It may seem unlikely, but the ghost of playwright Noel Coward and his perfect rhyming couplets have haunted Julia Donaldson. ‘Noel Coward liked perfect rhymes,’ says the author, who has made rhyme a trademark of her more than 200 books. ‘He hated nursery rhymes such as “Little Tommy Tucker sings for his supper, what should we give him, brown bread and butter”, because supper and butter don't rhyme and it would irritate him. I would have to slightly curb those feelings when I was writing and remind myself that I’m not being judged if I include a poem that doesn't perfectly rhyme.’
Her canon famously includes the rhymes ‘A mouse took a stroll through the deep dark wood. A fox saw the mouse, and the mouse looked good’ – the opening to the 1999 smash hit The Gruffalo; and the latest, ‘But the ladybird had a good idea, and she whispered into each animal ear’, from a story about a crime-fighting ladybird (What the Ladybird Heard at Christmas).
Rhyming stories cry out to be read aloud, and performance is part of Donaldson's background. As a former songwriter, she used to busk with her husband Malcolm, and the title of her first book, A Squash and a Squeeze, published in 1993, was taken from a song she wrote. Now, when she is not writing, she often performs her work at book festivals and theatres accompanied by her husband and children, while recordings of the husband and wife duo, plus four of their grandchildren, feature in a recent collection for babies and children (Rock-a-Bye Rumpus, released in September). ‘I haven't included many nursery rhymes in the book because, to be fair, some are quite outdated. A lot of them have rather weird things about parlours and people falling down the stairs or breaking their heads,’ she says.
WINNING FORMULA
Like The Gruffalo, the What the Ladybird Heardseries is an unlikely hero story, with crafty robbers unable to outwit a clever little ladybird; bravery, kindness and friendship are also themes often highlighted in her writing. The three friends in Sharing a Shellmay not always be happy housemates but they get back together in the end, while the witch's generosity in Room on the Broom pays off when the cat, dog, bird and frog she has made space for save her from the dragon. The unlikely friendship that develops between the dragon and feisty Princess Pearl in Zog demonstrates that we can overcome stereotypes and differences to contribute to society.
While simple, circular plots and lyrical prose characterise Donaldson's books, so do the accompanying illustrations. ‘It is good to have detailed pictures because, if the child is going to have the book read to them again and again, it is nice for them to have different things to spot,’ she says.
She has worked with a range of illustrators – ‘sometimes you write something that is not going to be quite right for the existing illustrators and then you have to look around, which is quite scary’ – but her most famous collaboration is with Axel Scheffler. He illustrated her first book and they have worked on 24 more together, including their latest, The Baddies, and, of course, The Gruffalo, which has sold 13.5 million copies. Look carefully and you will see hidden pictorial references to the Gruffalo character in many of their later works – from a child drawing a Gruffalo in the sand in The Snail and the Whaleto a Gruffalo-headed fish in Tiddler and a Gruffalo toy being cuddled in Tabby McTat.
Donaldson might have described the Gruffalo with his ‘terrible tusks, and terrible claws’ and ‘purple prickles all over his back’ in great detail, but she didn't actually know what he would look like until Scheffler drew him. She works very separately from her illustrators and only makes comments once the first sketches are produced.
‘Axel had three sketches,’ she recalls. ‘In one the Gruffalo was too upright and evil, in another he looked like a wild boar and in another he was slightly stooped over and a bit goofy. That was the one. Originally he had the animals wearing clothes – the mouse in lederhosen and the Gruffalo in some sort of knickers; I’m not sure what he would have done with the snake!’
PUBLIC STAGE
Even when children can read themselves, sharing storytime should continue, Donaldson says. ‘I would say to carry on reading to children even when they can read – [carry on] sharing family stories together. We used to make story tapes for our children and listen to them in the car,’ she says.
‘When I started writing, my children were grown, so although I am used to performing my stories to an audience – sometimes of hundreds – I haven't experienced that one-to-one with reading my books to my own children. It is now very different and my grandchildren have a lot of my books.’
In her role as Children's Laureate between 2011 and 2013, she promoted children performing stories and also campaigned for libraries to remain open, conducting a six-week library tour from John O’Groats to Land's End. In every library she visited, children would perform something for her before they acted out one of her own stories together.
‘Certainly reading quality picture books with children from a young age helps build a love of reading. Taking them to the library does too,’ says Donaldson. ‘If you go to the library, your child can rummage around and see what they like and then get out lots of books without spending a fortune.’
Unsurprisingly she is a wholesale advocate of what libraries have to offer young children, which includes free rhyme time sessions that involve listening to and joining in with rhymes, sometimes with music, as a means of boosting young children's language development, including extending vocabulary and phonological awareness. Donaldson has even written a series of 60 phonics-based books, arranged to be read from the early years, arranged over six stages. So is she in favour of the heavy focus on synthetic phonics that is currently being promoted by the Government?
‘When my children were at school, it was just before phonics came back with a vengeance and phonics was almost like a dirty word. I always liked phonics so I was delighted when it came back, but I wasn't in favour of the pendulum swinging right over to phonics and I’m not a fan of tests. Teachers know that children learn in all sorts of ways. Some children latch on to phonics, some look and say, and some do it by osmosis. You have got to cater for everyone, so I am not in favour of one way being the only way.’
CAUSES
The third ‘big thing’ on her list, after performance and libraries, is stories for deaf children. Now patron for the charity Action for Deafness, Donaldson was diagnosed with ‘cookie bite’ hearing loss in her thirties, which makes it difficult for her to hear speech and music in the mid-range of the audible spectrum. To compensate, she wears hearing aids and is helped by lip reading.
Her recently published book Colours, Colours Everywhere features a girl wearing a hearing aid – the illustrator, Sharon King-Chai, based the child on her own daughter – and Donaldson herself wrote Freddie and the Fairies, a story with a subtle message about clear communication and understanding the needs of people who have difficulty hearing. ‘I've heard many deaf children with hearing aids say how nice it is to see the fairy wearing one,’ she says.
It is perhaps not surprising that the author struggles to pick her favourite book. Although, having celebrated her 50th wedding anniversary this year, she does say that The Scarecrows’ Wedding is one that she is very fond of.
‘I just like the way there's a love triangle. It's very Hollywood-ish,’ she says, before adding, ‘I can often tell what stories people are going to say are their favourites. It's often Paper Dolls, lots of people say that.’ That's when I produce my much-loved copy of this very book to be signed. And I thought I was being original.
FURTHER READING
- Interview: Julia Donaldson, Nursery World, October 2022, www.juliadonaldson.co.uk
