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Hugh Lofting
Life Time
14 January 1886 - 26 September 1947
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English engineer Hugh Lofting, while at the front during the First World War, yearned for his children. Once, in his letters to them, he came up with Dr. Doolittle, who not only skillfully treated animals, but was excellent at talking to them. Lofting not only described in detail all the friends and wards of the kindest Dr. Doolittle, but also amusingly depicted them in his drawings: monkeys, crocodiles, parrots and the fantastic Tiani-Tolkay. Dr. Doolittle and his friends had enemies: “nightmarish
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English engineer Hugh Lofting, while at the front during the First World War, yearned for his children. Once, in his letters to them, he came up with Dr. Doolittle, who not only skillfully treated animals, but was excellent at talking to them. Lofting not only described in detail all the friends and wards of the kindest Dr. Doolittle, but also amusingly depicted them in his drawings: monkeys, crocodiles, parrots and the fantastic Tiani-Tolkay. Dr. Doolittle and his friends had enemies: “nightmarish and evil pirates.” When Hugh Lofting returned safely from the war, his grown children showed his father's letters and drawings to a publisher. He ordered the novel to an engineer, Lifting accepted the order, and in 1920 the story of Dr. Doolittle was born, which became a bestseller just a couple of months after publication. Twelve more followed the first book. Russian writer Korney Ivanovich Chukovsky (who knew English perfectly) reworked and largely re-invented Lofting’s creations and wrote a book based on the History of Dr. Doolittle, which he called Dr. Aibolit, and then a poem with the same name.