# Favourite book illustrator?



## ringo (May 6, 2012)

Just been reading one of my favourite books to my youngest, the illustrations are incredible. First published in 1969 it's perfectly of its time.

There's A Lion In The Meadow - Margaret Mahy, illustrations by Jenny Williams

What would you do if you knew there was a lion in the meadow, but your mother wouldn't believe you and gave you a matchbox with a dragon it to scare the away the lion...and in fact the dragon was there too?


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## killer b (May 6, 2012)

Wonderful illustrations. For some reason, some later editions have vastly inferior new pictures. Why would you do that?

I'll have sendak, fwiw.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

I couldn't begin to pick a favourite, so here are my top five.
Kathleen Hale







Shirley Hughes







Walter Crane






Quentin Blake






Anthony Browne


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## BoatieBird (May 6, 2012)

Sendak is wonderful, it's a shame when your kids outgrow these lovely picture books 
Jackie Morris is one of my favourites


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## BoatieBird (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> I couldn't begin to pick a favourite, so here are my top five.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 
Anthony Browne is quite wonderful. A friend has been studying children's literature and she had to write an essay on Anthony Browne.  We were going through one of his books together and his illustrations are just so rich and packed with meaning.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

BoatieBird said:


> Sendak is wonderful


Agreed, he's certainly in my top ten, just not my top five. My top five list is to do with books I loved as a child, and books my children loved, rather than on an intellectual level, iyswim


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

Although a new favourite is a photographer, Jerry Oke.


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## Cid (May 6, 2012)

Few of the standard greats...

EH shepard:






John Tenniel:






Poe inspired some fantastic stuff, lots to chose from (Beardsley, Kupka notably), but Harry Clarke's stand out for me:






And lastly, for the most brilliantly odd children's book ever, Captain Slaughterboard, Mervyn Peake:


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## alsoknownas (May 6, 2012)

Chris Riddell:


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## ATOMIC SUPLEX (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Shirley Hughes


 
I find Shirley Hughes' drawings utterly utterly repellant.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

ATOMIC SUPLEX said:


> I find Shirley Hughes' drawings utterly utterly repellant.


Why?


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Edward Gorey:


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Miroslav Sasek


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## albionism (May 6, 2012)

Shaun Tan


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## ATOMIC SUPLEX (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Why?


 
Because the pictures look vile and really ugly.
I dislike them enough to feel compelled to mention it on an internet forum.


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Tove Jansson


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## Sweet FA (May 6, 2012)

Julie Vivas


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

ATOMIC SUPLEX said:


> Because the pictures look vile and really ugly.
> I dislike them enough to feel compelled to mention it on an internet forum.


I think she's really good at the stance and look of children and at the normal chaotic mess of family homes.


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## Sweet FA (May 6, 2012)

OK, I'll state the bleedin obvious then; Axel Scheffler.


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Mary Blair


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## Stigmata (May 6, 2012)

Jan Pienkowski


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## Random (May 6, 2012)

Victor Ambrus


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## Random (May 6, 2012)

Sweet FA said:


> OK, I'll state the bleedin obvious then; Axel Scheffler.


By 2020 over tho-thirds of all books will be illustrated by Axel Scheffler


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Tomi Ungerer


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

Surprised no-one has mentioned Arthur Rackham




All his work is delicious but the attention to detail in this one is sublime


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## Random (May 6, 2012)

Kitty Crowther


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## Random (May 6, 2012)

The, now legendary


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

pennimania said:


> Surprised no-one has mentioned Arthur Rackham
> All his work is delicious but the attention to detail in this one is sublime


 
He lived next door to my Grandmother when she was little. She was the model for this...


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

Or Edmund Dulac






I like this one from the Tempest

the school I went to had these HUGE old books illustrated by him with beautifulplates protected with sheets of tissue paper - I spent literally hours poring over them.


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

And I still love the Flower Fairies - often look through the Treasury and can never decide which one I like best 




You have to love Cicely Mary Barker if you're a girlie 

look at the nasturtium seed shoes


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## ska invita (May 6, 2012)

Anyone remember





Prince What a Mess


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## ATOMIC SUPLEX (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> I think she's really good at the stance and look of children and at the normal chaotic mess of family homes.


Whilst I think her drawings are simply revolting. Different strokes.


