All About: Mice

The Seven Stories Collection holds the entire archive of one particularly famous mouse, Angelina Ballerina. However, we have written so much about Angelina recently, we thought it would be nice to explore some of the many other mice we have in the store (purely literary mice, no real ones!). If you are feeling inspired to explore more Seven Stories mice, click here to see all our Angelina posts.

Draft material by Martin Waddell for The Great Green Mouse Disaster, illustrated by Phillipe Dupasquier (Andersen Press, 1981)

November's first mouse, or hoard of mice, is the fantastically imaginative book by Martin Waddell and Phillipe Dupasquier. The book is virtually wordless, and as each page unfolds, the viewer is presented with a cross section of a hotel. Turn the page again and the action has moved on slightly, as you follow the progress of the rampaging hoard of green mice scattering throughout the hotel, causing chaos!

The archival material we hold runs to one, reasonably large, A4 file, full of Waddell's plans and notes for how the book should work. It being a particularly unusual book, I was very curious to work out how someone would go about planning it. It turns out that Waddell had some fairly concrete ideas about how he would like the book to look, and created a detailed 'story' for each characters progression on each page. The book is full of some brilliant detail, and it would take anyone a very long time to really find every different element. At the end of the book, there is even a list of things that Waddell thinks the reader might not have noticed!

Below is a sample of 'Story 4 The Mouseman', who is responsible for all this calamity:

'He is in the pursuit of the Mice and the Cat. In the cover illustration he will scoop up a milk bottle and this should be about his person as he runs. In 1 he is in the dining room, level 3, catching a glass of wine in mid air as it tumbled of the tray of the shocked waiter, who has been knocked aside by the jumping cat and cascading mice. Has has scooped a chicken from the table in passing, and is clambering over it - the table, not the chicken - to the stairs from 3 to 5.'

The Martin Waddell Collection, kindly donated by the author in 2008, consists of drafts and pre-publication material for 53 picture books and 63 educational books, including those published under the pseudonym Catherine Sefton. Several of the picture books have artwork represented elsewhere in the collection, such as Can't You Sleep Little Bear, illustrated by Barbara Firth, Tiny's Big Adventure, illustrated by John Lawrence and The Pig in the Pond, illustrated by Jill Barton. The collection also includes a series of notebooks and appointment diaries, and a series of printed books written by Waddell. 

Artwork by Emily Gravett for Little Mouse's Big Book of Fears, (Macmillan, 2007), inlaid with picture of title page of the Seven Stories copy of the book. Artwork © Emily Gravett, 2007

This artwork is an example of a much smaller collection than the one mentioned above, as it consists of just this one piece of artwork! These mice are final pieces of artwork used in the end papers, and  the 'Phagophobia (Fear of being eaten)' page. Another incredibly imaginative mouse led tale, this follows our hero, Little Mouse, on his journey through a book exploring all his different fears - entomophobia, clinophobia, acrophobia - amongst others. The pages are covered in little mouse 'nibble' marks, with several fold out pages of additional sumptuous detail, such as the 'Visitor's Map of the ISLE OF FRIGHTS'.

This collection may only contain one piece of artwork, executed in pencil, acrylic, and watercolour, but there is also an additional mouse illustration on the reverse of the card. The wider Seven Stories Collection actually does contain other work by Emily Gravett, also, by strange coincidence, of mice. Gravett kindly donated the piece above, and also her preliminary artwork, final pieces and prints of the final work for 'A was an apple pie' in Elizabeth Hammill's Over the Hills and Far Away. Some of this work is currently on display in Rhyme Around the World, at Seven Stories in Newcastle.

A Counting Book by Helen Craig, published by Aurum Press Ltd. c.1980

This month’s printed book featuring mice is A Counting Book by Helen Craig. Of course this tiny little mouse-filled book is by the illustrator of that other famous mouse Angelina Ballerina – oops!  We weren’t meant to mention her this month but this is too good an opportunity to showcase a less familiar book by Helen Craig, and one which was published before Angelina burst into the world in 1983.

