In the Beginning there were Folk Tales (by Malachy Doyle)

My very first picture book was The Great Castle of Marshmangle. I wrote it 19 years ago, and life was never the same again.

 

I'd been writing for two or three years by then, but in October 1996 I went on a week-long Writing for Children course at the Ty Newydd residential writing centre in Wales. The tutors were Kevin Crossley-Holland and Valerie Bloom, and not only were they brilliant, but they were immensely encouraging of me and my writing. I've since taught courses at Ty Newydd with both Kevin and Valerie, and it's always a delight to be giving back to new writers, a thrill to be back at such a wonderful place, and a particular delight to see them both again.  

Kevin talked a lot about retelling folk tale, and about the responsibilities of approaching traditional material.
'Yes,' he said, 'many folk tales are dark, but naming the terrors helps children understand them - it's damaging to pretend there are no terrors.'
Yes, he said, they may be about people a world and an age away from us, but 'the deeper we look the more we're willing to grant humanity to those who are unlike us - to see that they are who we are - to realise that there's so little difference between us all that it's not worth mentioning.'
'Folk tale is healing and reconciliatory' he said. 'It looks for common ground between all of us who are human. The stories decode a hidden world but also celebrate a shared identity.' 
(And yes, I was taking notes, and yes, I have them still. I was a most determined apprentice!)

He asked us to find a folk tale, to take a folk-motif, and make it our own. He told us that his book Storm, one of my all-time favourites, came from an eight line section in a Scottish folk tale of a girl who goes on a night journey. I found a story called The Ghosts and the Game of Football in a Patrick Kennedy collection and turned it into one called Famous Seamus that went down a treat on the Friday night read-around. It eventually found its form as The Football Ghosts, published nine years later by Egmont in their Banana Books strand - particularly pleasing as Kevin's Storm, a Carnegie medal winner, was also a Banana Book.

 

And I've been doing it ever since - playing with folk tale. Probably somewhere approaching half of my books, including many of my picture books, either retell folk tales or more often use lines, ideas, motifs from folk tales as a starting point. If they've survived for hundreds, for thousands of years, changing with every telling, then there's obviously some core of truth and relevance and entertainment that will survive one more retelling, one more adaptation.

I got back from Ty Newydd in October 96, all fired up and searching for folk-tale inspiration. I was reading Ciaran Carson's superb book on Irish traditional music, Last Night's Fun, and was very taken with a story he quoted from the musician and story-collector Seamus Ennis. (It also appears in Joseph Jacobs' English Fairy Tales as Master of all Masters). So I wrote a picture book, and then, just to be sure, rang Ciaran Carson to check he didn't mind (and to clear with him that there weren't likely to be any copyright problems). Faber and Andersen made immediate offers, I went with Andersen, and it became my first book with the legendary Klaus Flugge (and the very lovely editor, Janice Thompson).

I had great fun, aided by my then teenage daughter Hannah (who's recently illustrated my Pete and the Five-a-Side Vampires), coming up with all the wordplay: Smoulderglow for fire, Soggadrop for water, Sandcastle Stompers for wellington boots, Brainbox Banana for a top hat... A teacher once told me her class had found the book invaluable when they were studying kennings - and was shocked when I told the class I hadn't a clue what one was. Oh, and I just loved the illustrations for the book by the masterly Paul Hess

It got loads of foreign editions and I was up and running: thanks to Kevin and Valerie, to Ty Newydd, to the wonderful and never-ending resource that is traditional story.

The Letterbox Club by Malachy Doyle

I was delighted, some time back, to be asked to be a patron of The Letterbox Club.

One of the best things about being a writer for children is the way that, every now and again, you get direct evidence that the work you're doing is making a real difference. 

The Letterbox Club is a scheme, initiated by Booktrust (in the UK), where children who are placed with foster carers are sent, once a month, packs of books and number games. Many of these children have moved from one placement to another and rarely if ever get mail in the post addressed directly to them. Many have few, if any, books. Many are well below average in attainment levels.

