Day 10 Evening Panel Discussion: ‘READING PICTURES’ at Toorak/South Yarra Library

This event was a new edition to the Literature Alive Program and was an eagerly anticipated panel discussion.

Mandy Cooper, the curator of GALLERY FOR A DAY, was the M.C for the evening and she spoke briefly about what picture books mean to her, that the narrative is in the artwork and that it’s a unique skill it is to make this relationship work. She quoted Children’s Writer and Illustrator Ann James:

The illustrator must not merely echo the words, they must illustrate between the lines. So the story is like a song -lyrics and music. Each has it’s own voice and part to play. But they must be in tune with one another. They can be discordant but discordant on purpose.

Mandy then introduced Kevin Burgemeestre to talk about his thoughts on this topic.

Kevin thinks he has the best job in the world. He can’t believe he’s paid to play, that he does all the things he once got into trouble for at school. Kevin tells us how the reader always brings something to the work, whether that is based on their own experiences or their imaginations.

Text gives impetus for drama. It creates sequence. You establish a shot, a scene and you have action and reaction. And it has to be dynamic on the page. There are a number of points of view that create the reaction.

Kevin likes to use metaphor. Through gesture and body language, his character is telling us something symbolic and he reminds us of how religion always used over-wrought alter pieces to get the message through.

Composition is important. For example, how you divide the paper? This connects the art to the narrative particularly well if there is conflict. A fence maybe…

In Kevin’s book, ‘Thunder Mountain’ he deliberately drew his illustrations increasing in size across the page to relate to a counting narrative.

In ‘B for Bravo’ Kevin’s dioramas create drama through shadow and depth and shape and in the mountains scene, the emptiness creates possibility for the plane to fly through.

In regards to point of view, Kevin quite rightly states, the mouse has a different view to the eagle.

In Kevin’s new book, (it’s YA fiction) called ‘Kate’, Kate is protected by ‘Spirit’ the dog and the artwork has deliberate elements of tribal spirit symbolism that relates to the text. Very cool stuff from Kevin.

Elizabeth Honey was introduced next and she spoke about using less words and letting the picture do the talking. We were honoured to see the roughs for a new book. She was in a dilemma and asked us our opinion on the medium she should use. Wow!

It’s a picture book about all the things parents say to children. Families have a way of communicating, they use words that deal with situations or ‘wrangling’ as Elizabeth put it. It was a delightful story.

Hop up, wriggle over, snuggle in.”

Elizabeth wanted to use the right medium to covey the mood of the book: soft, fluffy and how big should the book be? These were all valid questions.

Elizabeth also showed us how she wrote and re-wrote ‘Not a Nibble’. When you work with water, double spreads are the order for the day.

Elizabeth writes and paints at the same time when she’s creating a book as this allows an economy of words. It also allows her to make pictures intriguing and to not give it all away too early, such as in her book ‘That’s not a Daffodil’

Elizabeth chose to work in gouache on rough watercolour paper that has a deep tooth so she could then layer with oil crayon. There were some difficult perspectives to deal with as the Turkish man next door was huge and trying to fit him in the artwork with the little boy took some time. It’s all about angles…

Mark Wilson works completely different to Kevin and Elizabeth. Yay!

Mark uses dual narratives in historical based stories. By this, I mean he used his illustration and the text to tell the story, all adding a different perspective.

For example, in ‘Angel of Kokoda’ Mark used the illustration of Kari and certain birds, lifelike and carved, that were important to his tribal belief systems as well as the text that was telling the story and a letter from command that described the state of the battle. This layering is really effective storytelling, allowing the reader to put all the pieces together. And there’s so much information here.

‘Vietnam Diary’ used two narratives through illustration. On a double page spread, there are two brothers on opposing sides. On one side of the page, one brother is protesting against the war in Vietnam and Mark has painted this in a dropout, tonal effect. It’s very 60’s in style, representing that era. On the side, the other brother is painted very life-like, clean cut; almost like a photo. This young man (which just happens to be Mark himself) has had his name drawn out of a tattslotto type of machine ordering him to do National Service and join the Army. The illustration is ‘realist’, reflecting his situation at the time. Very cool Mark.

In the book ‘My Mother’s Eyes’ Mark used colour to represent the horror of war, rather than draw that detail for children. He is allowing the reader to use their imagination and through the emotive use of colour: red for fire, anger, blood.

Several people in the audience then had an opportunity to ask our panelists questions and one absolute beauty, which was directed to Mark was: “What artists have influenced your careers, obviously Turner has?”

