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Now that you mention it
This is an interesting theory about the influence the first book read/listened to has on a person which I have never thought about before.  It does however make a lot of sense.  I also can't remember what was first but I do remember a book I at first struggled to read and since it is a really simple little book I must have been pretty young and I have actually fairly recently thought about this book and it's moral.  It was "Elke saak het twee kante" which would be something like "Each story/case has two sides to it" and I still end up trying to look at issues from various angles before making up my mind.  The other book/s that I'm sure I must have heard my parents read is the Bible and I've been looking at that from various angles all my life and am still obsessed with it.  This is truly amazing to me!

posted by AardigeAfrikaner on September 24, 2008 at 1:57 AM | link to this | reply

 I was never read children's books, My Dad used to read the news paper out loud to us but i guess that does not count.  ... and my cousin read me  books of Jules Verne... This first one I remember was the Captain of 15 years.  My mom was more into music than reading,  so she used to sing to us all the time and play us records to go to sleep.  I guess I had an unconventional family life :-)

posted by Sinome on September 22, 2008 at 8:29 PM | link to this | reply

Sadly, I can't remember that far back! LOL
I do remember reading books before I went to bed though.

posted by shelly_b on September 22, 2008 at 7:27 PM | link to this | reply

A Bible Stories picture book was the first thing I remember being read to me by my mother.

posted by TAPS. on September 22, 2008 at 4:48 PM | link to this | reply

Mal, hope I'm not too late with this...
I devoured the Hardy Boys as a kid/young teen, and The Adventure series by Enid Blyton..(ie. "The Castle of Adventure")

posted by Rumor on September 22, 2008 at 3:56 PM | link to this | reply

My dad read WINNIE THE POOH to us over a long series of Saturday mornings.

I remember when he came to the final words of THE HOUSE AT POOH CORNER, he got all choked up... 

Later he read from THE THURBER CARNIVAL by James Thurber: The Night The Bed Fell...  The Dog That Bit People... 

When it was my turn, I read Pooh to my kids, and later, when we were all a little older, THE LORD OF THE RINGS.  That took a while!  But Tolkien wrote to be read aloud.

And we read THE BOOK OF THE DUN COW.  That book's first two chapters are about the best read-aloud prose anywhere!

 

posted by Ciel on September 22, 2008 at 1:09 PM | link to this | reply

gap
The first things I can (vaguely) remember that were being read to me by one of my grandmothers were fairy tales , especially those by H.C. Andersen, which of course I read myself later, so I don't actually remember the very first, and things are a little cloudy...

posted by Nautikos on September 22, 2008 at 12:41 PM | link to this | reply

Re: "Where the Sidewalk Ends" and "A Light in the Attic"
Don't be silly, Cunning.  We all know that Palin barbeques orphans on her Weber.

posted by gapcohen on September 22, 2008 at 12:02 PM | link to this | reply

Wonderful topic

I'm new here, hope I can jump in.  I don't specifically remember being read to, but I remember the first book I asked to buy from Weekly Reader. It was on dinosaurs. Even as an adult I still love anything old - paleontology, archaelogy, history.

Oh - loved the Boxcar Children too.

posted by Pollygirl on September 22, 2008 at 10:25 AM | link to this | reply

my parents never read to me as a child - but when my son was born he loved Green Eggs and Ham.

posted by ladychardonnay on September 22, 2008 at 9:39 AM | link to this | reply

Mine was The Little Engine That Could as well. It still rings in my head to this day when things get rough. I also loved Little Red Ridinghood, it was the first one I remember from elementary school. This has been a treat! sammy

posted by sam444 on September 22, 2008 at 9:36 AM | link to this | reply

"Where the Sidewalk Ends" and "A Light in the Attic"
And Encyclopedia Brown books were a staple.  More recently, I've been reading about how Sarah Palin barbecues terminally ill orphans on her Third Reich commemorative grill and things of that nature.  Oh, the fiction that's being spun these days.

posted by CunningLinguist on September 22, 2008 at 8:53 AM | link to this | reply

gap
Sad as it may sound... I have no memory of a book being read to me as a child.  I vaguely recall a reading of "Night Before Christmas" to my brother and I but no special moments of a parent reading me to sleep. 

posted by Troosha on September 22, 2008 at 8:45 AM | link to this | reply