Helen Fielding tells schoolgirls: Learn from Bridget Jones and stay true to yourselves

 
Inspiring: Helen Fielding during her visit to the Get London Reading flagship school St Mary's (Picture: Alex Lentati)

Helen Fielding has used her most famous creation, Bridget Jones, to teach young girls how to tackle the challenges they will face as they grow up.

The author gave a talk and took part in a Q&A during a visit to the flagship school for the Standard’s Get London Reading campaign, St Mary’s in Battersea.

Speaking to a rapt audience of 10 and 11-year-olds, she said: “Bridget Jones is an ordinary girl who thinks she ought to look like a girl in a magazine but learns that the most important thing in life is that if you are kind and honest and real, people will love you just as you are. We like people who are real, don’t we girls!”

Fielding, 56, discovered that hardly any of the 35 girls she spoke to had heard of her or Bridget, who came to epitomise the chaotic life of an urban Nineties singleton.

The Evening Standard’s Get Reading campaign is supported by NOOK

But the writer soon caught the girls’ imaginations, encouraging them to learn “there are more important things than shoes and clothes” and telling them to “stay true to yourselves”. She cited other strong female characters in literature, such as Pride and Prejudice’s Elizabeth Bennet, who refused to conform to what was expected of them.

Fielding encouraged the girls to have the confidence to pursue successful careers, telling how she worked “incredibly hard” to get into Oxford.

The author leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially to the girls: “In a few years’ time, trust me, you will start to think about some new things. Should I be thinner? Do I have enough make-up? Am I the right shape? Trust me girls, this stuff is coming.”

She compared the girls’ favourite teen sitcom, Disney’s Austin & Ally, to Jane Austen’s Pride And Prejudice and her own Bridget Jones’s Diary.

Life lessons: Renee Zellweger in the film of Bridget Jones

“Austin & Ally is about dating and clothes and looking nice and things going wrong with friends,” she said.

“Pride and Prejudice, written 200 years ago, is about a girl who never thinks she’ll get anywhere but is confident inside and ends up staying true to herself despite pressure to conform.”

Fielding, whose son Dashiell and daughter Romy are fans of the Disney sitcom, also read excerpts from The Velveteen Rabbit, another book “about being real”.

She said: “The challenge I face with writing is overcoming the feeling that I would rather do something else, or that I have nothing to say, or would rather spend the whole time eating. It takes discipline, but if we want to succeed as women, we have to put the work in.”

Literature: Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet in Pride And Prejudice

Fielding, who grew up next to a factory on the outskirts of Leeds, said no one thought someone like her could get to Oxford.

“I was naughty at school, but I also worked incredibly hard to get into Oxford and when I got there I got to meet people who liked playing with words as much as me,” she said.

As her parting message, she added: “You are all very clever. Be strong inside and remember there are more important things than shoes or clothes.”

She visited St Mary’s to mark the third anniversary of the award-winning Get London Reading campaign. Three years ago, St Mary’s was one of London’s worst performing schools, with no library and 57 per cent of pupils passing SATs. But since executive headteacher Jared Brading asked Get London Reading to come in, a library with 1,000 new books has been installed, and 25 volunteers trained by our campaign partner Beanstalk arrive twice a week to read with 75 pupils.

This year St Mary’s achieved 100 per cent level-4 or above for SATs reading, with 59 per cent achieving a level-5.

Mr Brading said the visit had connected with the girls: “Helen’s message is vital because many of these girls have huge challenges to overcome, including resisting local gangs, but with the help of my staff and the Get London Reading volunteers and a sprinkle of inspiration from successful people like Helen, they can rise above it and be the first in their family to go to university.”

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