Funny expressions, loud smacks, spiritual eyebrows, coupled with a magical "nice" -
This meme is believed to have been seen before.
It is such a simple meme, which has been played as much as 3.8 million times on the b station, and has also derived various spoof versions, instantly popular all over the network.
Some netizens have speculated about how this "nice grandfather" got on fire.
Some people guess he's an actor, while others think he's a professional comedian.
There are many speculations, but no one thought that such a person with a great talent for funny was originally a well-known children's writer and poet in britain - Michael Rosen.
The old naughty boy who didn't grow up
Michael Rosen was born on 7 May 1946 to a Jewish family in London, England.
Both parents were teachers and an older brother was four years older. Despite his poor family, Rosen's childhood was never short of laughter.
In 1953, Rosen and his father were camping.
His parents would often tell him stories, jokes, and nursery rhymes.
The older brother is good at imitation, and often dances to show Rosen funny things from school, making him laugh.
Such a beautiful childhood became a source of material for his later writing path.
As an adult, Rosen joined the acting club and briefly studied in medical school. But he gradually realized that this was not what he loved.
In his opinion, reading and writing are his interests.
Every word is filled with infinite power, which is an unparalleled enjoyment.
After determining his development direction, he came to Oxford University, spent a lot of time studying writing, acting and directing plays, and wrote his first play "Backbone", and successfully entered BBC TELEVISION after graduation, writing children's performance scripts.
But fate took a turn.
In his third year at the television station, Rosen was suddenly told to "leave his job."
"I think you're better suited for freelancing."
The reason for this, though, was actually arrested because Rosen had opposed racial discrimination. This so-called "black history" is seen by the company as a "stain."
Rosen did not hesitate to leave and began his true sense of "free creation."
A warm and beautiful childhood and various past experiences have allowed Rosen to understand the psychology of children and know how to tell stories in the tone of children.
In 1974, he published his first children's poetry poem, Mind Your Own Business.
Educator Morag Styres described Rosen as "one of the most important figures in contemporary children's poetry" and one of the first poets to "closely integrate their childhood experiences and speak in mandarin that children actually use."
He will use rich expressions and body movements, say funny words to make the children happy, and will also seriously tell the children the truth in the story as an adult.
To date, Rosen has written more than 200 books.
Fairy tales, poems, paintings, he devoted himself in a variety of ways to the creation of children's books.
△ Michael Rosen works (partial)
With the famous illustrator Helen Oxenberg, "We're Going to Catch a Bear" has made it an undiscrued classic in parent-child reading with immersive audiovisual enjoyment.
△ Excerpt from "We're Going to Catch a Bear"
He showed the real world to the children gently and wittily through words, opening a new door for them and giving them different enlightenment.
The saddest man with the most stories
All along, Rosen has been like a combination of "Mr. Bean + Hans Christian Andersen".
In addition to writing fairy tales and making funny short films, the most enthusiastic thing is to participate in various activities held by schools, TV stations, libraries, etc., to give children live stories and mingle with children.
In him, there seems to be an endless amount of happy energy.
But just like there is always a shadow under the sun, only happiness and no pain, then it is not called life.
His son, Eddie, was Rosen's "muse of inspiration," and Rosen often wrote Eddie's stories into his own work.
In 1999, Rosen told Eddie bedtime jokes as usual and tucked the quilt into the sleeping Eddie. But the next morning, when Rosen tried to get Eddie out of bed, he found that Eddie was not breathing.
The unexpected acute meningitis claimed the young life of 18-year-old Eddie.
There was no sign, not even a word of goodbye.
After Eddie's death, Rosen fell into great grief. The smile of the past no longer appeared on his face.
In the fifth year after Eddie's death, Rosen wrote The Book of Sorrows, incorporating all his emotions into his work.
The book begins with a self-portrait by Rosen.
Underneath the crooked lines, Rosen's comical smile was hilarious.
