Polly Dunbar | |
---|---|
Born | 1977 (age 45–46) Cotswolds, England |
Occupation | Illustrator, writer |
Genre | Children's picture books |
Website | |
pollydunbar |
Polly Dunbar (born 1977) is an English author-illustrator. [1]
She is best known for her self-illustrated books Penguin , the Tilly and Friends series (which became a BBC children's television series) and Hello, Mum – an illustrated memoir of motherhood and her first book for adults. [2] [3]
She has also illustrated other authors' books: Bubble Trouble by Margaret Mahy, My Dad's a Birdman by David Almond, Can Bears Ski? by poet Raymond Antrobus, Owl or Pussycat? by Michael Morpurgo, and While We Can't Hug by Eoin Mclaughlin. [4] [5]
Hello, Mum is Polly's first book for grown-ups, a visual diary about early motherhood.
She is the daughter of children's book writer Joyce Dunbar, whose picture book Shoe Baby she illustrated.
Dunbar was born in the Cotswolds and moved to Stratford upon Avon at eight months old. [6] She went to school there until she was eleven and moved to Norwich with her family. There she attended City of Norwich School and Norwich School of Art and Design, now known as Norwich University College of the Arts. She started writing and illustrating at age 16, when she published two books – which she describes as "cartoon books inspired by teenage antics". [6] She went to Brighton University and graduated in 1999 with a degree in illustration. [7]
She lives in Waveny Valley, Suffolk with her partner and their two sons. [8]
Polly Dunbar's Dog Blue and Flyaway Katie, both as author-illustrator, were published in 2004. [9] The following year she illustrated Shoe Baby, written by her mother, author Joyce Dunbar. [9]
Her 2007 book Penguin is her most critically acclaimed book to date, winning the Booktrust Early Years Awards in the pre-school category [10] and the silver award in the Nestle Children's Book Prize for children under five years old. [11]
She is also the illustrator for Here's A Little Poem which was on the IBBY honour's book list for 2008, and Bubble Trouble by Margaret Mahy, which won a Boston Globe–Horn Book Award in 2009. [12] [13]
Dunbar was named "Most Promising New Illustrator" in Publishers Weekly''s Cuffie Awards in 2004. [14] In 2008, she was featured in The Times 's list of "The best new picture book illustrators". [15] In 2008 Booktrust named her one of the Ten Best Illustrators, and in 2011 she became their fourth writer in residence. [16]
In 2020, Dunbar illustrated Can Bears Ski? by award-winning poet Raymond Antrobus, Owl or Pussycat? by Michael Morpurgo, and While We Can't Hug by Eoin Mclaughlin. [17] [18]
In 2021 her first adult book, Hello, Mum, was published by Faber and Faber.
Her Tilly and Friends books became a BBC animated television series, which aired on CBeebies in 2012. [19]
She co-founded Long Nose Puppets in 2006. Since then, the company has performed puppet adaptations of her books Penguin , Flyaway Katie, Shoe Baby, Arthur's Dream Boat, and soon While We Can't Hug. [20] Their production of Shoe Baby won Best Children’s Show at Brighton Fringe Festival. [21]
Sticker Activity Books:
The Carnegie Medal is a British literary award that annually recognises one outstanding new English-language book for children or young adults. It is conferred upon the author by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP). CILIP calls it "the UK's oldest and most prestigious book award for children's writing".
Margaret Mahy was a New Zealand author of children's and young adult books. Many of her story plots have strong supernatural elements but her writing concentrates on the themes of human relationships and growing up. She wrote more than 100 picture books, 40 novels and 20 collections of short stories. At her death she was one of thirty writers to win the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Medal for her "lasting contribution to children's literature".
The Guardian Children's Fiction Prize or Guardian Award was a literary award that annual recognised one fiction book written for children or young adults and published in the United Kingdom. It was conferred upon the author of the book by The Guardian newspaper, which established it in 1965 and inaugurated it in 1967. It was a lifetime award in that previous winners were not eligible. At least from 2000 the prize was £1,500. The prize was apparently discontinued after 2016, though no formal announcement appears to have been made.