This printed book comes from Pat Garrett’s Counting Book collection and is one of the smallest books in our collection, measuring just 5.5 cm square.  It comes in its own little slipcase which physically constrains the long concertina of pages.  Each double-page spread features colour illustrations of mice amusingly constructing the numbers 0 to10 out of a variety of handy objects including balloons, string, flowers, bubbles, and (as in the photo) a jigsaw puzzle ‘7’ which looks suspiciously like it’s made from pieces of cheese! The final 3 double spreads somehow accommodates 100 tiny mice!

Pat Garrett kindly donated her Counting Book collection to Seven Stories in 2006.  It consists of over 640 counting and number related books, mostly published between 1960 and 2000. Whilst this collection is made up mainly of picture books, it also includes books in a variety of formats such as board books, rag books, pop-up books, activity books, as well as three 19th Century mathematics text books and even friezes, an advent calendar, and plastic counting blocks.

To find out about Pat Garrett’s Alphabet book collection, check out our ‘Bird’ blog in May earlier this year by clicking here.

If you'd like to find out more about the Seven Stories Collection, then 

email: collections@sevenstories.org.uk or phone: 0191 495 2707 or comment on this blog.

Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medal Winners

Yesterday the big announcement was made!  

The 2015 winner of the Kate Greenaway medal was William Grill for Shackleton’s Journey and this years Carnegie Medal went to Tanya Landman for Buffalo Soldier.  Over the past weeks our steering group have enjoyed reading and discussing all of the books shortlisted for the awards; here they are enjoying words, illustration, tea and biscuits.  

Carnegie and Kate Greenaway medal steering group at Seven Stories

To fill the gap in our reading lists, I thought it would be a great chance to delve into the Carnegie and Greenaway treasure chest to the show you some of the items in our collections that have won prizes in the past. Our book and archive collections at Seven Stories represent work by hundreds of authors and illustrators and among them are many Carnegie and Greenaway prize winners.

This is a very small selection, if you’d like to see some more, or you have a Carnegie and Greenaway favourite that isn’t featured, let us know!

The second ever Carnegie winner was Eve Garnett in 1937 with The Family from One End Street, which was quite ground-breaking for its portrayal of a working class family.  It may not be considered anything revolutionary today but in 1937, children’s literature was dominated by middle-class children.  We don’t hold any original material but we do have multiple editions in our book collections.  

Eve Garnett's Family from One End Street (Puffin Books, 1945)

In 1961 Antony Maitland won the Kate Greenaway prize for his portrayal of Mrs Cockle’s Cat.  This image only demonstrates a small amount of material that we hold in our Antony Maitland Collection; we have the whole dummy book, original illustrations and a draft of the cover for Mrs Cockle’s Cat.  We also hold artwork from his other books.

Original artwork for Mrs Cockle's Cat, Anthony Maitland c. 1961 ©Anthony Maitland 

Seven Stories Visitor centre is based in Ouseburn Valley in Newcastle and our Collections are held at our Gateshead office so, this next winner is close to home.  Set in the fictional Garmouth, quite like our own Tynemouth, is Robert Westall’s 1975 Carnegie winner The Machine Gunners.  Westall wrote his draft for The Machine Gunners by hand in notebooks. Six years later Robert won the Carnegie again for The Scarecrows. We hold a selection of original work within our Robert Westall collection which includes material from the majority of his published books. Alongside the archive we also have an extensive Westall book collection, which includes some interesting translations.   

Draft of Machine Gunners, Robert Westall c. 1975 © Robert Westall Estate

Peter Dickinson also won the Carnegie prize two years running. Tulku won in 1979.  Here is an early, incomplete typescript manuscript which is a possible first draft of Tulku.  There is also preliminary material for City of Gold in our archive, which was Peter’s Dickinson’s second book to win the Carnegie in 1980.  City of Gold was illustrated by Michael Forman whose work you can see in our upcoming exhibition. 

