The Places You Will Go

Monstrously Wonderful

By DAPHNE LEE

From Tots to Teens, StarMag, 3rd July 2011

IN a radio interview, Patrick Ness said that he wept during the writing of A Monster Calls (Walker Books, 215 pages, ISBN: 978-1406334906). “If I’m writing anything that’s this difficult and I’m not upset, then I’m not doing it right,” he said. “If I’m not crying why would I think anybody else will be moved?”

When I received my review copy of the book, I read the last couple of pages and found myself simply blubbing. I then read the book all the way through and, at the end, I cried again. Ness has obviously done it right.

A Monster Calls was a book that the Irish author Siobhan Dowd wanted to write. She had made notes, had imagined the characters, planned the premise, written a beginning. But Dowd died before she could write the book. She had cancer and she was only 47.

Making Facts Stick

By DAPHNE LEE

Tots to Teens, StarMag

HISTORY was one of my favourite subjects in school. I found the stories interesting, and it amused me to imagine what the men and women that featured in them were really like.

But in most history books, historical figures are reduced to names linked to significant events and dates. There is no sense of what made them tick, their likes and dislikes, their hopes and dreams. Was Parameswara a serious or cheerful man? Did Frank Swettenham [right] like durians and other local delicacies or was he a fussy eater? Did Yap Ah Loy ever put his feet up with a good book?

If history textbooks are to be believed, the people mentioned in them do nothing but sign treaties, fight wars, and plan assassinations and rebellions. It takes historical fiction, I suppose, to flesh out a historical figure – to animate those blurry black and white lithographs and awkwardly proportioned illustrations.

Historical fiction also, because it doesn’t just present the dry, bare facts, but puts them into the context of the lives of thinking, feeling people, makes much more of an impression on the reader. If a story is told well, the details stick.

Josephine Tey's fascinating exploration of the man who was Richard Plantagenet (in The Daughter of Time) helped me to finally make sense of the War of the Roses. It also turned me into a lifelong Ricardian just as Shakespeare's bit of Tudor propoganda (Richard III) has probably fixed Richard as a hunchbacked monster in the minds of many.

It's easy to get carried away and believe everything one reads, but we have to remember that it's historical fiction and not accept it all as fact. Anyway, you know what Winston Churchill said about history being written by the victors! There are definitely many versions of every historical event depending on the perspective of who records or retells it.

I wish someone would write some exciting hostorical fiction set in Malaysia. I suppose Hikayat Hang Tuah qualifies but who knows if he even existed. Apparently, National Laureate Muhammad Haji Salleh has completed an English translation of that book. I hope it is published with some fanfare and doesn't just slip quietly into the bookstores and get relegated to the bottom shelf of the Malaysiana section.

Good News for Frens and Relayshuns of Edward Bear?

Thanks to the insidious power of TV and the slap-you-silly assault of merchandising, Disney's orange bear [right] is what children of the 21st century (and late 20th century) think of when you say "Pooh". Will a sequel to A. A. Milne's original stories give the original bear [left] of little brain a public relations boost? I, for one, will offer up prayers to the god of bears for the reinstatement of the rightful Mr Sanders.

Read more about Pooh's return in The Guardian.

Hot Men of Children's Literature II: Brian Selznick

I started this in January this year and then forgot all about it!

So, after nearly a year, my next pick is Brian Selznick, American illustrator and author.

Selznick won the 2008 Carnegie Medal for The Invention of Hugo Cabret, an illustrated novel that functions like a picture book: the story is told equally with words and pictures.

Oliver!

I found out on Monday that Oliver Jeffers will be coming to KL for the British Council's Animating Literature conference in February 2009. I'm so excited!

Love his books especially Lost and Found. Really looking forward to his latest book, The Great Paper Caper. Have looked it up on Amazon and it looks like it'll probably be on my column's Christmas recommendations list.

I'm hoping Jeffers will do a workshop at the library, and at least one reading at a bookstore.

Jeffers was this blog's first (and, so far, only) Hot Man of Children's Literature back in January this year!

