Helen Oxenbury

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2020

⏱️ 37 minutes

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Summary

Helen Oxenbury is an illustrator of children’s books whose work has featured in many very popular titles for younger readers including the award-winning We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, by Michael Rosen. Helen has won the Kate Greenaway Medal twice and was awarded a lifetime achievement award by the Book Trust in 2018. She attended the Ipswich School of Art and later the Central School of Art in London where she met fellow illustrator and her future husband, John Burningham. After the birth of her children she began illustrating children’s books, working at the kitchen table long after they’d gone to bed. Her work for Ivor Cutler’s Meal One, published in 1971, was praised by Spare Rib magazine for its portrayal of a single mother and her relationship with her young son. Helen came up with the idea of her baby board books in the late 1970s after the birth of her third child who suffered with eczema. Discovering that her daughter could be distracted from scratching by looking at baby catalogues, Helen created a series of board books placing babies and toddlers at their heart. Such a concept was unheard of at the time. From the late 1980s, Helen ensured that the babies and children featured in her books came from different ethnic backgrounds and her work in So Much by Trish Cooke has become a children’s classic. In We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, published in 1989, Helen’s pictures celebrated the joy of adventure and the bond between siblings. DISC ONE: America by Marilyn Cooper, Chita Rivera and Shark Girls DISC TWO: Mir Ist So Wunderbar by Ludwig van Beethoven, conducted by Mark Elder, performed by London Philharmonic Orchestra. Tenor: Andrew Kennedy, Soprano: Lisa Milne, Soprano: Anja Kampe, Bass: Brindley Sherratt DISC THREE: Tubby The Tuba by Danny Kaye DISC FOUR: Lullaby of Birdland by Erroll Garner DISC FIVE: Episode 1of Life In A Scotch Sitting Room Vol. II by Ivor Cutler ‎ DISC SIX: Schubert ’s Impromptu No. 3 in G flat D899 by Alfred Brendel, (piano) conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras DISC SEVEN: Singin’ in the Rain by Gene Kelly DISC EIGHT: Les Pecheurs de Perles, Act 1: Romance: Mi par d'udir ancora (Je crois entendre encore) by Beniamino Gigli, conducted by Eugene Goossens BOOK CHOICE: The Empire Trilogy by JG Farrell LUXURY ITEM: A bed with an unlimited supply of white linen sheets CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Les Pecheurs de Perles, Act 1: Romance: Mi par d'udir ancora (Je crois entendre encore) by Beniamino Gigli, conducted by Eugene Goossens Presenter: Lauren Laverne Producer: Paula McGinley

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds Music Radio Podcasts
0:04.8	Hello, I'm Lauren LeVern and this is the Desert Island Disks Podcast.
0:08.4	Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take
0:13.2	with them if they were cast away to a desert island. And for right reasons, the music is shorter
0:19.2	than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.
0:39.1	My cast away this week is the illustrator and author Helen Oxenbury. She's one of the UK's
0:50.4	best loved children's illustrators and her books have been family favourites for over 50 years,
0:55.9	running the prestigious Kate Greenaway Medal twice and selling and astonishing 35 million copies.
1:02.4	Her artistry, her talent for capturing an emotional memory and her tender observation of the
1:07.4	details of children's lives, mean her illustrations resonate with readers of all ages. If I say we're
1:13.9	going on a bare hunt, you'll probably feel a wind and hear the squelch of mud, even if you last
1:18.9	read the book decades ago. Like much of her work, bare hunt brings a domestic adventure vividly
1:24.4	to life with an intimacy and informality that makes it all more affecting. The book's characterful
1:30.4	animals, ensuitant children and natural landscapes are recurring themes in her work, which ranges from
1:35.7	collaborations like the modern classics so much to the 1999 edition of her own childhood favourite
1:41.7	Alice in Wonderland. As an author illustrator, she broke new ground. She was the first person to come
1:47.4	up with boardbooks about babies, four babies and one of the first to feature subjects from different
1:52.5	ethnic backgrounds. Though whether her books are as pleasurable to create as they are to consume,
1:57.5	is another question. She says, people have the impression that illustration is jolly. I suppose it
2:03.0	is in a way, but it is very hard work as well. It can consume you. It's so personal that you feel as
2:09.4	if you're putting yourself on a plate. Helen Oxenbury, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you very
2:15.5	much. So Helen, as you say, your work is all consuming. How much of yourself ends up in the illustrations you create?
	...

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