Typescript draft of Tulku, Peter Dickinson c. 1978 © Peter Dickinson 

There are very few authors who have won the Carnegie prize more than once, Berlie Doherty is another.  Her first prize was for Granny was a Buffer Girl in 1986 and the second for Dear Nobody in 1991.  Berlie's books can be found in a number of our book collections and our archive collection includes material from her published books, story books and radio broadcasts. The original material for Granny was a Buffer Girl includes these drafts and photographs which we think were used for inspiration. 

Drafts and photographs for Granny was a Buffer Girl c. 1984 © Berlie Doherty

Anthony Browne won the Kate Greenaway in 1992 with Zoo, at Seven Stories we hold one preliminary sketch from the book which shows the zoo visitors looking into the orang-utan’s cage.  We also have a preliminary sketch from Gorilla which won Browne his first Kate Greenaway prize in 1983.

Original Illustration for Zoo c. 1992  © Anthony Browne

A lot of Philip Pullman’s collection is digital but this is a typescript draft from the 1995 Carnegie winner His Dark Materials: Northern Lights.  Some of my favourite items in our collections are Philip Pullman’s handwritten notes and drafts which show his doodling and thought process. Philip’s name is very popular, particularly within our ex-library book collections, it’s great to see how the artwork for ‘His Dark Materials’ developed over time into what is the very recognisable Philip Pullman cover. 

Typescript draft for His Dark Materials: Northern Lights c. 1995 © Philip Pullman 

Emily Gravett’s Little Mouse’s Big Book of Fears won the Greenaway prize in 2008.  In our collection we have some original artwork of mice, these drawings were used to create the final artwork digitally.  The drawings were scanned and then digitally positioned into the relevant spreads like a collage.  

Original artwork for Little Mouse's Big Book of Fears c. 2007 © Emily Gravett

Come along to Seven Stories Visitor Centre after our grand reopening in August and you may be able to spot some of Emily’s mice in our Rhyme Around the World exhibition or...If you'd like to find out more about the Seven Stories Collection, then email: collections@sevenstories.org.uk or phone: 0191 495 2707 or comment on this blog.

Visitors to the Collection

Over the years, we have had quite a few fantastic and famous faces visiting our Collection store.

Here are a few images of some of comments from the lovely authors, illustrators and editors that have visited, and even a few illustrations too!

Above we have comments from a few illustrators, including Catherine Rayner and Emily Gravett, the little mouse is apt as we have some of the artwork for her book 'Little Mouse's Big Book of Fears' in the Collection. Also the author Gillian McClure, and Roger and Gill Wright, who donated the archive of Elinor Lyon.

Here we have some 'wonderful' comments from some more illustrators, including Ed Vere, Ian Beck and Anthony Browne, who has kindly provided us with a shape to transform! The comment below the cheeky monkey by Anthony Browne is from another ex-Children's Laureate, the poet Michael Rosen.

At the top of the page, we have a lovely little picture of the Incredible Book Eating Boy himself, drawn for us when Oliver Jeffers visited in 2009.

Some more fantastic comments, and a lovely little illustration from Lauren Child, whose exhibition we hosted in 2009/10. There is also a fantastic comment from John Burningham, beloved illustrator, who we also worked with for an exhibition in 2010.

One of our favourite comments from Colin McNaughton, although we won't be working any less any time soon!

A list of some of the names that visited in 2011, including Imogen and Sophie Smallwood, daughter and granddaughter of Enid Blyton, as well as a cheeky 'Lost Thing' from the very brilliant Shaun Tan.

And the final page, with our most recent comments from two very lovely new illustrators who have been filmed as part of our Picturebooks in Progress project - Yasmeen Ismail and Levi Pinfold.