But under the self-portrait, there is this text:
It's my sad look.
Maybe you think I'm happy to look at it.
Actually, I forced a smile.
Because I guess people don't like to see me sad.
The Book of Sorrow is like peeling an onion, peeling away layers of sadness in different grayscales and shapes.
Rosen uses simple and poetic language to show the pain of losing his son as a father: love, anger, shock, fear, despair...
Sometimes, grief is boundless, everywhere, and there is no escape.
And then, that's how I looked.
There is no way.
My saddest part was when I thought of my son Eddie.
I loved him very, very much, but he died anyway.
In the book, Rosen looks back at his son's growth time bit by bit, recalling every picture related to Eddie.
These lively and bright images finally disappeared into a white space – because I could no longer see what the child looked like after.
In 2004, the British Association awarded Sad Book the "Special Award for Best Children's Picture Album".
In the past, adults always felt that they had to build a positive, sunny, and strong appearance for their children, but Rosen let the children feel the emotional power of sadness and sadness through words.
One person commented: "The healing power of this book is that it is not an attempt to appease, but to face the human experience authentically—a reality that is intense, sad, and beautiful." ”
No one knows exactly how Rosen survived the emotional trough.
It is a very cruel thing for a father to face the death of his child, but he is like a heroic warrior.
Even if every remembrance and nostalgia means to face the grief and uncover the wounds again, he still does it, and he constantly confronts indifference, numbness, and forgetting, and uses words to commemorate Eddie's departure.
At the same time, he also devoted himself to the public welfare cause of meningitis research, calling for more people to pay attention to the disease.
Whenever someone asked about Eddie, Rosen would laugh and answer:
"Eddie died, so he'll always be 18. It's not like me, the old man, who gets older every year. ”
He opened his own social media account, often posted videos of himself telling stories, singing, reading poetry, and making many witty short films.
In front of the eyes of the world, Rosen returned to the funny appearance of the hippie smile and full of joy.
People have received countless laughs from Rosen's stories and videos, and Rosen has also gained the strength to continue to create from the smiles and trust of children.
Sing about life
Fate did not particularly care for this happy "little old man".
After the loss of his son, Rosen was once again pushed to the brink of life and death.
In March 2021, the 74-year-old Rosen was unfortunately infected with the new crown.
After lying in the intensive care unit for 7 weeks, experiencing 3 critical illnesses, he took so many drugs that he felt that his body was about to become a "pharmacy".
Fortunately, Rosen survived this "disaster" and was successfully discharged from the hospital.
Unfortunately, it left serious sequelae, in Rosen's own words: his eyes, ears, and toes were not very "bright".
After being transferred from the intensive care unit, Rosen spent 3 weeks in the rehabilitation unit before learning to walk again.
The hospital's paramedics wrote him a letter of support, printed out the poems Lawson had written and pasted them on his bedside, helping him breathe, speak, and move.
Rosen's words once warmed the childhood of a group of people, and now, these words have given Rosen the motivation to persevere.
"Relearning to walk like when I was a kid makes me feel younger."
Despite a long period of loneliness and despair, Rosen remained optimistic.
As he staggered back down the street, passers-by gave many well-meaning blessings.
Perhaps as Romain Rolland once said: "There is only one kind of heroism in the world, that is, to love life after seeing the truth of life." ”
Rosen is also a "hero" who sings about life.
He wrote this intimate encounter with death into a storybook, "All Kinds of Love."
It is a record of the struggle against death and a tribute to goodwill.
Positive and optimistic, humorous and funny, gentle and kind... These beautiful words can be used to describe him.
The picture books he creates, the poems he writes, and his strange performances, he sees the world in the simplest way, and also pays every tenderness and love with the purest soul.
He never tried to whitewash the imperfections of life with fairy tales, but told everyone with sincere and gentle words:
Facing the sadness, despair and death brought by life is the real "nice" attitude to life.