So the big bright Letterbox packs, dropping through their postbox, addressed specifically to over 10000 children across the UK, with books and games chosen to match their current level, are truly exciting. Research has been done to prove beyond a doubt that these packs make a real difference to their reading and numeracy.

The two original Letterbox Club patrons are Dame Jacqueline Wilson and Lemn Sissay. I was asked, when the scheme spread to Northern Ireland, to be a regional patron. I write a letter to each child by name. Some of my books are included in the packs. And I go, every now and again, to a 'Fun Day' to meet the children.

Last Saturday we all met up in the Ulster Museum in Belfast. I read them my new picture book, The Nose that Knows - they seemed pleased to be the first children to see and hear it. I read Too Noisy, and they all joined in (especially a particularly enthusiastic young girl at the front!). I read them a chapter from Pete and the Five-a-Side Vampires and one little boy acted out, to much amusement, the role of Pete's pet dog Blob as he turned into a Werewolf. Everyone, even the adults, joined in the howling. Then we all went off and made models of wolves out of Jumping Clay.

As I was reading one very small boy edged closer and close to me until he was almost sitting in my lap. Afterwards his foster mother told me that, only a few weeks ago, he was so wary of strangers and of coming forward that such behaviour would have been unthinkable.



Dr.Rose Griffiths, founder of the Letterbox Club





The Letterbox Club in Northern Ireland is funded by Fostering Network as part of its Fostering Achievement programme, in partnership with the Northern Ireland Government.  At a time of savage cuts - the NI government support for the Bookstart programme has recently been completely withdrawn - Letterbox Club funding has been guaranteed up to 2016. I very much hope that it will continue beyond that, and that The Letterbox Club, across the UK and possibly beyond, will survive and grow. 

        

What's it all about, Alfie? by Malachy Doyle

I was sent a list of questions the other day. They came from a publicist who wanted information in advance of my next picture book. 

Most of them were easy enough:

Did you ever imagine you’d reach a hundred books? (it’s going to be my 100^th book - whoopydoo!)

What inspired you to write it?

What sort of relationship did you have with your grandparents?  (it’s about grandparents, sort of)`

How many bobble hats do you have? (read the book and you’ll understand)

But one question stopped me in my tracks:

What keeps you motivated in what is predominantly a solitary occupation?

Hmmm.  Interesting.  Here’s what I wrote back (with additional thoughts, for your eyes only, added here, in italics):

I love being a writer.  It’s far-and-away my favourite occupation. (beats packing Polo Mints on the night shift, anyway.  And ‘working’ in the British Rail laundry, reading Emile Zola behind an enormous pile of sheets.  Oh, and ‘teaching’ a bunch of unruly sixteen year old girls in inner-city Leeds, in the year they’d just raised the school leaving age. They did NOT want to be there!)

I love living in a world of imagination.

I love having total freedom as to when and what to write.

 Writing’s hard, but I love the buzz you get when you know you’ve cracked it. (even if, the next day, you realise you maybe haven’t)

I love that young children are so open to joy, to excitement, to wonder.  I love living in the mind of the four, five, six-year-old Malachy, of seeing the world through his eyes and trying to capture some of that joy, wonder, excitement (and silliness) on the page.

 

I love making books, and working with illustrators and good editors. (not that there are any bad editors, of course, but we all have our moments!)

I love the first time I get my hands on the finished product.  (like last week – Pete and the Five-a-Side Vampires, illustrated by my very own daughter, Hannah. Whoopy-doopy-doo!) 

 I love reading my books to children (especially little Daniel, above), and watching them read the books  themselves.

Books have brought so much joy to my life – it’s a privilege and a continuing wonder to be a part of bringing some of that joy to the next generation.

So that’s what it's all about, to me.  That's what keeps me motivated.  Anything you’d add, anyone?

My latest picture book is called Peek-a-Book, illustrated by Rowan Martin (Parragon, August)

My storybook, Pete and the Five-a-side Vampires, illustrated by my daughter, Hannah Doyle - it's her very first book - is published by Firefly Press (September)

And my next picture book, Tadcu's Bobble Hat, my 100th book, illustrated by Dorry Spikes, is published by Gomer Press in October.