The 5 Childhood Stories Still Influencing My Work Today
Plus a FREE colouring print to download, share and enjoy
February seems like such a depressing month. But if you look a little closer, the signs are all there that we are on the cusp of something special. The rebirth of spring, season of blossom, queen bumblebees and bulb flowers shooting, shard-like, out of the soil. To help you spot the signs of new growth against the grey, I hope you enjoy this free illustrated colouring print, available to download, print and share below. I’ll be posting a new one for all subscribers every month!
In January, I finally sent off two of my children’s picture book ideas to literary agents with the hope of finding representation in 2025. While I wait to (hopefully) hear back, I thought I’d share five of the stories from my own childhood that have stayed with me for the last thirty years or so, and influenced the way I write, draw and create visual stories. Some of these are television series as well as books, because as I’m sure we can all agree, nineties kids’ TV was pretty much an art form of its own.
The Animals of Farthing Wood
(TV series and book by Colin Dann)
This TV series left a particularly permanent mark on me. I was outraged at the injustice of Farthing Wood’s destruction, but I also loved the ecological relationships between the animals and the fact that it didn’t shy away from the brutality of life and death. The illustration style of the series, with its crisp outlines against natural, painterly backdrops, has definitely influenced my own style.
Where’s Wally?
(TV series and books by Martin Handford)
My favourite Wimmelbilderbuch (German for ‘teeming picture book’) of all time, we also had the TV show of Where’s Wally? on VHS, and it was my go-to video to watch if I was ever off sick from school. I remember curling up on the sofa with my duvet and our golden retriever Murphy, awash with the contentment of watching something so familiar and cosy.
Puzzle Island
(Book by Paul Adshead)
This book was a classroom favourite at primary school. It is the most beautiful, absorbing and clever puzzle book that tells an overarching story full of visual and linguistic clues. There are four animals hidden in every picture, riddles in the text, and even a final puzzle to solve on the front cover. The illustrations are also lovely and, like Where’s Wally?, full of busy little details.
Noah’s Island
(TV series by Elphin Lloyd-Jones)
If you were to ask me my favourite childhood TV show, this would be it. Noah’s Island was kind of like a weird ecological spin-off of the Noah’s Ark story, in which a group of animals find sanctuary on a floating island, and learn to live together in harmony for the survival of all. Basically a utopian society full of compassion and pragmatism, complete with a polar bear, defrosted mammoths, and a Russian desman called Sacha. Oisky poisky!
Watership Down
(Film and book by Richard Adams)
The first book to ever make me cry, and the most notoriously savage ‘kid-friendly’ film from 1978 that traumatised entire generations with its graphic depictions of rabbits being maimed and killed. But again, there was so much power in the fact that this story didn’t shy away from the realities of the natural world, including the peace that accompanies death. In the film, I particularly love the minimal, folkloric design of the Black Rabbit of Inlé.
If you enjoyed this post…
Fellow nineties kids, I’ve got my eye on this book by Chuck Klosterman
They don’t make witch movies like they did in the ’90s (Cosmopolitan)
Dive into The 90s Museum UK on Insta
