Books

Harry the Master Violinist

Fighting Words: An extract from a story by P7, Fane Street Primary school, Belfast, Co Antrim

Illustration: Caragh O’Donnell Delaney

Tue May 17 2022 - 00:00

Harry lived in the countryside. One day he was walking to school with his friend, Timmy. While Harry was walking to the school, he saw some people playing the violin, and he thought he would like to learn an instrument like that. The people were fancy, they always wore fancy clothes wherever they went. They used to practise their music every day in the streets of the village.

Harry said, “I would love to play the violin, would you?”

Timmy said, “Yes,” because he didn’t know what to say.

Harry said, “I wish I had a violin that I could play.”

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When Harry went home after school he asked his mum for a violin.

His mum replied sadly, “I can’t get you a violin because they’re pretty expensive.”

Harry thought, how can I make money to buy a violin for myself?

Harry got some money, but when he went to the music store for a violin, he found that the violins were still too expensive.

Harry went home and found some wood in his backyard. He had a picture in his mind of what a violin looked like. His mum was good at knitting and making stuff.

He asked his mum, “Can I take some strings?”

His mum said, “Yes, of course.”

He went to the backyard and started building the violin.

He went to his friend Timmy and told him, “I have a violin! We could learn together the violin!”

They went into the street and asked the fancy people, “Can you teach us to play the violin?”

One of them replied, “Why don’t you come with us, and you can learn with us?”

The boys climbed into their horse drawn cart...

Over the last year, Fighting Words and Fighting Words NI have been running a special project linked to the Department of Culture’s Centenaries initiative. Using either time travel, or the discovery of a time capsule as a device to get ideas flowing, we encouraged groups to think about how Ireland and the world have changed over the last one hundred years. Following discussion, groups then wrote collective stories in response to the theme.

Fighting Words