|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
25 September 2025
|
We are delighted to welcome Simon Lamb, author of a Passing
on of Shells, back to the blog to celebrate the publication of his latest book, the inventive and imaginative Mat o'Shanter - a witty and wry reimagining of Robert Burns' Tam o'Shanter.
Simon
has been a primary school teacher, has reviewed books, performed poetry at
numerous festivals and has been Scriever at the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum. Here Simon offers a fascinating insight into
the length of poems exploring an impressive array of poets and poems along the
way.
No matter where I go, in Scotland, the UK, or even abroad, I am pursued on my
travels by one persistent question. It glugs around the room, regardless of
venue, unspoken, till, when the time comes in our workshop to put pen to paper,
a voice pipes out its name. How long does my poem need to be?
I do not think
the question comes from a place of how-quickly-can-I-make-this-nightmare-end-?,
not at all. Rather, I believe the questioner simply wants – demands? –
parameters. Give them a sheet of calculations and they’re done once the
calculations are completed. Give them the task of composing a short story and
even the slight tick-box structure of beginning-middle-end gives them a goal to
which to aim. But give them the freedom of writing a poem – particularly one
without a prescribed form – and the world of success criteria caves in.
The answer to the question can be only this: your poem
should be as long as it needs to be.
In my first book, A Passing On of Shells (Scallywag Press, 2023), each
poem was written in exactly fifty words. When quizzed on why, I would reply
that the six-word story was too short; flash-fiction’s hundred-words too long.
For me, fifty was the Goldilocks number. That is not to say I only ever want to
write poems of fifty words in length, just that it felt right for those
particular poems in that particular book. They were still as long as they
needed to be.
Scottish poet
Don Paterson makes a convincing argument in 101 Sonnets (Faber &
Faber, 1999) that a sonnet’s fourteen lines create the “perfect” length for a
poem. (I’m inclined to agree: my legacy as writer-inresidence at the Robert
Burns Birthplace Museum in Alloway, Ayrshire, is a series of six sonnets
inspired by the museum’s six sites. It’s a very attractive and addictive form!)
The time it takes to read a sonnet, to listen to it spoken aloud, the space it
takes up on a page, the almost-square shape of its existence… And yet, still,
the best sonnets are those that feel right to be a sonnet, fourteen lines. As
long as they need to be.
My most-taught poem in schools comes from Zaro Weil’s CLiPPA-winning collection of
poetry, Cherry Moon (Troika, 2019). The poem is called ‘Plum Tree
(Summer)’. It runs to a mere eighteen words. Add or remove even a single word
and I am convinced you would diminish the piece’s completeness. As a grand
advocate of teaching poetry over form, this poem gives and gives: immediacy,
repetition, property as noun, simile, first-person voice, stanza/gap,
questioning, sass! I could go on. Weil’s tiny masterpiece is as long as it
needs to be; its world is complete and awaits only a reader.
When reviewing my debut poetry collection, A. F.
Harrold noted that short poems have always appealed to him, being so much
easier to keep in one’s head than great long epics. (Harrold’s latest book, by
the way, is Pocket Book of Pocket Poems (Bloomsbury, 2025), with entries
starting at sixty-word poems and reducing in length through the course of the
book. Don’t miss the “Thematic Contents Index List Thingie”.) But great long
epics do have their place. Our storytelling culture is founded upon them. In
2026, Christopher Nolan – one of Hollywood’s hottest film directors – will
bring his take on The Odyssey to the big screen, no doubt bringing a whole new
generation to the ancient Greek epic.
In 1790, Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote his own epic
— with parallels to The Odyssey, it should be noted. (A mock odyssey?
McOdyssey? Don’t steal that; I’m having that.) Late one market day night,
farmer Tam drunkenly quests home through a biblical storm. It’s ‘Tam o’
Shanter’. And it is excellent. A classic of Scottish literature and one of my
favourite poems. And, yes, you know what I’m going to say next: at 228 lines,
it is just as long as it needs to be.
My new book is a spiritual sequel, a redux, and
something entirely all its own. It’s Mat o’ Shanter. Running to 228
lines, my modern-day adventure takes all of the narrative beats of the original
and reverentially spins a new version for the ears and eyes and hearts of
today. Just as Nolan looks to bring Odysseus et al. to new viewers with his big
screen bonanza, I hope to bring Tam and his cronies to new readers, turning his
tale anew. I hope they will agree the poem’s as long as it needs to be.
While the draw of the satisfaction of completing a
sonnet (14), a limerick (5), a haiku (3) is strong, I suggest that when it
comes to poetry – especially poetry without the constraints of form – we focus
on what is best for the poem at hand. When asked, How long does my poem need to
be?, encourage the writer, whatever their age, to be brave enough to write the
poem as long as it needs to be.
That plum tree lives forever in its five-line world.
The drunken Scotsman lives forever in his 228-line epic. Be brave enough to
write the poem you are writing; trust in your ability to craft a
perfectly-sized universe.
A big thank you to Simon Lamb for this fascinating blog and to Sarah
Pakenham at Scallywag Press for the opportunity.

Tags:
CLiPPA
poetry
reading
reading for pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
15 January 2025
|
We are delighted to welcome Brian Moses,
multi-talented prolific performance poet and percussionist, to the blog to
discuss his latest collection, On Poetry Street, a
treasure trove of 52 playful poems, one for each week of the year, with Tanja
Jennings, a former Carnegie Medals judge.
Brian has travelled widely with his
repertoire of over 3,000 poems and is a Reading Champion for the National
Literacy Trust and a National Poetry
Day Ambassador. His enthusiastic indoor,
outdoor and online school sessions combine rap, rhythm and rhyme.
On Poetry Street sparkles with alphabetic acrobatics, surreal
scenarios and virtuoso wordplay. Here Brian talks about the art and lyricism of
poetry, the pangs of first love and how a sudden idea can spark creativity.
Congratulations on your creative, inventive
and quirky collection Brian.
What does poetry mean to you?
It’s an addiction. Poetry touches every emotion. It can
make you smile, laugh, shiver, think, wonder. It can make you sad and it can
comfort you. It can say a lot in little, but what it does say can be so
powerful that it remains with you through your life.
What is the first poem you ever wrote?
When I was 16 and keen on Sally who lived up the street
from me, I wrote her a poem. In fact, the first poem I ever wrote was for her.
I spent hours and hours composing it until one day, when I knew I’d never do
any better, I decided to deliver it. I copied it out neatly, folded it and
stuck it in an envelope. When it got dark, I sneaked up the road and pushed it
through her letterbox. I waited one day, two days, a week.....but she couldn’t
have been impressed, and later I knew that she hadn’t when I saw her walking
out with someone else, someone I knew. He was two years older than me and had
his own motorbike. I knew no good would ever come of it. I worried for Sally,
that she’d made the wrong choice, went for ‘flash’ instead of ‘steady’. I soon
got over it, but for a week or so it did hurt, that first rejection.
Fortunately, it didn’t stop me writing more poems!
What is the secret of your sound?
I’ve always loved music and music is rhythmical and
poetry is rhythmical and so I can combine percussion with poetry and I like
that.