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## Firky (May 6, 2012)

ska invita said:


> Anyone remember
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 
God I forgot all about that.


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## mentalchik (May 6, 2012)

Cid said:


> John Tenniel:


 
I have a 1968 copy of Alice Through the Looking Glass with colour plates.......unfortunately the paper cover is lost


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

I just found this 





young illustrator called Chris Thornley


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

I like Ivan Bilibin too


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## ringo (May 6, 2012)

Like like like


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

pennimania said:


> I like Ivan Bilibin too


 
He died in the Siege of Leningrad


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## yardbird (May 6, 2012)

The lovely Nicola Bayley, who was my mate and shared a work space at college.
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=e...w=171&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:87


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

Love this thread  





Charles Tunnicliffe - amazingly prolific - wonderful woodcuts, did loads of Ladybirds even Brooke Bond tea cards. especially good for horses, farmy stuff and birds


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

aubrey beardsley


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## pennimania (May 6, 2012)

Pickman's model said:


> aubrey beardsley


 You must have read my mind I was just going to do him! 

Superb


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## Belushi (May 6, 2012)

All the greats have been covered I think, but Pauline Baynes deserves a mention


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 6, 2012)




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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

Johnny Canuck3 said:


>


Can you name the illustrator? I can't make out the signature.


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## oryx (May 6, 2012)

Edward Ardizzone:


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Can you name the illustrator? I can't make out the signature.


It's Frank Frazetta.


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Can you name the illustrator? I can't make out the signature.


 
Frank Frazetta.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

It's a really familiar style. What childrens books has he illustrated?


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> It's a really familiar style. What childrens books has he illustrated?


 
Not sure if he's done any children's books. I know he's done adolescent books, ie Conan.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

Well, adolescents count as children.


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Well, adolescents count as children.


 
He did Tarzan as well.


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Well, adolescents count as children.


 
Frazetta and Boris Vallejo were the big fantasy illustrators of the 70s and 80s. They were all about muscly hunks, busty babes and monsters and dragons. He worked mostly in comic books and isn't exactly what I'd call a children's book illustrator. I always found his stuff quite ugly and kitschy, but then I'm probably not the right demographic.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

Did he do LP covers?


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## Reno (May 6, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Did he do LP covers?


 
Yes. He did several for Molly Hatchet and Nazareth.


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

Belushi said:


> All the greats have been covered I think, but Pauline Baynes deserves a mention


2000+ years of book history and all the greats have been mentioned in fewer than 50 posts? i think not


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## Mrs Magpie (May 6, 2012)

Ah, yes Reno. I knew I'd seen his stuff somewhere.


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

not seen any mention of john tenniel yet


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

or cruikshank


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

or herge


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## Pickman's model (May 6, 2012)

or tolkein


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

or holling c. holling


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 7, 2012)

Edward Lear:


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

I love Rowlandson's illustrations in Dr Syntax.

http://www.antiquemapsandprints.com/geography-travels/THOMAS-ROWLANDSON-CARICATURES.htm


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 7, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Did he do LP covers?


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

and no one's mentioned rudyard kipling either, here from the story of the elephant's child


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

and there's been little said of heinrich hoffmann


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

and i am surprised no one's come forward as a babar fan


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

any kathleen hale fans out there?


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 7, 2012)




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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 7, 2012)

Maurice Sendak


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

Pickman's model said:


> and there's been little said of heinrich hoffmann


I read that to a child and he became hysterical at that page  I loved that book as a child.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

Pickman's model said:


> any kathleen hale fans out there?


 
I think i mentioned her earlier, but I think there's a kid's book illustrators thread too.


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## Pickman's model (May 7, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> I think i mentioned her earlier, but I think there's a kid's book illustrators thread too.


books are books, mrs m


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

I agree, but there may be more than one thread so I'm not sure where I've mentioned Hale.


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## Reno (May 7, 2012)

There are so many great kids books illustrators around now. I like Delphine Durand, especially Big Rabbit's Bad Mood






http://delphinedurand.blogspot.co.uk/


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## Johnny Canuck3 (May 7, 2012)

Wind in the Willows


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## ska invita (May 7, 2012)

my fav tintin


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## albionism (May 7, 2012)

Does anyone here remember a children's book,
perhaps from the late 70s-early 80s in which a 
child climbs up a playground slide that goes way
up into the sky? I cannot really remember it very
well, but i do remember thinking, as a 9-10 year
old how very strange the book was. Would love to
know what it was called and have another look at it.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

Pickman's model said:


> and i am surprised no one's come forward as a babar fan


 
I've always loved Babar, but surprised you do, politically speaking.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

albionism said:


> Does anyone here remember a children's book,
> perhaps from the late 70s-early 80s in which a
> child climbs up a playground slide that goes way
> up into the sky? I cannot really remember it very
> ...