Mark nearly fell off his chair, he was flattered Turner could be seen in his work. I can see it too now, in the way he uses light to illuminate certain illustrations. Mark rattled off a few other admired artists such as Tom Roberts, whom he has written a book about, ‘Ben & Gracie’s Art Adventure’ & ‘Inside the world of Tom Roberts.’

Kevin loves the artwork of Max Meldrum and Ken Avery (of Bugs Bunny fame), Rembrandt for humanity, Goya, Sidney Nolan, Arthur Boyd, Joy Hester, Fred Williams.  Quite a list, but I will have Google Max Meldrum and Ken Avery.

When Elizabeth Honey was asked about admired artists she immediately answered Matisse, and that he strongly influenced her in ‘I’m still awake, Still’. You can see this this in Elizabeth use of long lines and flowing movement. How cool is that!

Overall, the READING PICTURES discussion panel evening was deemed a success and will remain on the agenda for the festival next year. What a great night!

 

Day 12 ‘Live art in the Mart’ – LITERATURE ALIVE at Prahran Market

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Saturday morning dawned bright and sunny and it was a beautiful day at Prahran Market.

There were children doing drawing and doing writing workshops on long white trestle tables with the assistance of Kevin Burgemeestre and Mandy Cooper. There were more little children getting their faces painted. It was a very festive atmosphere.

Proceedings kicked off with a little girl called Natasha reading out aloud her story. She took that microphone and went for it. A natural talent, I believe.

Kevin then showed the children some of his illustrations and artwork and how he goes about writing a children’s picture book. Kevin had two dioramas on display from his book ‘B for Bravo.’

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Heather Gallagher read her story ‘The Plug Hole’ which the children just loved. 

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I then read my latest book ‘Kick it to Me!’ 

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‘Kick it to Me!’ is published by One Day Hill www.onedayhill.com.au

They publish culturally significant Australian stories. An awesome independent publisher.

Nadine recited her picture book ‘Roar’ and there were plenty of roars in response (this is us roaring!)

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Nadine also read to us her delightful story ‘Nan’s Umbrella’. She had a few tricky questions for the children afterwards, which they were able to answer with no problems at all (they were definitely listening).

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Kevin and Mandy launched into their chosen story time books and the kids rolled around on the hay bales and beanbags, having a ball. Both Kevin and Mandy are master storytellers; excited little people invaded their personal space on more than one occasion. Kevin and Mandy were a big hit. Mandy also has the most beautiful singing voice; she’s missed her vocation!

 Heather read a chapter from her new book ‘Ferret on the Loose’ just recently published by New Frontier. It was hilarious.

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‘Ferret on the Loose’ by Heather Gallagher is a Little Rocket from New Frontier publishing. It’s for 7+ readers and is available at any good bookstore. There’s a rocket to make in the back of the book. That’s pretty cool!

All in all, it was a perfect day at Prahran Market.

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(Thank you to my biggest fan, the wonderful Toby)

I felt quite sad when it was time to say goodbye to Nadine, Heather and Helen, and Kevin and Mandy. As Maurice Saxby Mentees, we have had the most amazing two weeks. But as Helen kindly reminded us, it’s not the end; it’s just the beginning of our friendship.

Nadine, Heather and I (and Laura who is overseas) are already planning our next catch up!

A big thank you must go to Helen Chamberlin for looking after us and guiding us through our work and to Pam Horsey from C.L.A.N who has done a wonderful job planning and organising everything. A big thank you must also go to N.E.E.F and to Stonnington Council.

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Day 8 Maurice Saxby Mentorship

Day 8 Readings Bookstore, Lygon Street, Carlton

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This afternoon, we met with Emily Gale at Readings Bookstore in Lygon Street Carlton.

Readings is an independent bookstore with six retail shops in Melbourne. They have a real literary scene going on as they regularly host a ‘calendar of events’ including book launches, authors-in-conversation, panels, signings and performances. Their website and blog is very snappy too, free shipping for books bought on-line and great book reviews on their blog.

Anyway, Emily is a Children’s and Young Adult Specialist at Readings. She knows a lot about book selling and tried to give us an idea about how it works. There’s a section in the Children’s Books area that’s set up for new titles and it covers four levels. The top level is for new books and the other books on the lower levels are books that Readings sell at least once a week.

The shelf life of a book does vary but four months is about average. Some distributors have certain conditions; such as the bookseller only has a year to sell them before they stop accepting returns.

To remain in the bookstore, to remain in Readings, a book needs to sell at least one per month.