How important is rhyme in your poetry?
I think about 50% of my poems rhyme and 50% don’t. When
I do rhyme, the rhyming needs to be right. A weak rhyme can spoil a poem. A
rhyming dictionary is my best friend!
Why do you think alliteration in poetry is
important?
It sounds pleasing and it contributes to the flow of
the poem.
Why do you think repetition is important in
poetry?
It can build in a rhythm to a poem without using rhyme.
What is your favourite type of word play?
I’m not sure I have one. I just love playing around
with words.
Is your ‘Unlikely Alphabet of Animals’
inspired by Edward Lear?
Not really. It was a poem written a while ago but one
that I never found a home for. It seemed a perfect shoe in to ‘On Poetry
Street’.
Which poem did you have the most fun
creating?
Probably ‘Villages’ as I spent a long time
investigating villages with interesting names although many of the ones I
discovered were perhaps a little too rude to include in the book!
Which poem did you find the most difficult
to write?
I was not sure about the ending to ‘The Land of
Yesterday.’ It didn’t seem quite right. My brilliant editor Janice Thomson,
came up with one or two different ideas and we batted them back and forth till
I gave one of them a final twist & we were both happy.
‘A Mouthful of Words’ and ‘A Difficult Poem
to Read Unless You’ve Swallowed a Dictionary’ are entertaining. How did you
decide upon which words to include?
With the help of a rhyming dictionary and choosing
words I liked the sound of and which rolled off the tongue in interesting ways.
What is your favourite word and why?
Winnebago because it rhymes with multiple words.
What gave you the idea for your ‘if’
sequence of poems?
All writers ask ‘What if’. They are two very powerful
words and have the potential to lead you to some very strange places. ‘What if
T. Rexes were vegetarian? What if aliens stole underpants? What if there was a
5 star snake hotel?
How long does it take you to think of a
poem? Does it just flow?
Some poems arrive with a whoosh! they fall onto the
page and within fifteen or twenty minutes I’ve pinned them down. Others take
much longer and need to be returned to a number of times before I’m satisfied.
My best ideas come to me when I am out walking the dog.
What is the most exciting idea you have
ever had for a poem?
I think I’ve always been interested in things that
sound like they shouldn’t be true but actually are true - a man walking his
iguana along the beach, problems with taking a lobster through security, an
Egyptian mummified foot on display in a museum. Things that are strange, but
true, often start me writing.
Mark Elvins’ quirky illustrations capture
the comic nature of your poetry. Which is your favourite and why?
I like so many of Mark’s illustrations. They complement
the poems perfectly. You’re asking me to do what I tell children I can’t do
when they ask what’s my favourite poem. My answer is the same as the poet Brian
Patten who always replied that he couldn’t say because he was frightened that
if he did, the other poems would get jealous!
Which poets have influenced you the most?
I was drawn to poetry through my enjoyment of the
lyrics of rock music, particularly singer/songwriters like Bob Dylan, Joni
Mitchell and the Beatles. Bob Dylan was the first ‘poet’ I admired. I read his
lyrics on the backs of his vinyl album covers and his words fired my
imagination.
The poetry I was offered in school made little
impression on me at the time. It wasn’t
until I was 17 and picked up a book of poems entitled ‘Penguin Modern Poets:
The Mersey Sound’ that I realised that poetry could be fun, that it could
speak to me in a language that I understood and that it had relevance to my
life as a teenager. Roger McGough, Adrian Henri and Brian Patten inspired me. I
was hooked. The book changed my life.
Which poets would you recommend to readers
today?
These days I read a lot of poets, particularly those
who write for young people. Charles Causley is a favourite and often neglected
in schools. Other writers whose work I admire are Kit Wright, John Agard, Wes
Magee and Gareth Owen.
What advice would you give to a child
wanting to write poetry?
If you want to be a writer, write. Don’t just talk
about it, do it. And keep a writer’s
notebook filled with ideas, things people say, strange signs, observations etc
It quickly becomes a treasure chest of ideas that may one day become poems.
Do you have any plans for future projects?
I have a verse novel being published by Scallywag in
October 2025. I have a new collection of poetry that’s almost complete, plus
I’m working on a fiction title and a poetry book for the very young.
Many thanks to Brian for this insight into his work and
to Scallywag Press for the opportunity.
Discover more about Brian Moses’ by visiting his website at https://brianmoses.co.uk/ and You Tube
channel at https://www.youtube.com/@bmredsealearn.

Tags:
Creativity
Poetry
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
30 April 2023
|
We are delighted to welcome the charismatic Simon Lamb to the YLG blog to discuss his debut collection A Passing on of Shells with Yoto Carnegies judge Tanja Jennings. With each miniature story composed in 50 words, it has sparked excitement in the world of children’s poetry.
Poet, performer and storyteller Simon grew up in Scotland where drama was his first love followed by mathematics. He has been a Primary School teacher, reviewed books, performed poetry at festivals, toured with a one man show and now facilitates workshops in schools. In 2022 Simon became Scriever at the Robert Burns Museum in Ayrshire giving him the opportunity to create new projects promoting the literature of Scotland and celebrating new voices.
Here Simon talks about what poetry means to him. He explains how an idea became a reality when Scallywag Press commissioned him.
Your debut poetry collection was a joy to read. It’s contemplative, humorous, lyrical and experimental with the concept of story and quest running throughout it. What inspired you to craft poems in 50 words?
The concept of the fifty 50 worders started in 2014. It’s the Goldilocks number. It’s not a six-word story or a hundred-word story. It’s that middle ground. This appealed to the mathematician in me. I wrote them over a year, put them away and then revisited the drawer in the Pandemic.
You teamed up with Scallywag Press to launch your collection. How did this come about?
It happened because I had been reviewing children’s books for a newspaper in the Highlands which featured titles from Scallywag Press. They contacted me out of the blue asking if I had any writing they could look at. It was just meant to be.
Can you explain the idea behind your title?
For me launching something like fifty 50-word poems is like 50 little books rather than just one book. I was inspired by a nature programme about the vacancy chain of the Hermit crab and the passing on of shells. Just such an intriguing concept to me. Writers love finding those things that we can then use to talk about other stuff. I think that’s really obvious in Chris’s illustration where he chooses not to illustrate crabs but to depict humans within shells.
What was it like collaborating with Chris Riddell?
I’m still pinching myself it’s happened. He’s a superstar. I felt incredibly lucky. For me one of my favourite parts of the entire thing was sitting down with his roughs for the very first time and seeing these 50 first illustrations.
Can you pick a favourite illustration?
I have a soft spot for Snow Globes. Chris’s illustration for that one is just pitch perfect to those words. He’s captured the moment of capturing the moment.
What about the creative process behind the layout of the book?
Scallywag hired me to typeset the book. It’s thrilling that all of the spreads were typeset before Chris illustrated. I guessed where all of the words might appear and he illustrated around it. That’s talent.
How important is structure and the performance element of poetry to you?
I think there’s a link between performance and the typed word. In Snow Globes there are long lines and big thoughts. In Tales from a Garden there are short lines and little images of what we see around us. Spaces between words illustrate movement in The Three-Legged Race. We should be encouraging fun in children’s poetry. They shouldn’t just see poetry as rhyming couplets.
