I knew We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, first of all, as a song. And it was sort of like a folk song. Also I believe it was sung around campfires here in America, too, which I didn’t know. And Michael Rosen who is the author or the person who has re-written it, also knew it as a song, and he very brightly thought I’m going to put this down on paper.
And he asked me to do the illustrations for it and what I loved about it was that it didn’t specify who was going on a bear hunt, and I think the author actually, Michael Rosen, thought he wanted a line of kings and queens and people.
And I thought no, bring it right down to the
so the children feel that they could possibly do it. And my idea, first of all, was just have an older brother, two sort of younger ones, and the baby, and a dog. But, in fact, I think most people think that the older brother is the father which it doesn’t matter, it could easily be.
And also it gave me an opportunity to do landscapes which I love. I had this idea of doing a black and white page when they’re thinking and when they’re saying, you know, about where they’re going and what they’re going to do. And then when they’ve decided, it burst into color.
And then they have this pause when they get to a forest and they’re thinking. I did the black and white. And then, again, when they move it’s in color. So I think that was quite
it was quite good to change the mood of the illustrations throughout the book.
I think, I try not to religiously echo the text, but try and give something a little more, or, you know, giving obviously the feeling of the text, but maybe having, for instance, a dog who is reacting to everything that’s going on. So then you see him, the dog appearing again, and again, and again. So he develops, but he doesn’t interfere with the actual story.
I mean, one mustn’t go off on a limb and sort of
you know
have a sort of terrible ego trip, but you have to keep to the text, but of course, if it is an amusing text, you can make it even more amusing which I love to do. I love to do. In fact, most texts that I have chosen to illustrate are mostly with humor.
I think Farmer Duck is a sort of Animal Farm, the famous George Orwell book for babies. And I thought at the beginning that it was going to be very, very difficult to get any expression into a duck’s face. I mean, they’ve got a hard beak and little beady eyes, and I don’t seem to have much expression.
So that was quite a challenge to try and get the poor old duck to have
to show his certainly emotions. And, of course, there were all the other farm animals, too, but they were easier than ducks, I have to say. But I did enjoy the communication between the animals.
And then, of course, on top of that is the lazy old farmer who is exploiting all these animals who I just made as horrible as I could.