The Nestlé Children's Book Prize, and Nestlé Smarties Book Prize for a time, was a set of annual awards for British children's books that ran from 1985 to 2007. It was administered by BookTrust, an independent charity that promotes books and reading in the United Kingdom, and sponsored by Nestlé, the manufacturer of Smarties candy. It was one of the most respected and prestigious prizes for children's literature.
The Yoto Carnegie Medal for Illustration is a British literary award that annually recognises "distinguished illustration in a book for children". It is conferred upon the illustrator by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) which inherited it from the Library Association.
David Almond is a British author who has written many novels for children and young adults from 1998, each one receiving critical acclaim.
Sir Michael Andrew Morpurgo is an English book author, poet, playwright, and librettist who is known best for children's novels such as War Horse (1982). His work is noted for its "magical storytelling", for recurring themes such as the triumph of an outsider or survival, for characters' relationships with nature, and for vivid settings such as the Cornish coast or World War I. Morpurgo became the third Children's Laureate, from 2003 to 2005, and he is also the current President of BookTrust, the UK's largest children's reading charity.
Winifred Shirley Hughes was an English author and illustrator. She wrote more than fifty books, which have sold more than 11.5 million copies, and illustrated more than two hundred. As of 2007, she lived in London.
Gyo Fujikawa was an American illustrator and children's book writer. A prolific creator of more than 50 books for children, her work is regularly in reprint and has been translated into 17 languages and published in 22 countries. Her most popular books, Babies and Baby Animals, have sold over 1.7 million copies in the U.S. Fujikawa is recognized for being the earliest mainstream illustrator of picture books to include children of many races in her work, before it became common to do so.
Pamela Kay Allen is a New Zealand children's writer and illustrator. She has published over 50 picture books since 1980. Sales of her books have exceeded five million copies.
Lara Kate Jones was a British artist, children's author and illustrator. She is best remembered for her Poppy Cat series of children's books, which have been published in 20 languages and sold over two and a half million copies.
The Booktrust Early Years Awards, originally the Sainsbury’s Baby Book Award(s), was a set of annual literary prizes for children's picture books. It was administered by Booktrust, an independent charity that promotes books and reading; from 1999 to 2004. The Booktrust Early Years Awards was sponsored by the supermarket chain Sainsbury's with its last award give in 2010.
The Federation of Children's Book Groups Children's Book Award is a set of annual literary prizes for children's books published in the U.K. during the preceding calendar year. It recognises one "Overall" winner and one book in each of three categories: Books for Younger Children, Books for Younger Readers, and Books for Older Readers. The selections are made entirely by children, which is unique among British literary awards. It was previously known as the Red House Children's Book Award.
Helen Gillian Oxenbury is an English illustrator and writer of children's picture books. She lives in North London. She has twice won the annual Kate Greenaway Medal, the British librarians' award for illustration and been runner-up four times. For the 50th anniversary of that Medal (1955–2005) her 1999 illustrated edition of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was named one of the top ten winning works.
Joyce Dunbar is an English writer. She primarily writes books for children, and has published over seventy books. Dunbar is perhaps best known for Tell Me Something Happy Before I Go To Sleep, This Is The Star, and the Mouse and Mole series. She is the mother of the children's writer-illustrator Polly Dunbar.
The New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults are a series of literary awards presented annually to recognise excellence in children and young adult's literature in New Zealand. The awards began in 1982 as the New Zealand Government Publishing Awards, and have had several title changes until the present one in 2015, including New Zealand Children's Book Awards. As of 2020 they are administered by the New Zealand Book Awards Trust and carry prize money of NZ$7,500.
Robyn Belton is an illustrator of children's books. Her work, often focusing on themes of war and peace, has won many prizes, including the New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards 1997 Picture Book Winner and Book of the Year, and the Russell Clark Award in 1985 and 2009. She herself has been recognised with the prestigious Storylines Margaret Mahy Award and the inaugural Ignition Children's Book Festival Award. She lives in Otago, New Zealand.
Eoin McLaughlin is a bestselling Irish children's writer. His books have been translated into over 25 languages and described by The Times as "an important historic record of the time".
June Crebbin is a British writer for children based in Leicestershire. After she took early retirement as a primary school teacher, she wrote and published over 40 books.
I think we better have a word with a certain green crocodile.