Is there a poem in your collection that has inspired young audiences to create?
I read Two Slugs Just Chilling in the Compost Bin at an event. One of the boys was inspired to write a sequel about the disappearing slug. Just wonderful.
You’ve described Poetry as a snow globe. Can you elaborate on that?
I think Snow Globes is the closest I’ve ever come to defining poetry. I wrote it when I realised that I had more to say about poetry itself.
So, Poetry for you is like a miniature world captured in 50 words?
The use of the word capturing extends the poem out beyond the 50 worder. We’re trying to capture something on that blank of piece of paper. Almost flourishing something into existence that’s then captured. We’ll grow older but the poem will forever be there. We might read it differently but the poem will always be as it was.
You’ve used your collection to reflect how poetry is taught in schools. What do you think is the most effective way to connect students with poetry?
I think about this often. It’s stereotypical but true. In Primary we encounter poetry as comic verse. In Secondary it’s heavy, weighty, grey and sad. It’s almost like that’s all it’s allowed to be. That’s stifling. It does instil the idea that there’s rhythm in the rhyme and shows that comic verses stick but we’re not allowed to bleed over. I worry that when we teach poetry, we only teach structure and form without teaching what poetry is, about it being the art of playing with words and the freedom of using words.
The concept of story and quest is significant in your collection. What were your thoughts when writing Apocalyptic Scene?
I had this vision in my head of a character who is triumphant at this moment. It poured out in this purple prose. I’ve always been struck by Geraldine McCaughrean’s Carnegie Medal speech,
“We must never be afraid of using words that make the kid go and explore further” so I included meaty words.
Are there any poets you find inspirational?
I like Simon Armitage and Zaro Weil. Scottish poet Don Paterson has done some cool stuff with narratives and voices.
What advice would you give to students studying Performing Arts?
I’d say remember that you are part of a community. Explore every aspect and make the most of every opportunity.
Congratulations on your Scriever post. Can you tell us more about what it will involve?
It’s important to make sure that we are celebrating and commemorating Burns but also exploring other Scottish writers beyond that. Poetry should be enjoyed all the year round. The more voices we hear the better literature is. The Scriever Introduces showcases four current Scottish Writers inspired by place and history- Justin Davies, Barbara Henderson, Lindsay Littleson and Theresa Breslin.
Have you any future projects planned?
This book has created ripples. It looks different and feels different. I’m still thinking about what I want to say next.
A big thank you to Simon Lamb for the interview, and to Tanja Jennings and Scallywag Press for making this happen.

Tags:
Creativity
Interview
Poetry
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
26 January 2023
|
We are delighted to welcome Patience Agbabi to the blog for an exciting
interview and discussion around Poetry
By Heart. Patience was born in
London in 1965 to Nigerian parents. She has been writing poetry for over twenty
years, and is now writing for children too. The
Infinite, the first in the Leap Cycle series, won a Wales
Book of the Year Award and the series has an enthusiastic following amongst
young readers. The third instalment, The Circle Breakers, is out now. Patience
is also a judge on Poetry By Heart, the national poetry speaking
competition for schools and colleges in England and in this interview explains
why she recommends we all learn poetry by heart.
Could you describe your
own first encounters with poetry – at home and at school? When did you first
feel that poetry offered something special? Do you remember learning poems by
heart?
My
foster mum read to me every night as a young child so my earliest memory would
be of hearing nursery rhymes and loving the sounds as well as the sense of
them. Poetry at school came much later. It would have been early secondary and
I remember loving the soundscapes again, as well as the shape it made on the
page. I distinctly remember the teacher explaining iambic pentameter and understanding
it instantly. I was lucky because quite a few of the pupils found it difficult
– it seems to be the hardest technical device to grasp – and it actually opened
up creative doors in my head. When we had to learn ‘The quality of mercy is not
strained’ speech in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, I found it
relatively easy because I was in tune with the iambic pentameter. I do think
it’s important when learning a poem by heart that you get a choice. I was quite
happy learning Shakespeare but I wasn’t your average kid.
You have always taken part
in Spoken Word and live poetry performance – why is that so important to you and
what do you see in audience responses?
I’m
lucky to have had the gift of a very strong memory for learning poetry, even
stronger when I’ve written it myself. I tend to write rhyming poetry which
helps enormously with the mnemonics. My creative process involves revisiting
lines over and over in order to generate subsequent lines. I hear them out loud
in my head. That means by the time I get to the end of a poem, I know it. I
could reproduce it on paper. Learning to deliver it fluently out loud takes a
bit of rehearsal, much more as I get older! The spoken word and live poetry
scene was very exciting for me. I feel privileged to have been living in London
at the end of the last millennium as the scene was so vibrant, there was lots
going on every week. I was initially inspired by hearing other poets perform.
In the early days it was a mixture of African and Caribbean poets like Ahmed
Sheikh, Merle Collins, Benjamin Zephaniah and Jean Binta Breeze. Then I also
fell in love with the punk poetry of John Cooper Clarke, Joolz and Attila the
Stockbroker. Then rap poets came on the scene. I could go on. I was inspired by
them all and once I’d got over the crippling nerves, I loved the act of live
performance, bouncing off the energy of the audience. In fact, I was less
nervous performing off by heart because even though my voice was steady, my
hand used to shake like crazy holding a piece of paper and I would find that
distracting and worry the audience would be distracted too. Audiences always
respond differently when someone is performing by heart. It seems more real;
not having the pages there breaks down the barrier between poet and audience.
When did you first get
involved with Poetry By Heart and why did you want to support the competition?
I
was asked to judge the very first competition which was in 2013. I had to look
up the date and I can’t believe it’s been around for a decade now. I instantly
said yes because I think there’s something transformative about performing a
poem out loud to a live audience. I liked that it asked young people to choose
one poem pre-1900 and one post-1900. I’d always enjoyed poetry from previous
eras but at the same time, loved contemporary poems. So I thought it would be a
very good thing indeed to be involved in. I’ve judged quite a few written
poetry competitions and I always find it excruciating to only be able to choose
a few winners and runners up. There are always poems that don’t quite make it
that are really good. But with Poetry By Heart, I know that every young person
standing up on the stage is a winner. They will have gone through the process
and had the chance to at least perform in front of their peers at school and if
they were lucky and advanced further, a wider audience at the finals.
What do you most enjoy
about being a judge for Poetry By Heart – could you describe the kind of
performances you see and what the young people gain from the experience of
performing at The Globe?
It is great to see young people take a
poem by someone they’ve never met and make it their own. The best performances make
the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. Since Covid, we’ve done the first
stage of the judging from videos and that has worked surprisingly well. There
is an intensity to the recordings, often done on mobile phones, that make you
feel that person is performing directly for you. That said, it’s even better
when I see the same poem on the big stage at the Globe. Then, the young people
are performing in front of family and teachers and poet judges and the Poetry
By Heart team; there is that communal buzz you can only get from live
performance. The Globe is particularly good as a venue because it is both
formal enough – designed for Shakespeare – but it’s also informal because it
has that Groundling space at the front. That makes it very accessible. Mind
you, it has been pretty hot the past couple of years so that front space has
been a bit empty, people seeking out the shade, but I look forward to seeing a
crowd a bit close to the stage this year!
