Iconic images from children’s books shape the way we see stories and characters. From Winnie the Pooh drawn by EH Shepard, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by John Tenniel, The Very Hungry Caterpillar created by Eric Carle, right through to the horned and big clawed Gruffalo created for Julia Donaldson by Axel Scheffler, each has a place in childhood memories. Image above: Conor Busuttil’s dragon illustration
Every year young fans come to Bath Children’s Literature Festival to see their favourite authors and illustrators in action. Without the pen and imagination of artist Cressida Cowell, those incredible creatures of How to Train Your Dragon would never have taken flight. But the one-time Children’s Laureate admits that when she was a child her pages were full of splodges and wobbly writing.
When Cressida was a school girl she was known as Messy Cressy for the state of her school notebooks. She says: “Then one day my Year 3 teacher gave me a notebook and said it was for her ideas, which mattered, not the spelling and the untidy writing. And now I think every kid should be given a notebook to draw and write in, one that’s not marked, but allows them to tell stories and draw pictures.”
Rob Biddulph is a successful illustrator and author, crowned Illustrator of the Year at the British Book Awards. His bestsellers include Blown Away, Odd Dog Out and I Follow the Fox. His new book is When I Grow Up I’d Like To Be and when he performs at his shows for the festival he always includes a draw-along section for the audience to take part.
During lockdown Rob launched his live #DrawWithRob online art classes, which proved a huge hit with families. In 2020 he broke the Guinness World Record for the largest ever online art class, with 45,611 households taking part.
Meet the illustrators
There will be five illustrators in residence at Waterstones in Milsom Street during the festival.
Paddy Donnelly
Paddy Donnelly author of Badger’s Book, will be hosting storytime and fun activities on Saturday 27 September. Paddy was working as a digital designer, frustrated about the temporary nature of his work before he launched his career as a children’s book illustrator.
“I decided to try and get into picture books in order to make something ‘real.’ I started off by illustrating for other authors, and a year or two later I began to write a few of my own stories. I’ve published 27 books so far, and I absolutely love it! If I could travel back in time and tell little six-year-old Paddy that he now gets to draw dinosaurs for a living, it would blow his mind.
“I’m working on a variety of super-secret picture books, that I can’t tell you about. However, I can tell you that 2026 is going to be a very busy year when it comes to publication days, so stay tuned!”
Angie Morgan
Angie Morgan, author of laugh out loud picture books, is busy preparing to entertain her young audience in Waterstones on Sunday 28 September.
“I will be showing children how to draw different expressions on faces (very easy and so important) and will also be reading aloud from my two newest books – I Really REALLY Don’t like Parties and It’s Really REALLY Not Fair. I will have black and white versions of some of the spreads from the books for the children to colour in and take home. I will also have some figures from the stories to colour in for the children to cut out and stick onto sticks so they can help the readings go with some audience participation!”
Conor Busuttil
Illustrator Conor Busuttil has asked his fans what they’d like to learn to draw during his stint at Waterstones on Saturday 4 October.
“As voted for on my socials, we will be learning to draw . . . dragons. They are one of my favourite things to draw and something I am sure any little creatives that come along will be able to draw too by the end. Hopefully you can create something extra special to take home.”
Conor wanted to be an artist from a very young age, filling his school notebooks with drawings, he said: “My advice to any budding artists or illustrators is to keep a sketchbook – I would look at things growing up and just love the shape or way something simply was – which without drawing, would simply niggle at my head until I got it down on paper. It was by drawing those random bits and bobs I would practice.”
Look out for Conor’s artwork depicting the festival’s mascot dog, Gatsby on shop windows around Bath leading up to and during the festival.
Petr Horáček
Czech born artist Petr Horáček will be entertaining children with drawing activities and storytelling during his afternoon at Waterstones on Sunday 5 October. He moved to the UK in 1994 after being involved in the Velvet Revolution which overthrew the communist government.
Petr has published several picture books for children, including Blue Monster and in 2001 won the Books for Children best newcomer award.
He said: “This month I have two books being published. The first one is Green Hippo and it’s about how it is to be different, how to be accepted by others and mainly how to accept the way you are yourself. It’s probably the most colourful book I have done so far. The second book is called The Long Walk. It was first published several years ago by some friends in the Czech Republic. The book is about a garden gnome and his life story. Working on the book was great fun and I’m really excited that it’s now going to be published here in England.
Huw Aaron
Huw Aaron’s new book, The Unfairies, is the first graphic novel to be awarded Waterstones Children’s Book of the Month. He’ll be talking about his eccentric little characters in fairyland and inspiring young people to create their own graphic novels at an event at the festival on Saturday 27 September.
How did Huw get into the world of illustrating? “I’ve always loved drawing cartoons and making up silly stories. But I never really thought it was something you could do as a proper job. I tried out various other careers, and was generally pretty rubbish at them, but still doodled and drew compulsively. My wife suggested I try selling some of my cartoons, and, to my surprise, people liked them.
“I started with magazine joke cartoons, and eventually realised: if you string enough silly cartoons together, you’ve got yourself a book. Once I jumped into making kids’ books, I knew I’d found the place I was supposed to fit.”
Find more of your favourite children’s characters
To celebrate the tenth anniversary of the publication of much-loved picture book, The Lion Inside, a special puppet show will re-tell the story of the little mouse and the lion.
And there will be live appearances of two other instantly recognisable characters, The Gruffalo and Bluey at other events during the festival.
Tickets from bathfestivals.org.uk/childrens-literature/whats-on/
