Julia Donaldson - Early Life

Early Life

Donaldson was born in 1948 and brought up in Hampstead, London, with her younger sister, Mary. The family occupied a Victorian three-storey house near Hampstead Heath where the siblings liked to play. Her parents, sister, and their pet cat Geoffrey lived on the ground floor, an aunt and uncle lived on the first floor, and her granny lived on the second floor.

Donaldson's father studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of Oxford before serving in World War II, being a prisoner of war for five years. He went on to work in the field of genetics at the Maudesley Hospital, producing some important twin studies, and was also a keen amateur cellist. He contracted polio when Julia was six years old and he was initially hospitalised. His attempts to walk with crutches and callipers were unsuccessful, so he had to resort to using a wheelchair. This was at a time when there were not many aids and facilities for the handicapped in public places, but he was able to continue working with help from his wife who assisted with some arduous physical tasks such as transfers between car and wheelchair.

Donaldson studied Drama and French at the University of Bristol, and as part of her course spent several months in Paris, where she went busking with a female friend. The duo were subsequently joined by their friend Malcolm, a medical student who played a left-handed guitar and sang, and who later became Donaldson's spouse.