Would you recommend that
everyone learns poetry by heart and why?
Definitely. Because it’s fun and gives
you confidence and instils a deep love of language and literature. And it also
enables a reaching out to community. People generally learn poems so they can
share them. They might savour them on their own tongue and lips but there is
also a pure joy in lighting up someone’s life with a poem. The key thing is, it
must be a poem that’s been chosen, not imposed. When someone chooses a poem,
they choose it because it speaks to them. Even the process of finding such a
poem is like finding a jewel, a linguistic gem that must be celebrated. I also
think there’s something infectious about learning poetry by heart. When you see
other people doing it, as I did, all those years ago in my early 20s, I wanted
to do it too.
Book 3 in The Leap Cycle series of
books for young readers is just out – what do you enjoy most about writing for
young people in particular? Does your background as a poet have an impact on
your writing?
There’s a point early on
in Book 1, The Infinite, when my heroine states, ‘I LOVE words, the
shape and the sound of them and how they feel on my tongue.’ Part of the
impetus for writing for young people was wanting to celebrate the voice of my
heroine, Elle. All the books are written in her voice, a first-person
narrative. I created a main protagonist who loves poetry, on the page and out
loud. In the sequel, The Time-Thief, Elle has won a poetry
competition and eventually reads her poem out loud at, wait for it, a poetry
salon at Dr Johnson’s house in the year 1752. It’s a time-travel series so I
was able to create that scene. In the latest book, The Circle Breakers,
anonymous notes are written in rhyming couplets and there is a spoken word
Battle of the Beats in one of the earlier chapters. I’m currently working on
the finale, Book 4, which includes scenes in a library called The Four
Quartets. My poetry background totally fed the entire series. I could not have
written it if I didn’t have a deep passion for poetry, both on the page but
also out loud. Young people love hearing books read aloud. I’ve had a lot of
feedback from teachers who have enjoyed reading The Leap Cycle books to
their Year 5 and 6 classes. It feels like things have come full circle; my love
of words came from hearing them being read aloud by my mum. Now I’m writing
books for young people. Hopefully I’m inspiring some writers of the future.
The Circle Breakers
is out now, published by Canongate, 9781838855796, £7.99, pbk and Poetry By
Heart is open to all schools, primary and secondary, and colleges. To find
out more visit the website or contact the
team direct on info@poetrybyheart.org.uk
or on 0117 905 5338.
Thank you to Patience for the interview and to Andrea Reece for the opportunity.

Attached Thumbnails:
Tags:
Interview
Performance
Poetry
Poetry by Heart
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
27 July 2022
|
Valerie Bloom is the 2022 winner of the CLiPPA award with her impressively wide-reaching collection Stars with Flaming Tails. We were delighted to have the opportunity to talk with Valerie about her work, career and collection.
You were born and grew up in Jamaica. What role did poetry play in your childhood and did you write as a child?
I grew up listening to poetry. My mother and grandmother used to recite poetry all the time. Two favourites of theirs were The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner and Casabianca. The Jamaican Poet, The Honorable Louise Bennett Coverley was a household name and I remember every weekday sitting around the radio with my family and listening to her mid-day programme, “Miss Lou’s Views”.
As children, we were encouraged to memorise the poetry of the Bible, and every morning and evening we’d recite a psalm during family worship.
Then there was the National Festival where poetry was performed alongside the other art forms. The medal winners would usually be featured on the television, so we would be seeing poetry being performed all summer. At school I was always being coached to enter the festival though we never actually went. I think the logistics of taking kids from rural Jamaica to the capital for the competition was just too much for my teachers.
As soon as I could write I started making up poems and stories. The first was published when I was twelve.
You moved to the UK in 1979, what were your early impressions and experiences of the country?
First impression was probably the same as that experienced by many people coming to the UK from a tropical country – cold. In the middle of July, I kept asking if it was about to snow. I couldn’t imagine that it would get any colder. It was the first time I’d experienced cold sunshine.
Then I was struck by the beauty of the vegetation – the profusion of colours in the flowers. I was quite distressed when winter arrived and I thought all the trees had died!
If I was walking through my town in Jamaica and I made eye-contact with someone without saying hello, I would be considered ill-mannered. I soon learnt that here, if you greeted people on the streets with a cheery “good morning”, you’d receive some strange looks.
I was invited to a poetry reading a little while after I got here and was expecting a performance such as I was used to in our oral tradition. I was amazed when the poet stood and read from his book the entire evening. I’d never seen that before.
Your first collection of poetry was Touch Mi, Tell Mi, can you tell us a little about how that came to be?
I’d been writing poems in Jamaican before I came to the UK. Soon after I arrived, I was approached by someone from the Jamaican Society in Manchester. They had been living here for some time and wanted to form a choir to sing Jamaican folk songs but had forgotten the words. They asked if I could help. I taught and choreographed the songs and soon they were performing around the country.
To add some variety, I would perform a poem or two and people soon started inviting me to give solo performances of the poems. At the performances I’d be asked where they could get the book but I didn’t have one.
I was invited to do a weekly slot reading my poems on Radio Manchester and would write a poem during the week and read it on the radio the following Sunday.
I went to see Jessica Huntley from Bogle L’Overture Books, clutching a handful of these poems, and asked if she would like to publish them. To my amazement, she said yes immediately. The rest is history.
There's a wonderful cadence and musicality to your poetry. Does reading aloud or performance form part of the writing process for you?
When I’m writing I often think about how the poem is going to be performed. Poems are designed to be read aloud. They are as much about sound as they are about the words, so performance and oral delivery are important considerations when I’m writing. Sometime the performance even comes to me before the words and then I find the language to go with the actions. I write a lot on trains, planes and in hotel rooms and sometimes I forget where I am and start acting out a poem I’m writing on the train. I come to my senses when I realise the people around me are looking a little alarmed.
You've written across a broad range of forms - novels, poetry, for the radio and also for the jazz ensemble, Grand Union Orchestra - what has been the most exciting writing experience for you and why?
I did a one woman show for the Children’s Book Show some years ago. That was pretty exciting as we toured around the UK, but also I was able to incorporate story-telling, songs, movement, not just poetry.
Stars with Flaming Tails is your most recent collection and there's a very experimental and playful element to the subjects and forms explored. How do you go about writing and selecting the poems for a collection?
I’m always writing, so at any given time I have some poems which have not been published. When I’m putting a collection together, I go through those poems to see which ones I’d like to use and then write others that would go well with them, whether in terms of themes, language or subject matter. In the case of Stars with Flaming Tails, I got a bit carried away and wrote way too many poems for the book. The fact that I had the sections into which the book is divided seemed to make it easier to write poems to fit those categories. In the end it was Janetta at Otter-Barry books who helped me to decide on the final selection.
Children's poetry has not always received the attention it deserves, it feels to be in an exciting place with the CLiPPA, with Joseph Coelho being announced as the new Children's Laureate and with Manchester's new Poetry Library. What do you think poetry has to offer?
