and had extraordinary adventures. During his last years, he had a house right here in Topanga, where Lofting died in 1947, and where the final two Doctor Dolittle books were completed with the help of his sister-in-law, Topanga resident and respected ballerina Olga Fricker. Lofting was a British citizen, but he spent most of his life in America, where he wrote all of his books. The resourceful, kind, and optimistic Doctor Dolittle sets out for adventure with his animal companions in this illustration from the Newbery Award-winning 1922 book The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle, drawn by the author, Hugh Lofting, who illustrated almost all of his own books.

The story of dr dolittle by hugh lofting