David Maybury | Blog

One of the fall outs from suffering a Shamrock Shake come-down was that I missed Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler in Dublin on Wednesday. (Those milkshakes have a lot to answer for). Those that made it to Eason’s on O’Connell street tell me that it was great and crikes am I jealous!

The Irish Independent had a story on the appearance yesterday - and report that the TV adaptation of the Gruffalo will be out later this year. There’ll be a host of merchandise to go with it - including - Gruffalo pyjamas. Consider this a very early plea for the PJ’s next christmas!

MS Corley may be a certifiable genius.

Go see some more - here.

The Observer published the winners - and runners-up - for the Observer/Cape Graphic Short Story Prize. The Observer site has a whole heap of galleries so there’s plenty to ogle

Julian Hanshaw‘s winning short - Sand Dunes and Sonic Booms.

Emily Haworth-Booth’s short - What do married people talk about?

Isabel Greenberg’s short - Cheer up love, it’s only a credit crunch.

Some really great stuff - worth reading. Definitely.

The Guardian and Times UK both feature slide-shows at the minute. The Times have the winner (left) and runners-up from The Wind in the Willows cover competition (here)

The Guardian has 11 illustrations by Quentin Blake, Emily Gravett, Posy Simmonds, Axel Scheffler, David Roberts and Alexis Deacon, from The Birthday Book - to commemorate the Prince of Wales’s 60th birthday - edited by former children’s laureates Michael Morpurgo and Quentin Blake.

And JK Rowling wrote in the Guardian about the scene she chose for The Birthday Book - where Harry Potter goes to face the dementors.

The destinies of wizards and princes might seem more certain than those carved out for the rest of us, yet we all have to choose the manner in which we meet life: whether to live up (or down) to the expectations placed upon us; whether to act selfishly, or for the common good; whether to steer the course of our lives ourselves, or to allow ourselves to be buffeted around by chance and circumstance

It’s Wednesday and the world is busy with book launches, radio programmes and emails. Sorry for yet another link post:

> Dominic Wells in the UK Independent is watching the watchers as they watch the watchmen.
> The first of Neil Gaiman’s Irish interviews has appeared online. Hot Press are next and then Inis, I think.
> The Sunday Tribune has a look at fairy-tales too.
> John Carey looks at the history of illustration - with some worrying results - in Jenny Uglow’s new book.
> Malorie Blackman talks to Alison Flood from the Guardian about writing Noughts and Crosses.

The winner of the Observer Graphic Short Story Prize has been announced - Julian Hanshaw - for his “haunting, evocative and beautifully drawn story“.

The story will appear in next weeks Observer and Mr Hanshaw should be seeing a specially uniformed postman outside his door with a cheque for £1000 some time this week.

Looking forward to seeing it! More over on the Observer.

The mysteriously talented Mr Alan Clarke has an exhibition of paintings, sketches and other things in London opening next week - it opens on Wednesday and runs until 22 November in the Capital Culture Gallery.

If ye’re in the area (and even if you’re not) I highly recommend dropping in to have a snoop. (And if no one is looking maybe grab a painting or two - one for me, one for you)

Something nice and light for a post Culture Night morning. And I couldn’t think of anything better than a day spent with Babar - who features in the current New Yorker. There is an exhibition of Laurent de Brunhoff in the Morgan Library and Museum in New York with original artwork and sketches.

The New Yorker piece, here, comes complete with a slideshow of de Brunhoff’s work. Enjoy.

Two bits of good news for Cartoon Saloon - not too long ago (a week or three) the company landed a 52-episode deal with everyone’s favourite network for cartoons, Cartoon Network.

But it gets better….

This years illustration for the Children’s Books Festival is out - and guess who’s name is on the bottom? Tomm Moore of Cartoon Saloon. The poster looks great - the monsters, Dracula being my favourite, is frighteningly frightened.

I’m off galavanting in Sligo today and with long trips across country comes long hours of trawling through newspapers. A couple of highlights from 4 hours of sitting on a bus:

> Anthony Horowitz appears in the Irish Indepdent - interesting read and good interview by Julia Moloney.

> Alan Garner encourages the habtit of reading outside your age bracket in the Times (UK) - comes ahead of the The Children’s Writers and Illustrators Group Conference next week.

> Louise Tucker investigates the phenomenon of boys reading Shakespeare as a graphic novel but not in text on the Guardian Blog.

Mobile broadband… it even works on a bus trekking through the middle of nowhere in west coast Ireland.

The Observer’s graphic short story competition is back with an offering of £1000 and publication in the Observer Review. Check out last year’s winner, Catherine Brighton, for a start and then get the creative juices flowing. On the success of last year Brigthon had her first book published by MacMillan.

More info on the Guardian blog as well as a feature on Raymond Briggs - just to put it all into perspective I guess.

The artist/designer Pauline Baynes, the woman behind the original illustrations for Lord of the Rings trilogy and CS Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia died last week aged 85. The Guardian and UK Independent have extensive obituaries.

Apparently she was working on 40 illustrations for a new edition of Aesop’s Fables which will hopefully be published next year.

A few pics from the Children’s Books Ireland - Summer Day Out in Farmleigh on Sunday. Jack Lynch and Len Graham told tall tales, Jen Murray (of CBI fame) blowing up balloons and the stomach turning Gabriel Fitzmaurice read some of his really really rotten rhymes.

Well done to everyone at CBI and to all of the storytellers, writers and illustrators who put on a great day of stories and madness.

PS - this is officially post no 200!! (with nearly 577 comments on the site so far -I’m flabbergasted at that- thanks to everyone who reads!!)