This rings a bell with me. I think my eldest daughter had that book....


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## Mrs Magpie (May 7, 2012)

As a child I loved Zozo. Most people know him as Curious George but in all the books I had he was called Zozo.

eta, just discovered via a Wikipedia trail that he was called Zozo over here so that he didn't have the same name as George V or George VI. This means that the books were originally my Mum's.


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## pennimania (May 7, 2012)

Charles Keeping - illustrated a lot of Rosemary Sutcliffe's (love her books)
and this one
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	



Wasteground Circus


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## pennimania (May 7, 2012)

Helen Cooper - her books are just delightful


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## IC3D (May 7, 2012)

Pauline Baynes


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## yardbird (May 7, 2012)

http://www.usborneusa.com/images/kids.jpg

Stephen Cartwright - my old flatmate


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## killer b (May 11, 2012)

Cid said:


> Poe inspired some fantastic stuff, lots to chose from (Beardsley, Kupka notably), but Harry Clarke's stand out for me:


 
a friend just posted these up on the facebook. incredible.

http://50watts.com/Harry-Clarke-Illustrations-for-E-A-Poe


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## oryx (May 11, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> I read that to a child and he became hysterical at that page  I loved that book as a child.


 
Child should be so lucky, my dad used to read us WW Jacobs's 'The Monkey's Paw' as a bedtime story.


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## Mrs Magpie (May 11, 2012)

killer b said:


> a friend just posted these up on the facebook. incredible. http://50watts.com/Harry-Clarke-Illustrations-for-E-A-Poe


His stained glass is breathtaking.


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## killer b (May 11, 2012)

whoa.

have a browse through the rest of that website i posted mrs m - loads and loads of fantastic illustrations and whatnot. i've just spent the last half-hour doing the same...

especially liked joan kiddell monroe


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## Mrs Magpie (May 11, 2012)

I'm still working my through Clarke. I knew about his stained glass and his bookplates but now I'm finding so much else...pleased to have located a biography too....


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## killer b (May 11, 2012)

brief stained glass diversion: i was visiting my auntie a few weeks ago, and they have a series of magnificent burne-jones windows in her local church:


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## Mrs Magpie (May 11, 2012)

killer b said:


> brief stained glass diversion: i was visiting my auntie a few weeks ago, and they have a series of magnificent burne-jones windows in her local church


As does St Giles in Camberwell with just about everything else done by Ruskin.


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## Mab (May 15, 2012)

yardbird said:


> The lovely Nicola Bayly, who was my mate and shared a work space at college.
> http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=e...w=171&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:87



Yes, I love The Mousehole Cat--a wonderful story with gorgeous illustrations and the film. There is a short piece on the making of The Mousehole Cat with Nicola Bayly.

What a great thread!


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## Reno (May 15, 2012)

Not sure Gustave Dore has been mentioned yet, surely one of the most famous. As a child I used to forever look at his finely detailed depictions of heaven, purgatory and hell and we had a book of Balzac short stories illustrated by him which were wonderfully grotesque. Unfortunately I can't find the illustration of someone being sliced in half vertically by a sword, which used to both horrify and delight me as a child.


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## Yuwipi Woman (May 15, 2012)

http://www.childrensliteraturenetwork.org/birthbios/brthpage/06jun/6-3lobel.html

Anita Lobel.

Her life story is interesting. She survived a concentration camp in Poland.


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## seeformiles (May 17, 2012)

I always loved Graham Oakley
















And Alan Aldridge:


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## Boris Sprinkler (May 17, 2012)

John Bauer.

