I found something interesting on the Not Safe For Children blog which I wanted to expand upon here. It’s about a cool project called The Monster Engine which has now been made into a book. Basically it poses the question – What would a kid’s drawing be like if it were made into a real illustration? The illustrator in this case, Dave Devries, gives lectures and demonstrations to kids and adults alike and uses the children’s own submissions of monsters, superheroes and the like and then “tarts them up” into realistic illustrations.

The results are pretty damn cool I’d have to say! Dave’s background is in comic book illustration so the pictures tend to have a “graphic novel” look to them. There’s also an interview with each kid who submitted a picture which was used in the book. I hear the interviews themselves are pretty interesting. I think I’m gonna have to order a book for myself to have a closer look.

The whole experience of going to the site reminded me of my own childhood and the first “book” I wrote and illustrated way back in grade four. The book was unimaginatively called “The Australian Bush Friends” and it was about a group of animals trying to get together for a dinner party or something? I remember that after I’d finished the book Mister Gray, my teacher at the time, took the story home and read it to his own kids while he was marking the grades. I also remember being awarded some sort of presentation at the time for doing such a good job on it. I was about 9 or 10 years old so the details are a little sketchy now? The main benefit from all of it though was that it continued to nurture my love for books and writing. which I’m very appreciative of. I can safely say that most of my teachers at school were good in this regard.

Later on, when my first real children’s book was published I remembered my old teachers and the primary (grade) school I went to. I bought a veritable truckload of books from my publisher – something like 50-100 books – so that I could give them out to family, friends and the people who had helped me out at various stages of making the book. I also made sure that my old school library and the two public libraries in the immediate area received a few books each. I saw that as giving back to them what they had given me and, library budgets being what they are, it just made sense.

I also made sure to track down some of my old teachers so that I could give them a copy as well. I managed to find two of my teachers who meant a lot to me, Mister Burton and Mister Fluke – but, sadly, Mister Gray had either died or moved away (I can’t remember exactly what Mister Burton had told me about it now?) It was good to catch up with old friends again – albeit a little weird now that I was an adult.

I’m glad that I’ve always had people around me who helped nurture my love for books and writing. Many people don’t have that at all and I think it’s a bit of a loss for them. I used to draw a lot when I was a kid but then school started to get “serious” and the need to draw was somewhat lessoned until, eventually, I stopped drawing altogether. Fortunately though I always continued to write, not knowing – or even caring for that matter – whether or not I was any good at it. It made absolutely no difference to me. I enjoyed it and I was expressing myself in a different form from my physical state (ie. not talking for a change!) Songs, stories, shopping lists – it didn’t matter. At least I was writing and I was having fun.

It’s always sad when a passion for something finally disappears though. I try to keep in mind that things can always change and that change is good. If you really want to do something then you’ll find a way to do it. Maybe not now or next week, but eventually. I know I said “finally disappears” but, then again, nothing is really final, is it?

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 12th, 2005 at 11:20 pm and is filed under Blogs, Children's Books. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.