Among other things, poetry develops self-awareness and empathy, is an outlet for self-expression and it helps children to make sense of the world around them. It’s been shown to aid in cognitive development and encourages creative expression. It frees children from the restrictions of grammatical rules, making them more willing and able to explore their emotions in their writing and because it’s usually a short piece of literature, it means it’s appealing to reluctant readers and writers.
Can you give readers any insight as to what might be next for you?
There’s a chapter book coming out soon and I’m now working on another book of poetry. Other projects are just in their embryonic stages so I can’t talk about them yet.
A huge thank you to Valerie Bloom for the interview and to Andrea Reece for the opportunity.

Attached Thumbnails:
Tags:
Awards
CLiPPA
Diversity
Interview
Poetry
Raising Voices
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
08 February 2021
|
Ifeoma Onyefulu has written over twenty
children’s books including the seminal A
is for Africa. Many of Ifeoma’s
books are published by Frances Lincoln Ltd.
Here Comes Our Bride and Ikenna Goes to Nigeria won the Children's Africana Book Award in the United States.
Ifeoma’s play No Water in the
Jungle was performed in London. Ifeoma loves telling stories to school
children and comes from a family of storytellers. Here Ifeoma introduces us to her new poetry
collection Sing Me a Song Ma.
If anyone had told me I would be writing poems in 2020, I would have laughed at
them. But in January last year something strange happened, I began to get
requests from schools to do poetry workshops, and no sooner had I said no to one
school another one would pop up like a jack-in-box toy. I had never written a
poem in my life, and that was the strangest thing. Then, two days before I was
due to travel to Scotland to do a writing workshop for a school, I was asked again.
I would gladly have done a workshop on
writing plays, if such a thing exists in schools, because of No Water in The Jungle, one of my
plays, staged in London in 2019.
Anyway, I had a decision to make pretty
fast, and it was not going to be easy to say no to the school, with two days to
go. What’s more, we, the school, and I had spent months corresponding, and setting
up the timetable, and I was to do the assembly, too.
Finally, I rang a friend for some moral
support, and she chuckled, ‘But when I read your books, I think of poetry… it
is the way you write,’ she said breezily.
Poetry - that word again.
I decided to stick with the timetable and do
the workshop as initially planned.
So, as I was wondering how I was going to compose
an upbeat email to the school about my decision, my eyes somehow wandered off
and settled on a photograph on the far end of the wall. It was a picture of a
Fulani woman I took years ago in northern Nigeria; she was dressed in bright
clothes and had beads on her hair. After staring at it for what seemed like hours
but was only a few seconds, I heard a voice in my head about a girl who liked many
colours but would only wear blue when she went to see her grandma. Why? Was it
because she liked blue or because her grandma liked blue?
I grabbed a pencil and paper and began writing.
I didn’t know if it was going to be a short story or not, but I remember reading
it back, and it felt like a poem with sprinkles of intensity and imagery, which
surprised me a lot.
So, I wrote and wrote, I was very thankful
I had something to do during the first Lockdown, and that was how I came to write
my first poem titled What are Colours to
Adaora!
Then, I wanted to write more poems children
would enjoy, as much as I enjoyed the stories our mother and sometimes our grandfather
told my siblings and me when we were children in Nigeria.
In December 2020, I published some of the poems
online, as a collection, titled Sing Me a
Song, Ma.
Two of the poems, especially Grandma’s Tree, are about nature, and
the way we treat our trees. It was inspired by a conversation I had with our
late mother about her favourite avocado tree, which didn’t produce any fruits
for a long time.
Another poem, Rain, is about water shortage, people in low-income countries often
struggle to get enough water. During the dry season, when rainfall was rare, we
bought water from a well, but in the rainy season, we saved enough rainwater for
cooking and washing, which lasted for several days.
However, some of the poems are lighthearted,
for example, Sing Me a Song, Ma, is
about a child who doesn’t want to go to sleep, so she comes up with a brilliant
way of staying awake by getting her mother to sing her song, “A song that will
make my eyes wake up and…. A song that will make me dance.”
Finally, I hope Sing Me a Song, Ma, will be an e-book for children and their
families to read aloud together.
A big thank you to Ifeoma Onyefulu for writing this blog and introducing us to Sing Me a Song, Ma which is available via Smashwords

Tags:
Diversity
Poetry
Raising Voices
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Schools
Storytelling
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
01 October 2020
|
To celebrate National Poetry Day we are honoured to welcome Charlotte Hacking from the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education to talk about the CLiPPA award and to introduce this year's shortlist. Established in 2003, the announcement of the 2020 winner will be made 9 October at a special event at Cheltenham Literature Festival.
The
CLPE Poetry Award, fondly known as the CLiPPA, is the only award in the country
dedicated to children’s published poetry.
In
our work with schools, teachers and children across the country, we know what
an important branch of literature poetry is, providing the gateway for so many
young readers and writers in their journey towards becoming literate.
The award exists to celebrate the best of children’s poetry in all its
forms, bringing prestige to the form and prominence to those shortlisted, as
well the winners.
It’s
an absolute privilege to be a judge on this award. Every year, I get to explore
the full range and breadth of children’s poetry that’s been published. Reading
through all the submitted titles is such a pleasurable experience, every title
offers something to delight and inspire. Coming up with a decision of which
titles rise above the rest to make the shortlist is the hard part!
For
me, I look through the eyes of all the children I’ve had the pleasure to know over
my career as a teacher. I’m looking for the best poetry, of course, but I’m
also looking for something that offers something new and special to children,
that will encourage them to read, to perform or to show them that poetry is a
medium they can use to make sense of or to share their own thoughts and
feelings, and that can give them a voice. One of my absolute highlights is to
judge the shadowing scheme alongside the award, where schools submit videos of
children performing poems from the shortlisted collections, as that’s where we
really get to see the impact of the titles we’ve selected.
This
year’s shortlist is comprised of books that universally stood out for all of
the judges on the panel. Choosing a winner was really difficult, but the
shortlisted titles were books that every single one of us agreed on. There’s a
really good range to delight children of all ages. Reflecting on it now, what
links all the titles is a sense of the experiential - engaging with the natural
world in The Proper Way to Meet a
Hedgehog and other How To Poems, Cherry
Moon and Poems the Wind Blew in;
experiencing the rich folklore of Scotland through fresh eyes in Wain and a deliciously visceral
experience of food in Midnight Feasts.
In a year where experiences have been limited for a great deal of the
population, but especially for children, this seems particularly important.
Over
the years that I’ve had the honour of judging the award, we’ve seen such a
positive shift in the quantity of collections and anthologies submitted, but
also in the quality. Back in 2014, when I started as a judge, many of the
submissions were standard 12.7 x 0.8 x 19.7 cm texts, with paper so thin that
the next poem could be seen through the poem you were reading. This isn’t to
say that the poems inside these collections weren’t of quality, but production
value adds a lot to the feel of the collection as a whole.