We have these above the bed Princess Tuvstarr looking for her lost heart whilst Leap the elk looks over her (and I can't find the exact painting via google)


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## DaveCinzano (May 18, 2012)

Stephen Cartwright (RIP):


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## ringo (May 18, 2012)

Ralph Steadman


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## pennimania (May 18, 2012)

omfg how could I forget Steadman?

was looking at a book of his last night 

love this thread - thankyou for starting it ringo


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## Mrs Magpie (May 29, 2012)

yardbird said:


> The lovely Nicola Bayley, who was my mate and shared a work space at college.
> http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?hl=e...w=171&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:87


Just been reading about her in Sebastian Walker's biography.


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## yardbird (May 30, 2012)

Mrs Magpie said:


> Just been reading about her in Sebastian Walker's biography.


Nicola going to Sebastian Walker really put Tom Maschler's nose out of joint 
Maschler hasn't spoken to Nicola (and nor did he to SW) since she left him. He thinks that he discovered Nicola and was/is bitter about it to this day.


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## 2hats (May 30, 2012)

and


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## ringo (Jul 29, 2012)

RIP Margaret Mahy, writer of beautiful books

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jul/23/margaret-mahy-dies-76?newsfeed=true




ringo said:


> Just been reading one of my favourite books to my youngest, the illustrations are incredible. First published in 1969 it's perfectly of its time.
> 
> There's A Lion In The Meadow - Margaret Mahy, illustrations by Jenny Williams
> 
> What would you do if you knew there was a lion in the meadow, but your mother wouldn't believe you and gave you a matchbox with a dragon it to scare the away the lion...and in fact the dragon was there too?


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## Stigmata (Jul 29, 2012)

ringo said:


> RIP Margaret Mahy, writer of beautiful books
> 
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jul/23/margaret-mahy-dies-76?newsfeed=true


 
Damn, I must have read The Haunting ten times as a kid


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## such and such (Jul 30, 2012)




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## such and such (Jul 30, 2012)

Probably doesn't count as they are collages not illustrations but Jeanie Baker's work amazed me as a child


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## bouncer_the_dog (Jul 30, 2012)

Russ Nicholson... one of many cool illustrators who appeared in the Fighting Fantasy books..


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## ska invita (Sep 2, 2012)

^^^ good call

from deep in the memory banks managed to drag up the first book at school i read that was off the main bookcase, having worked through the red,green,yellow, blue labelled learning to read books (iynwim) ...remember the pics (not amazing, but nice memories of), but not the story ...







> The Voyage of QV66 is a children's novel by Penelope Lively. It is set in a strange, flooded, somewhat post-apocalyptic England devoid of people, and centres around a group of animals consisting of a dog, a cat, a cow, a horse, a pigeon and a mysterious character named "Stanley".
> 
> Plot summary
> 
> The characters travel in a boat (the QV66 of the title) with the intention of reaching London Zoo so that they can discover what Stanley is. They have a number of adventures along the way, including being joined by a parrot, several characters losing their way in a balloon, and Stanley himself getting locked in a bank vault. It is eventually revealed that Stanley is a monkey.


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## polly (Nov 24, 2012)

Lots of mine have already been mentioned (Maurice Sendak, Shirley Hughes, Jan Pienkowski), but I also love

John Burningham



Korky Paul



Raymond Briggs


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## Miss Caphat (Nov 24, 2012)

aw, what a great thread. I'm going to come in here and hide when I'm scared or confused by the world  

errol le cain was my favorite when I was a kid

Thorn Rose (Sleeping Beauty)


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## zenie (Nov 24, 2012)

Kay Nielsen for me...


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## Miss Caphat (Nov 24, 2012)

also eric carle


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## polly (Nov 25, 2012)

Also recently discovered Satoshi Kitamura


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## nagapie (Nov 25, 2012)

That's lovely, polly, any specific book recommendations with his illustrations?


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## polly (Nov 25, 2012)

nagapie said:


> That's lovely, polly, any specific book recommendations with his illustrations?


 
Yes! That picture is from In the Attic, which has brilliant illustrations on every page - really detailed and original. The story is great too. It's all about using your imagination.

I just ordered Angry Arthur too, which looks like it has similar illustrations but I can't vouch for it. Will let you know if it's a goer


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## catinthehat (Nov 25, 2012)

Mabel Lucie Atwell - pretty old I think as I used to read the books my mum had as a child when I stayed at my Nan's.  I think they must have been pretty popular in the past as there were also pictures and china things in my mums old room from these illustrations.  Some of them were a bit cutsie but the ones that are a bit darker are my favorites.


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