I’m still gathering my thoughts from the wonderful experience that was the IBBY Congress in London Thursday to Sunday 23-26 August.  Four days of inspirational speakers and meeting kindred spirits from all over the world.  I’ve now added a selection of photographs to our Flickr – you can see them here.  I haven’t quite finished tagging and describing yet, but I’m getting there… and here is a smaller selection for you to enjoy on the blog – again, I’ve numbered them so that I can come back and label them!

A London children’s theatre company Theatre Peckham helped the Opening Ceremony go with a swing with their delightful performance of an extract from the theatre adaptation of Kate DiCamillo’s The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.  Then fuelled with a piece of Wally’s delicious 25th birthday cake (but where was he?  Answer: everywhere, in the guise of the very game Imperial College staff!), we headed back to the auditorium for our first plenary session – and what a line up!  Three UK Children’s Laureates – the current reigning Julia Donaldson and two of her predeceesors, Michael Morpurgo and Anthony Browne.

Each spoke about what particular passions they had brought to their role as laureate: Michael  described how he and poet Ted Hughes had first come up with the idea, and how Hughes had been instrumental in making it all happen; Anthony played the ‘shape game’ and showed how it appears everywhere in his work and outside it; and Julia talked of the three areas close to her heart: enhancing children’s experience of reading through drama; keeping libraries open (a big issue in the UK); and promoting stories for and about deaf children.

Julia and her husband Malcolm, on guitar, then showcased some examples of what theatre can do to enhance literacy, from the chorus of a very fast Italian pasta song written while on holiday in Siena, Italy, to a virtuoso performance of The Gruffalo in French, German and (its most recent language) Scots.  In between, we were treated to the song that inspired Julia’s book A Squash and a Squeeze with audience participation… and I say treated, well, it was a real treat for me as I got to be the hen!  Thanks to Australian author Susanne Gervay (yes, that was one of my top thrills of IBBY, meeting Susanne in person…), you will shortly be able to see it on Flickr too – don’t laugh too much!!

Well, that was just the first few hours of the Congress – I will certainly be writing more about it over the coming weeks.  In the meantime, hello to all those PaperTigers friends I got to meet for the first time in real life – Shirin Adl, Candy Gourlay, Dashdondog Jamba; and to old friends and new.  I’ll now be dreaming of IBBY Mexico 2014…  In the meantime, head on over to Flickr and enjoy my photos – and much better ones on the official IBBY Congress 2012′s photostream.

The inaugural Pop Up Festival of Stories took place on July 9th and 10th and has been declared “an astonishing success”! Visitor numbers exceeded expectations as over six thousand children, with their families and friends, flocked to London, UK,  to revel in the fun of the first ever Pop Up Festival of Stories – a free two-day festival for kids, celebrating the fun of reading. The festival was the finale to the Pop Up Schools Programme which gave almost 3,000 children aged three to 14 from 8 schools the chance to explore books and meet authors and illustrators at exciting host venues in the London area.

Dylan Calder, Pop Up’s Director, said: “Pop Up exceeded all our expectations. We set out to create a free literature event that was both accessible and extraordinary, that children from all kinds of backgrounds could enjoy and be part of…We’re already starting to plan for 2012 and beyond…and we’ll soon be announcing an extension of our programme.”

Author Philip Ardagh on the ceiling in his House of Illusions

Sara Montgomery, Acting Head of Guardian Books which ran a hugely successful pop-up children’s bookshop at the festival, said: “The Guardian is delighted to have been associated with the Pop Up Festival of Stories. It featured a great line-up of authors, which resulted in queues around the corner for signings at the Guardian Bookshop on several occasions. The Guardian Book Doctor, featuring the Guardian’s children’s books editor Julia Eccleshare, was a hit, with no shortage of ‘patients’ requesting their book recommendation diagnoses over the two hours she was in session. Sales were robust, and being part of the festival was valuable exposure for the Guardian Bookshop and the recently-launched children’s books website.”

Former UK Children’s Laureate Michael Rosen described the festival as “A fantastic time for fun, creativity and pure pleasure for children and adults alike.”

Former Children's Laureate Michael Rosen and author/illustrator Hervé Tullet

Nicky Potter was kind enough to send us these lovely photos from the event taken by Danny B. To see more photos check the Pop Up Festival website and the Pop Up Festival Facebook page. Enjoy!

Award-winning Irish author and publisher Siobhán Parkinson has been named Laureate na nÓg, Ireland’s first laureate for children’s literature. The Children’s laureate is an initiative of The Arts Council with the support of the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Children’s Books Ireland and Poetry Ireland. Siobhán will hold the position for two years.

Siobhán is the author of more than 20 books for children and teenagers, including Sisters… no way!, a truly double-sided tale of reluctant stepsisters, which won the Bisto Book of the Year, the leading annual children’s book award in Ireland. She recently set up a new children’s imprint Little Island, which will be translating a range of foreign books for older children and teenagers, so we will be watching them eagerly; and she has also just completed six years as the M.I.E. Poetry Ireland writer-in-residence at the Marino Institute of Education in Dublin.

As Laureate na nÓg, Siobhán will work to “engage young people with high quality children’s literature and to underline the importance of children’s literature in our cultural and imaginative life.” She will deliver her keynote address at the Children’s Books Ireland (CBI) Conference at The National Gallery of Ireland this weekend. There, she will be joined by other Irish and international speakers to address the theme of Nurturing the Seed: Prospects and Possibilities for Children’s Books.

Check out this video of Siobhán talking about her books, her writing and her plans for her term as Laureate:

Press Release:
New Children’s Laureate announced!

Anthony Browne was announced as the sixth Children’s Laureate at a ceremony at Centre Point, London, on 9 June 2009

Andrew Motion, chair of the selection panel, awarded Anthony Browne with his medal in front of 180 guests at Paramount, Centre Point.

Andrew Motion said:

‘Anthony Browne is an absolutely distinctive and extraordinarily skilful artist – someone whose work entrances children, and has influenced an entire generation of illustrators. His pictures and stories give deep and immediate pleasures, while also insisting that we – children and adults – return to them – and when we return, we have a gradually-expanding sense of discovery. It is a great pleasure to be able to recognise the achievement of Anthony’s work by celebrating his appointment as Children’s Laureate.’

Anthony Browne responded:

‘I hope to encourage more children to discover and love reading, but I want to focus particularly on the appreciation of picture books, and the reading of both pictures and words. Picture books are for everybody at any age, not books to be left behind as we grow older. The best ones leave a tantalising gap between the pictures and the words, a gap that is filled by the reader’s imagination, adding so much to the excitement of reading a book.’

To watch a video of Anthony Browne at the announcement click here.