Now, we see collections like Michael Rosen and Chris Riddell’s A Great Big Cuddle and James Carter and
Nicola Colton’s Zim Zam Zoom!, which are beautifully produced to
engage the earliest readers. Texts like Eloise Greenfield and Ehsan Abdollahi’s
Thinker: My Puppy Poet and Me and Kate
Wakeling’s Moon Juice, offer richly
illustrated poems in hand-held size publications for developing readers. And
titles like John Agard’s The Rainmaker
Danced and Joseph Coelho’s Overheard
in a Tower Block offer older readers sophisticated illustrations alongside
expertly crafted poems, providing a greater depth of reading experience. This
quality of production makes poetry irresistible.
Key titles such as Allie Esiri’s A
Poem for Every Night of the Year winning the Independent Bookshop Week
award in 2017 and Fiona Waters and Frann Preston-Gannon’s I Am the Seed that Grew the Tree winning the Waterstones Children's
Gift of the Year award in 2018 have also raised the profile of poetry, showcasing
poetry as a pleasure to own and dip in and out of or to give as a gift.
Over the last six years, we’ve been really keen to raise the prominence
of the award with the children this poetry is published for. In 2015, we
launched the CLiPPA shadowing scheme. Each year since, we’ve seen a significant
increase in the number of schools taking part, from the first year where we had
just 42 schools involved to this year, where before the scheme has even
launched, we have nearly 500 schools signed up to take part from across the
country. This really does engage the children with poetry and its creators and
supports them in finding texts that they want to read and buy for themselves. Publishers
report a direct uplift in sales as the shortlist is announced and our dedicated
resources enable schools to use the shortlisted books in classrooms to inspire
children to listen to, perform, respond to and write poetry of their own. CLPE’s Poetryline website also contains a
wealth of videos from a range and breadth of children’s poets made up of
prominent poets who have been shortlisted for the CLiPPA.
One of the joys of poetry is that you don’t have to read a complete
collection all in one sitting. You can dip in and out, share a poem and let it
linger, talk about a poem, perform it and let it live within you. Poems shared
can also be an inspiration for children to share their own thoughts, in art in
response to a poem, in music, dance or drama to accompany a poem or as a
stimulus for children’s own poetry.
The
important thing is that we make time for poetry and don’t allow it to be
marginalised. If we, as adults, have negative attitudes or are hesitant or
fearful about poetry, this can be easily passed on to the children. Instead,
make time to get to know and read poetry yourself and listen to poets reading
and performing their work on sites like Poetryline and the Children’sPoetry Archive. Arrange a visit – virtually or in person – from a children’s
poet. Seeing a poet bring their own work to life is an inspirational experience
for children of all ages. Use the CLiPPA shortlistto
keep up to date on the best new children’s poetry, as well as recommendations
from organisations like National Poetry Day to
ensure you stock a range of poetry that will delight and inspire the young
readers you work with. Provide opportunities for children to perform publicly
at school events or as part of competitions like the CLiPPA shadowing scheme
or Poetry
by Heart.
A big thank you to Charlotte for the informative blog and to CLPE for running this special award.

Attached Thumbnails:
Tags:
National Poetry Day
Poetry
Prizes
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
30 September 2020
|
We are delighted to welcome poet Mandy Coe to the blog to talk about the adventures of co-curating the Children's Collection with the brand new Manchester Poetry Library. Look out for Mandy's latest collection of poetry Belonging Street.
At
the opening of the first free lending library in Manchester in 1852, writer William
Thackeray said that people wanted
books, '…as much as we look to air, or as much as we look to light and water…' He was right, and the library proved to be so popular that day, a police
constable was placed at the librarian’s desk to help keep order. Today, Manchester is a UNESCO City of Literature, famous for its vibrant art, music and literature
scene, a perfect place for Manchester Poetry Library and its programme of cross-arts collaboration, translation
and recordings of new work.
So,
if Manchester is the right choice for this project, was I the right choice as co-curator?
I think so! My comprehensive school (think 1970s, bell-bottoms and strikes) owned
two poetry anthologies from Geoffrey Summerfield’s series, Voices.
Full of edgy poems and illustrations of their time, they were designed to
subvert. Like all school texts, the spines were cracked with being hurled about,
but as we scowled and licked pencils, poised to graffiti the pages, the poems
crept in. The door to literature, and in many cases, literacy, might have been closed
to us, yet these books represented a loose panel begging to be jimmied open. I
knew an invitation when I saw one, and took it.
The
co-curation commission arrived at the same time as Covid 19, and looking around
at my bookshelves, I was grateful that designing educational material for National Poetry Day and the Children’s Poetry Bookshelf had brought so many books my
way. The lovely Anne Fine, as children’s laureate, left My Home Library as her
legacy, and this inspired me to stock-take mine, and I set to: piling up new books
and blowing dust off old favourites. Here were cheap and cheerful paperbacks filled
with pen and ink drawings, plus huge books creaking open to full-colour spreads
that made you hold your breath. And of course (thanks Oxfam) one battered set
of Voices.
However, my library wasn’t this library… and it wasn’t as simple
as sizing up… or sizing down (surveying ‘Top Ten’ poetry book lists of the
great-and-good, confirmed a core list, but it also generated an infinite wish-list.
Is this what ‘curation’ means, I wondered? The capacity to cull combined with the
knack of cultivation? From my occasional stints as editor I knew the origins of
the word ‘anthology’ was from the Greek, anthologia, meaning ‘bouquet’. It
seemed that, like anthologised poems, each book must stand alone, yet resonate
with others to suggest what lies beyond. I sat in a circle of books and resolved
to borrow the three elements of Thackery’s speech:
Air:
the community is the library
First
goal… to support the Manchester Poetry Library’s commitment to reflect its community. Over 200 languages
are spoken in Manchester, making it one of the most language-diverse cities in
the UK. Guided by Poetry Projects Manager at MMU, Martin Kratz – a poet and passionate
advocate of poetry in translation – the collection will be rich with books in
translation and in first language. This celebration of both local and worldwide
poets will be developed through MPL’s programmes of festivals, readings,
mushairas and the commission of translation and new writing.
Light:
not nursery rhymes as an afterthought
Second goal… ensure a balanced selection for the three age-categories (0-5, 6-12,
13-17) with an equal representation of single-author collections v anthologies,
classic v contemporary, a multicultural range of writers, humour v reflective, small
press v larger publishers, plus a range of languages and audio. I was very happy
to include infants in the category, and thanks to the extremely experienced MPL’s
director, Becky Swain, we have a ‘young adult’ category for teens.
Water:
education
Third
goal… create a fourth category for educators and writers. In addition to my
work as a poet/illustrator and visiting teaching Fellow of MMU, I am a free-lance
literacy advocate working with schools and inner-city projects, so I know that
this category of teaching materials (including online resources) will be invaluable.
This category will support librarians, teachers, teacher-writers and writers
who visit schools, and help MPL develop a programme of children’s education events
sharing innovative ways of teaching poetry.