Thankfully, I found my book from One Day Hill Publishing. It went into paperback at Christmas; so I was relieved and happy to see it there.

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www.neridahmcmullin.com

www.onedayhill.com.au

Emily spoke about writers coming in and saying ‘hello’ and how much they enjoyed this, and that this sort of was promotion was still a good way to get your book into a bookstore.

Heather asked a very valid question, how could we get our books reviewed by Readings? Just ask, they said and all books would be considered. Yay!

Emily also gave us the heads up on what sort of children’s books people are asking for:

  1. Decent Mother’s Day books that are not pink and fluffy and full of perfect women.
  2. Toilet training books that don’t mention the word ‘potty’
  3. Junior/Middle Grade fiction is always popular.

Then we found out that Emily is a published author herself (this is her first YA book launched in Australia, she’s from London) and it’s the ‘book of the month’ at Readings.

Congratulations Emily!

It’s called ‘Steal my Sunshine’ and it’s published by Woolshed Press (Random House). This is Emily’s very cool website and there’s a sample chapter on there to read! www.emilygale.co.uk

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Readings is an awesome bookstore, thank you Emily for your advice and expertise on Children’s books and thank you Readings for supporting emerging writers.

Day 7 Visit to the Children’s Collection, State Library of Victoria

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Juliet O’Conor manages the Children’s Collection at the State Library of Victoria. She is a Research Librarian and an author of the famed ‘Bottersnikes and other lost things: a celebration of Australian children’s books’.

The collection has children’s books published between the 16th and 21st century, reflecting patterns of childhood reading over five hundred years.

The collection is divided into three areas: Rare Books, the Ken Pound Collection (about 25,000 books donated by Ken Pound), and the Children’s Literature Research Collection (which has about 70,000 books).

The earliest children’s book in the collection is The Scholemaster by Roger Ascham, written by the tutor of a young Queen Elizabeth I, and we got to look at it and turn the pages!

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The text is inaccessible, an ‘s’ looks like an ‘f’ and ‘u’ looks like ‘v’. It was quite hard to read. However, the quality of paper and beautiful font was wonderful to look at. Juliet explained how the upper classes had beautiful leather bound books with embossed golf family crests on them and the lower classes had much more simpler versions. These were priced accordingly.

We also had a look at the Horn Books. Wow! These were fascinating. Hornbooks were used in the 17th Century to teach children how to read. They were small, thin pieces of wood with a handle. On a piece of vellum or paper were printed letters of the alphabet, and maybe a syllabus and vowels. Usually, the Lords Prayer was on it too, as so often in these times education was part of religion. Then the piece of paper was covered by a thin layer of transparent horn to protect it. Like plastic. Cool, eh!

Depending on class some Hornbooks were embossed and engraved.

Check this one out…

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Ken Pound is an interesting character. He fascinated Heather! His collection was a privately amassed, put together by himself through buying books at markets and fairs from 1970 to 1994. The collection is solely Australian and New Zealand books, and Ken purely collected what he liked. His collection has certain books that are rarely found anywhere else in Australia. These include these funny little advertising booklets, which humorously reflect aspects of social history. Some were illustrated by the wonderful Ida Rentoul Oustwaithe. My favourite illustration was of two children playing cards with two quite adult looking Koala’s who were smoking and having a drink!

Others treasures in Ken’s collection are several editions of ‘Dot and the Kangaroo’ and ‘John Mystery Books’ which were published from the 1930’s – 1950. Growing up in an orphanage, we found Ken’s collection touching. He just loved books! His one requirement when he parted with his collection was that they remain ‘together’; quite a legacy we thought.  

We also got to look at two more very special and rare books. We looked at an Earnest Lister pop-up book from the 1890’s. The artwork was beautiful, and the diorama had been delicately hand-cut. They called it paper engineering.

At this time (1890’s) pop-up books or lift the flap books were also popular for teaching surgery. Scary!

My absolute favourite was a Beatrix Potter book from 1906. It was a concertina book of ‘Miss Moppet’. It was tiny, in a wallet format and it was absolutely divine. I believe it wasn’t so popular though. Apparently, children would read them and leave them lying around ‘undone’. Doesn’t sound too dissimilar to today, I’d say. Although I do admit, it was rather difficult to fold back up. I’m not good with maps either.

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The Children’s Collection also currently holds a wide collection of Lewis Carroll’s Alice books, some of which are on display in the Cowen Gallery. Juliet says: “The Alice books marked a shift away from didacticism to imaginative irreverence in children’s fiction, and continue to inspire literal, radical and subversive interpretation.”