His books, so far:

Lost and Found

How to Catch a Star

The Incredible Book Eating Boy

The Way Back Home

The Great Paper Caper

Pauline Baynes 1922-2008

Pauline Baynes, the illustrator of C. S. Lewis's Narnia books, died on 1st August.

She was 86.

For many she will live on because of the iconic images she created for Lewis's series, in particular (for me at least) that evocative picture of Luch and Susan frolicking with Aslan (on the cover of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe) and the one (in the same book) of Lucy walking through the snow with Tumnus the Faun (left).

In fact, Baynes illustrated books many other books by other authors, including J. R. R. Tolkien, Rumer Godden and Helen Piers. I was surprised to discover that she was also responsible for the cover for the first paperback edition of Richard Adams's Watership Down. That's one cover I remember distinctly from my childhood - I didn't know she was the illustrator until I read about her her death on Brian Sibley's blog.

Sibley also wrote her obituary in The Independent.

Say "No!" to Sham-Pooh! We Want the Real Pooh!

By DAPHNE LEE

Tots to Teens

MOST children now, if you say Winnie-the-Pooh to them, will think of that saffron-yellow tub of lard in a two-sizes-two-small red T-shirt, star of Disney's several series, all of which are based on A. A. Milne's books about the "bear of very little brain".

The latest Disney series is called My Friends Tigger and Pooh, and as usual, there is an annoyingly catchy theme song and characters who Milne would not recognise from his books.

Watching any of Disney's Pooh series makes me want to wring the bear's neck and also bash his friends, especially Tigger and Rabbit, to a pulp. Pooh, Piglet and Tigger are not exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer (understandable since they are toys who have stuffing for brains), but their stupidity reaches new, unchartered depths in the telly series. And the usually shrewd Rabbit (my favourite character in the original books) appears to be suffering from some form of dementia - worse still, Disney portrays him as a rather effeminate and neurotic elderly male.

But back to Edward Bear (that's Pooh's real name, although we also learn that he once lived in the forest under the name of Sanders) - the books he appears in are Winnie-the-Pooh (1926) and The House at Pooh Corner (1928). The former introduces us to the bear and his friends Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, Kanga and Roo, and Rabbit and Owl (the only two of the gang who are real animals and so, in theory, more brainy than the rest). Pooh has a growly voice and he does Stoutness Exercises. It's established that he is rather greedy, a bit of a coward, quite brainless, but perfectly amiable.

And the award goes to ...

I wonder if Malaysia will ever have its own awards for children's literature. Will the standards of writing and the number of children's books published ever call for the sort of recognition given by prizes like the Newberry and Caldecott, and the Carnegie and Greenaway, or should the awards come first, acting as encouragement to writers and illustrators of children's books?

In Singapore the National Book Council held a picture book writing/illustrating contest a couple of years ago. If I remember correctly, out of the submissions, six picture books were published. I didn't consider them particularly interesting or inspiring, well-written or -drawn. And, speaking to several writers and artists who had submitted work, I think the NBC still has very old-fashioned ideas of what makes a good children's book.

A friend and I are toying with the idea of applying for a grant with which to start a similar contest. Stay tuned to see if anything comes of it. As I keep saying, so much to do, so little time ... 

Hot Men of Children's Literature: Oliver Jeffers

In Tots to Teens today, I linked Fuse #8's final entry for her Hot Men of Children's Lit series. I'm starting my own list on this blog and choose Oliver Jeffers as my first Hot Man :-D!

Jeffers is an artist, designer and illustrator. He has written and illustrated four picture books: How to Catch a Star (2004), Lost and Found (2005), The Incredible Book Eating Boy (2006) and The Way Back Home (2007).

Jeffers is also a founder-member of the art collective OAR, along with Rory Jeffers, Mac Premo and Duke Riley. OAR's exhibitions so far include 9 Days in Belfast, book and the award winning BUILDING.

Jeffers was the official World Book Day illustrator for 2007.

He is from Northern Ireland and has a degree in visual communication from the University of Ulster. He lives in Belfast.

Red-headed rebel

Pippi Longstocking annoys me to death, but I'd still choose her over Pollyanna.