EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
As one of the UK’s most famous Children’s authors, Julia Donaldson is used to being peppered with questions by her young fans. But, she tells HELLO! in an exclusive interview, some of the topics can be very unexpected.
“What I really like about doing events for children is they sometimes ask such quirky questions,” she says. “They’d often say things like: ‘Where do you get your ideas?’ or: ‘How did you get to be famous?’ But recently, they have been saying: ‘Why have you got those funny shoes on?’ and someone once said to me: ‘How much longer is this going to go on for because we usually watch videos?’”
Of course, there are also compliments for her rhyming tales, of which there are more than 200, including The Gruffalo and Room on the Broom,, both of which have been adapted for TV.
“One of the nicest things is when a parent says their child knows one of my stories off by heart and can recite it all. I was that child who used to learn poems and I know how enjoyable that is.”
A former Children’s Laureate, Julia wants to spread that joy to more youngsters. She has become patron of the Stratford Literary Festival’s charitable outreach work, campaigning to improve school libraries and encouraging imprisoned parents to write bedtime stories for their children.
This week, she is helping raise funds for the festival’s Build a Library campaign, to benefit five schools nearby in Warwickshire, with every donation matched by the Big Give charity. “Big Give can double the impact,” she says. “It’s great that they’re raising money for such a good cause. What’s even better is
that it’s going to duplicate the amount raised, so there’ll be double the amount of great books for children to read.
“A lot of school libraries are quite depleted and it’s important for the books to look nice and appeal to children. A significant number of primary schools don’t have a library and, even more significantly, lots don’t have someone to run them.
“Unfortunately, there are a lot of homes where there aren’t any books, but pretty much all children go to school, so if there’s a library there and someone’s encouraging them to attempt reading, that seems to me the best way of catching children who previously haven’t had the opportunity.”
Book clubs are also something Julia is keen on. Stratford’s outreach programme has created a book club aimed at older readers.
“I’m in a book group,” she says. “It’s lovely to read the book and talk about it, but it’s definitely a social thing as well. It’s a good tool to help with isolation.”
Reading, she feels, should be done for pleasure,