Opening up and opening out
With the library’s physical opening postponed due to Covid 19, my
final goal was to put on the ‘virtual kettle’ and open the co-curation up to the
champions of children’s books. We selected libraries, reading and literacy projects
throughout the UK, plus a few overseas, such as the Bookaroo Festival in Delhi
and the Writers & Teachers Collaborative, in New York. A named individual
in each organisation was asked to suggest one or two favourite children’s
poetry books. This not only got people discussing children’s poetry, but will enable
MPL to make these champions visible to young readers through, “This book is recommended
by….” bookplates. Responses from this amazing community were positive, considered
and generous. Anne Fine invited us to use bookplates from ‘My Home Library’
while Apples and Snakes even offered to send free audio CDs! What a pleasure
this ‘open co-curation project’ was. To all who responded during lock-down, thank
you, thank you.
In 2014, seeing children’s poetry categorised under ‘jokes and
horror’, MMU’s brilliant Writing School team and Kaye Tew at the Manchester Children’s Book Festival, transformed, for one year, the prestigious Manchester Prize into
a competition to support children’s poets. Judged by myself and poets, Imtiaz Dharker
and Philip Gross, the best poems formed, Let in the Stars. This beautiful anthology,
with a forward by Carol Ann Duffy, was nominated for the CLiPPA prize – testimony
to all the illustrators and poets such as Carole Bromley, Ashley Gill, Chrissie
Gittins, Matt Goodfellow, Louise Grieg, Sue Hardy-Dawson – to name but a few.
Imagine how wonderful it is now, to be ordering these writers’ books for the MPL
collection.
The
collection touches on so many topics, there’s no doubt it will reflect our
young reader’s lives. With books like Our Difficult Sunlight: A Guide to
Poetry, Literacy, & Social Justice in Classroom & Community, From
Medusa To The Sky: Teaching Writing To Children With Special Needs, and
Somos Como Las Nubes, (We Are Like The Clouds), Poems About Immigration,
we are confident that the collection relates to both the public and the
personal. Here, children and parents, all our readers, will have a safe, creative
place to explore the world through poetry – no longer simply a category within a
library, but a library within a category. I can’t wait to see you there.
A huge thank you to Mandy Coe for writing this far-reaching blog feature.

Tags:
Collections
National Poetry Day
Poetry
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
22 September 2020
|
We are delighted to welcome Colette Hiller to the blog to talk about The B on Your Thumb a collection of poetry published by Quarto which uses rhythm, humour and wordplay to help to develop a love of the English language. The book has been chosen as a recommended read for National Poetry Day.
Please can you tell us a little about yourself?
I began life as a dancer at NY’s High School of Performing Arts (as in the film Fame.) Interestingly, fame was not something any of us thought about. But yes, we really did dance on the desks ! I came to London with the original Broadway production of Annie and liked it so much I stayed. After years on the London stage – with the RSC (spear carrier on the right) and the National Theatre (spear carrier on the left) , I joined The BBC as a researcher and then producer. I loved it there and worked
across many departments, Education to Current Affairs. This led to my role as a cultural producer at Sing London, filling city streets with public pianos, ping pong tables and Talking Statues. I’ve also written a best selling children’s CD – Applehead – The B is my first book.
The oral nature of language and storytelling is such an important part of our literary culture and of our early introductions to reading. How much did this influence you?
Strawberry short cake cream on top. Tell me the name of your sweet heart is it A? B? C I was hugely influenced by the skipping rope and handclapping songs of my youth. The rhythm, internal meter and simplicity of these rhymes stuck in my head. Further influence came from A A Milne , Mother Goose and from Alligator Pie the Canadian classic by Dennis Lee. ( I was chuffed to bits when Dennis Lee wrote an endorsement for the book. And in rhyme!)
Are there any rhymes that are particular favourites and, if so, why?
These rhymes are like my children so I don’t like to show favouritism! That said...I especially like TION – which tells a funny story. The A in my Head – is wonderfully daft! And... I like A lot a lot. I’m actually a rotten speller myself, and so this rhyme reminds me how to spell the word!.
A Lot
A lot is not just one word ,
it’s always made of two
A lot of people don’t know that
From now on, you do!
How important do you think sharing and reading aloud is?
Reading aloud is particularly important with poetry . When a poem is words on the page, it’s only half formed. It comes alive when said aloud. My challenge when writing these was to create rhymes which felt easy to recite, and gratifying.
Some of the complexities and irregularities of the English language can make learning to read quite tricky? Do you have any experiences from working with BBC Education or through your work with early education about some of the challenges associated with this?
English is tricky and lots of things seem to make no sense. But that doesn’t mean these irregularities are s tricky to teach. You just have to explain that they are weird. For that matter, take my rhyme to explain the spelling of WEIRD
WEIRD
I before E
Except after C
And W too
On the odd occasion
(Which is wEIrd!)
What do you think of Tor's illustrations and did you have any interaction with him during the process of the book?
Tor ’s illustrations are lively, entertaining and imaginative. While a silent B may be painfully shy, a Bossy E is downright bolshie! But more than that, the illustrations reinforce the learning message of each rhyme. They are also filled with hidden things for children to find.
There is a real sense of play, fun and interaction in the book, how important do you feel these are to learning?
I think the process of learning to read should itself be enjoyable and entertaining. It shouldn’t be arduous or medicinal. And above all it shouldn’t be predictable!
All of these rhymes were created around a playful sense of fun.
Thank you to Colette for the interview and to Quarto for the opportunity.
Attached Thumbnails:
Tags:
Poetry
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Spelling
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|
Posted By Jacob Hope,
07 September 2020
|
We are delighted to welcome performance poet and author Laura Dockrill to the YLG blog alongside Gwen Millward to talk about their new book Butterfly Brain. Part cautionary tale and part lithe and lyrical exploration of the ways in which memory and dreams contribute to our make-up, it is a beautifully written, illustrated and produced book that leaves a lasting impression upon the minds of readers.
Congratulations on the publication of Butterfly Brain it feels a really special book with some profound comments on the impact of keeping feelings secret, on dreams and on memories.
LAURA: Ah thanks so much. I’m so excited about it.
Please can you tell us a bit about yourselves?
LAURA: I’m an author from south London. My love for writing and storytelling began at a very young age where I would love making up stories and scribbling plays for my younger sister and brother. As a child I would always keep a sketch book, scrap book and note pad by my bed and would constantly be keeping notes, writing poetry and stories, drawing, cutting and scribbling. I was a nosy, curious child. Obsessed with people watching and conversation. I even transcribed one of my mum’s phone conversations to my grandma without her knowing! I guess this was all a love that never really went away. I looked to writers of all disciplines - from Jacqueline Wilson, Benjamin Zephaniah, Roald Dahl and Carol Ann Duffy to cookbooks, film script, theatre, poetry and music. I love lyrics and would enjoy listening to the inspiration behind a song- punk, Bowie and soul. My dad would always encourage me to research the artists that I liked. To pick up a dictionary and learn a new word. My mum makes documentaries, so I think that’s where my love for character came from. The two smushed together made for a very eager, brightly coloured, overly excited, untactful spy. I’m very grateful to do my job.
GWEN: I grew up in Wales and went to a Welsh speaking school in a tiny village called Llanfair Caereinion - go on! try and say it. My parents are both quite arty - writer Mum and artist Dad, so I found myself doing both and loved it (I wasn't very academic - I was really bad at maths, still am). I used to draw lots of leafy things and wildlife and wrote short stories about cats.
