Michael Rosen books Rosen's Almanac and Totally True Tales

Rosen’s Almanac (Ebury) is for grown ups and celebrates "weird and wonderful words for every day of the year", including his mother's term for dishwasher - 'the wishdasher'.

And released last month, Totally True (and totally silly) Bedtime Stories with illustrations by Emily Fox (Hachette), is aimed at 5-11-year-olds and features remarkable real life tales.

Michael Rosen grew up in Pinner and now lives in Muswell Hill.

"They are totally true stories which I have adapted and turned it into my voice addressing the child. I imagined it being a book that families can read to children and make it sound as though they are talking to the child - but it's me talking through the book."

It is packed with five-minute tales with what he calls the "wow" factor.

"Like the kid who found a giant dinosaur tooth in a river, a woman who set up a hummingbird hospital in her front room, or a guy who befriended a fish called Elvis.

Rosen's Almanac is one of two books the poet and author has out at the moment. (Image: Ebury)

"They are a mixture of the silly, the quirky, the unexpected and the uplifting," he adds.

"I am keen that children have stories with some hope in them. Like the story about bombing the land with seed pods to regenerate forests after terrible fires in Canada, or the office chairs that put themselves away, or what if you could go to the bottom of the sea and find an amazing octopus nursery?"

He says fact-based stories can often engage the 9-13 age range who are "looking for stuff to amuse, entertain and interest them but don't necessarily find it in fiction."

Rosen's Almanac springs from his Radio 4 programme Word of Mouth and belief that Britain's regional vernacular, and idiosyncratic family sayings are "portals to treasured memories".Rosen's bedtime fact-based book is for primary age children. (Image: Hachette)

A shout out on social media for the kind of things you remember your granny used to say garnered 2,000 responses with the best ones used in the programme and now the book, which celebrates the adaptability and joys of language.

Born in Harrow and raised in Pinner, he recalls his parents Harold and Connie's verbal quirks: "My mother used to say 'ask your father what he is doing and tell him to stop it,'" says Rosen.

"They both spoke Yiddish but weren't good at at explaining words - they would say 'don't go out looking like a schloch.' You would ask 'what is a schloch?' And they'd say: 'The thing you don't want to look like.'"

One contributor had a family phrase from their Granny, who came into the room and seeing there was no spare chair, said: "Don't mind me I will just sit on the commode."

It went down into family lore. On a more poignant note, when Rosen's son died suddenly of meningitis at the age of 18, an Irish relative observed that: "Death doesn't wear creaky boots."

The poet, and author has just become a brand ambassador for a new smartphone which rolls phone and Kindle-style reader into one with an eye-friendly paper-like screen.

He is all for anything that makes reading more convenient for both adults and children - pointing out how easy it is to Google a word or phrase you need explaining, then return to your book.

"I've been playing with it (the TCL 50 Pro NXTPAPER) and it's so readable and accessible," he says.

"There are no pop ups or messages coming in and when it's in paper mode it's very clear - through Google you have access to every book in world literature written before 1925, and you can make text larger."

Rosen is a "passionate believer" that different forms, whether reading, e-books the radio, or TikTok "work with each other not against each other."

The 78-year-old is proud to be a meme - when he goes into schools, mimes eating and says 'nice:' "It's a riot."

"Teachers have to quiet them down."

His performances of poems have been shared online millions of times, but he still loves going into schools and performing for kids.

He "despairs" of the proscriptive approach to literature and language that forces teachers to "make children have knowledge of the text rather than to explore it from their point of view."

"It's knowledge about literature rather than how does literature affect you," he says.

"Shakespeare plays are scripts - not literature - but too often the children won't act out a single scene. They are full of life, but they take the life out of them and it's so bloody dull."

He adds that we need to talk about how stories make us feel because: "We invented fiction as a way of understanding the world and ourselves - emotions like jealousy, fear, and ideas like how we should be ruled or what happens if you make a big, bad mistake. Can you overcome it?"