There’s no doubt about that, and looking at these books was an absolute treat. I always feel a connection with Lewis Carol. The poor guy suffered terrible from terrible migraine headaches (I do too) and prior to a migraine, he would get an ‘aura migraine’ (visual eye disturbances) for two to three days before the actual painful headache started. Apparently, during one of his aura migraines, he wrote ‘Alice in Wonderland.’ So, there’s an opportunity I’m obviously not making the most of!

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The Children’s Collection at the State Library shows the expansion over time from the didactic beginnings of children’s literature to works for children’s entertainment such as novels, illustrated fiction, picture books, graphic novels, poetry and traditional stories.

The collection grows by approximately 2500 books – antiquarian and contemporary – each year and it’s a place well worth the visit.

Thank you Juliet – what a wonderful way to spend the morning.

And thank you to Trevor McAllister, our very knowledgeable guide.

This is Juliet’s book which I’m going to buy this weekend.

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Juliet O’Conor

$59.95
The Miegunyah Press in association with the State Library of Victoria
Hardback 272pp Illustrated ISBN 9780522856514

Day 6 School Workshop with Elizabeth Honey at Prahran Library

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Elizabeth is a natural public speaker and her rapport with the Year 5 & 6’s of Stonnington Primary was engaging and warm. Conversational and funny, Elizabeth managed to get the children to open right up about what they like about story telling and writing.

Elizabeth talked about her experiences growing up and becoming a writer and what it takes to write a book. She used the analogy of ‘witchcraft’. For a witch to know how to make spells, she needs to understand the ingredients. She needs to learn her craft. And writing is the same; a writer must learn their craft before they can write well.

A collector of words, Elizabeth asked the children what sort of words they like to say, how it feels when they say it.

Partiality, pop, books (‘oo’ words were popular), arresting and quarrel were some of the words the children liked. Growing up, Elizabeth particularly liked the word ‘supreme’. Everything was ‘supreme’, supremely good or supremely bad. I have to admit I’m a big fan of the word ‘vivid’ (it must be the two ‘v’s).

We then launched into some of writing of our own. We were going to write some short poetry called ‘Haiku’. Elizabeth explained this style of poetry is made up of three lines. The first line consists of words with five syllables, the second line has seven syllables and the third line has five syllables.

Elizabeth showed us an image of a palm. It was facing upwards, holding some grains of rice. We were to write out Haiku about this image.

After much brainstorming and concentrating, the children had a chance to read out their poetry. It was fascinating what they wrote. It varied from “Dude, these are my drugs” to more poetic pieces about and hope and humanity.

This is mine…

The offer of seed

An open palm promise

Hope and hunger freed.

Yeah, I know, don’t give up your day job.

Then Elizabeth put up an image of an old man wearing a peaked gap. (He looked rather grumpy).

The children had to name him and make up a sentence he would say. He did look like an old sea dog, so the children came up with some terrific seafaring themed names and sentences like…

“Life on the seven seas is the only life for me…”

“Back in my day…”

“I’m not getting up and giving my seat to you…”

Elizabeth was wonderful with the children and I think they had a terrific time. They thanked her beautifully and I was very impressed with the children from Stonnington Primary School.

Elizabeth showed us how to deal with children with confidence and encouragement and I loved the way she taught them how to write simple but beautiful poetry.

About Elizabeth Honey…

Elizabeth Honey is a writer and illustrator of poetry, picture books and novels for children. Her work is always full of fun, with action packed stories, lively characters and zany illustrations. She is probably best known for her novel ‘45 & 47 Stella Street and everything that happened’ which was a CBCA Honour Book, and since then has written a number of highly entertaining novels, such as ‘Don’t Pat the Wombat’, ‘Fiddle-back’, ‘Remote Man’, ‘What do you think, Feezal?’,‘Cauldron Bay’ and ‘To the Boy in Berlin’. She has also written and illustrated a number of picture books, including ‘The Cherry Dress’ and ‘Not a Nibble’ which was the CBCA Picture Book of the Year.

“My books grow from an idea I find intriguing. I know it’s a good idea when it follows me around like a stray dog that won’t go home.”– Elizabeth Honey



You can read more about Elizabeth and her books at…

http://www.allenandunwin.com/default.aspx?page=311&author=98

Here are some of Elizabeth’s books…that can be bought in any good bookstore…

You can book her from an Author Visit to your school on…

http://bookedout.com.au/find-a-speaker/author/elizabeth-honey/

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