I studied illustration in Edinburgh which was an amazing experience for an 18-year-old straight out of a tiny village. This stretched my brain and arty-muscles and helped me figure out how to hone my drawing and writing. When I was 25, I got my first picture book contract with Puffin books. It was incredibly exciting, but my agent reminded me not to give up my day job (which at the time was temping in an insurance company in Bristol, not my area of expertise!) and it took another few years before I was able to concentrate solely on writing and illustrating. To date I've written and illustrated three of my own books and illustrated 14 picture books and 13 pre-teen fiction books. I have lots of other books in the pipeline including another two of my own - which I cannot WAIT to get started on! One involves monsters. I'm excited.
Can you introduce us to the book and to Gus the main character?
LAURA: Sure. As a writer of children books I spend a lot of time (usually) doing school visits. It’s a really important and precious part of the job as it reminds you what children are actually like. They are changing and growing all the time. You learn a lot from them. How robust and resilient they are especially. How genuine! Physically being inside a school is also very evocative for our own memories- the smell of the crayons, the sugar paper, the paints - the dining hall- the savoury smell of rice and potatoes and custard. Of biscuit and pencil sharpenings. The noise of squeaky rubber on school halls. Of laughter and shouting and the triumphant clang of an out of tune piano in a school hall with a school assembly singing. And I forgot how much kids sit back on their chairs! It’s a little thing but they are always at it. Always being told off for it! When my little brother hector was little he would do this and once he pushed too far and split his head! I remember seeing his hair. Angelic white curls drenched in blood! And the stitches. I think that’s always stuck with me- and something I ALWAYS love to bring out to the kids in school!
Gus has some pretty big things happening in his life. How important do you feel it is to approach difficult situations in books for children and young people and are there any considerations in your approach?
LAURA: It’s extremely important. Books were my first friend. For many children they are solace, wisdom and companionship. They teach us how to love- to be thoughtful and ask questions. It is important that we tell stories that children can relate to with characters they identity with that share the same interests, aspirations and fears as them. It would be a lie if we pretended that life was totally blissful all the time. It has its tough bits and pain but we can show a child that they are not alone. That they are not weird or broken. And that in itself helps. Books teach us how to put our feelings and emotions into words- and that is such a vital life skill. Books are vitamins for the brain.
Gwen: How did you respond to the story and character of Gus and were there any challenges in this?
GWEN: When I first read the text for Butterfly Brain I was really stuck by how fresh and raw Laura's words were. It's a heart breaking story but she tells it without soppyness or saccharine tone. It's gritty and painful and is straight to the point. Gus is a young boy in so much turmoil but can't unlock all that pain. It seemed right to reflect that in the drawings, which are quite edgy and dark I think. I have to admit I was in floods of tears towards the end of the book, trying to draw Gus as a baby with his Mum was hard to do through leaky eyes. I was a mess. I think also being a Mum to a 7 year old boy myself made it feel quite close to home - it really tugged hard at the old heart strings.
Gwen: Can you tell us a little about your artistic technique?
GWEN: The final images were drawn digitally, but initially sketched out in pen and ink. I used quite a strong dark line to outline the characters. This softens ever-so-slightly in the latter half of the book to reflect Gus's emotions softening and becoming less gloomy.
Laura: There’s a real sense of playfulness in the language of the book, which makes it very fun to read, did you enjoy writing it, were there any parts that you particularly enjoyed writing?
LAURA: Ah thanks! Yes I always spend a lot of time reading the work out loud. I write a lot in my head without paper and pen - in the bath or when walking or cooking. So the work always have a sense of rhythm and musicality to it. As I am inspired by storytelling and words in general- not just books- it is important to me that the work is illustrative and theatrical. That is not still and stiff on the page but dances and jiggles about. That people can feel the words in their mouth as though they are at a restaurant tasting a meal. When writing, a story does not just translate through the words alone but the order the words appear in and how they fit together too.
It feels like there are some visual and written influences – the opening has similarities to Hilaire Belloc’s cautionary tales (poor old Rebecca who slammed doors for fun and perished), and visually there are some similarities to the unsettling work of Edward Gorey. Were any works or artists a particular inspiration?
LAURA: I’m so glad you picked up on that. Yes I am a very big fan of the macabre and Avant Garde, fairy tales, Greek mythology, folk lore and fables. Cautionary tales! I love Shockheaded Peter which actually has similar stories but I wanted to make sure that I delivered the real caution- which is to remind us to take care of our mental health as well as our ‘physical’ self- which is a harder thing to write about especially for little ones. And that the brain and body are connected as one. It’s about trauma and grief. Using the guise of smashing a head open as a realisation of grief.
GWEN: I am a huge fan of Edward Gorey and I’m sure somehow in my subconscious his illustrations might have influenced me! I think Laura’s text inspired me mostly, though. Her language is very visual and I think I’m pretty dark, to be honest. It was a bit of a dream come true to be asked to illustrate this, I feel hugely lucky.
There’s some very profound comments around the role memory plays in defining who we are. Our members are librarians, do you have a favourite childhood memory of libraries and reading?
LAURA: You know I have met so many incredible librarians over the last ten years. Librarians that pick you up at 5am in the pouring rain for a day or touring schools, that carry the heaviest of boxes of books from their car. And back again. That sign your name in with a grin. That squeeze you in the back of their mini squished up next to their baby’s car seat and picnic blankets. Umbrellas and dog hair! Always smiling. Always talking about their favourite books. I have met librarians that have shown me to best shops in their villages- led me towards leopard print shoes and vintage dresses. Bought me the best carrot cake, hot chocolate and even gin in tins! I have met librarians that have INFLUENCE. Power. That can save a little child’s life by listening and sharing and offering that safe warm glow of the library arms to keep them safe like literary lighthouses! Librarians that know it all but say nothing and then speak up when it truly matters. That remember a young person’s name. That order that special book for them. That make them reading lists. That lend them pens and photocopy for them. That help with maths homework. That share satsumas behind the front desk.
I’ve met librarians that make the best cups of tea in the world. The greatest cheese sandwiches. Encouraged and supported. Been loyal. And engaged. Get the best coffee shortbread biscuits in. That are soft and gentle and cosy. That speak in hushed tones when you’re reading only to bellow down the hall and electrify a gaggle of noisy kids in the hallway and put them ALL in their place. Librarians in the most incredible of fancy dress costumes. That have been at a school or in a community long enough to be mistaken for the building itself. Then those are new that simply LOVE books and want to make a difference. That have moved with the times. The change. Seen people come and go. Remain constant. Capable of putting one book in the right hands that could change a life forever.
GWEN: My memories of libraries and librarians are very fond ones. I would go with my mum or gran to the local, which was tiny but perfect. We also had a library bus that would visit when I was really small (Wales used to have lost of these). There wasn’t a massive selection, but it was fun having a chat with the librarian that ran it and a novelty to hop on a tiny bus and look at books.
Thank you so much to Laura and Gwen for the fantastic interview and thanks to Piccadilly Press for the opportunity.

Tags:
Illustration
Poetry
Reading
Reading for Pleasure
Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
|