New Projects and Future Hope

When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant, You keep production lines moving and quality on track because there is no room for slowdowns With Granger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts, and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place, so nothing gets in the way of getting the job done Call one eight hundred ranger, click ranger. com or just stop by Ranger for the ones who get it done This is a global production When did hiccup and toothless first appear in your consciousness It's quite good to partly not know what you're doing when you're a writer. I like stories with strong female heroes, which there weren't that many, frankly when I was growing up Where do you think the evangelical side of this comes from? I meet so many children who are just as smart as every other kid. They just don't have the same access to books. We can't lose what books give you. Chris De Cal, welcome. Thank you. author and illustrator. and Yeah. Bomivver. How did you get? I've just established that on the basis of five minutes of acquaintance. Best known, of course. and I would have been slightly reluctant to say this immediately, but given that when we were testing the microphones a moment ago, this is how you describe yourself. B known for the How to Train your Dragon series. Yeah. yeah, yeah. ye. I do write other books as well. Well that's what I mean. now that your is not confined to that series, but it No Wizards of wors, Which ws were anywhere? Emily Brown, picture books? ye to which we will come, but we begin at the beginning There's a line. I was just trying to find it when I rudely started consulting my phone as we were introduced to each other. I think it's in outut of Africa Karen Briickson writite something like I think there are many delightful children out there who somehow cannot stand the idea of growing up . And I don't know why that popped into my mind when I was researching for this interview Yeah I'd say how to steal a dragon sword. Yeah. The story we are all a part of is not just a story about Islands and Dragons. It's a story about growing up And the thing about growing up is that one day, one day has to happen I'm sorry, but it's true. ye, that's yeah. You did resist, I think I did resist, yeah. ye, The Rad Range Dragon books are really about growing up. yeah, definitely. Your childhood seems to me to have been something of a dichotomy. and' probably oversimplifying, but you had your London life Yeah. and then you had this extraordinary sort of bucolic wilderness that you would take solace in every summer. Yeah I mean, it was quite extreme. It was quite like, I mean another story, you've already kicked me off with growing up, yeah Peter Pan. Yeah. I really ye I mean, how to traraining Dragon is also a story about a London childhood but the Netherland and it has a villain with a hook in it and flying and growing up. and that is you know completely coincididental but also not I grew up in the centre of London in a house without a garden, because my dad's job was in London. but My dad was an environmentalist. He was Before it wasool was h. Before it was cool. Yes, definitely before it was cool. He he was that was his heart, that was his heart thing. So he was chairman of the RSPB And after he retired, he was chairman of Q Gardens, he cared passionately about yeah about birds in particular, but you know, everything. How did he indulge this in a home with no garden? Yeah. well, well that's when he was working. very Yeah, he was a hard worker his day job which was a big job He was at the FT as well, wasn't he chred the financial Times for a? He was ch No he was chairman of Parson, which the whole thing Chairman of Pearson, which owned the financial Times thing. He was a yeah, he was a big British Viking Chieftain. I love that. Yes J P of which you at. Yeah Penguin books, the FT, the economist, B Ky B after Yeah Gold Cst film. Yeah, he was busy But his heart was in The wilderness. ye And so yeah. so Every year from when we were baby, we would be As a family, they had little babies and we would be dropped off by a local boatman on this uninhabited island off the west coast of Scotland and picked up again two weeks later. And if I say that in schools, I say you know, who thinks my parents Who would love that Everybody puts their hands up and who thinks my parents were crazy and yeah they all put their hands up. So I mean these days it would be borderline social services territory I mean, it was dangerous. I mean My lovely dad, love my dad. afterfter he retired, we discovered there was no Yeah, there was no GPS on the boat And and the reason for that was that my dad thought that that might spoil the wilderness experience. G ye So you were entirely enamorered of it though. I mean, there was no Far's a funny thing when you're a child, isn't it? Beuse it can be either all encompassing or strangely exciting and it seems you were all at the same time. All at the same time. Yes, but I was genuinely frightened. You were frightened. I mean yeah. So there were no I was quite right. It was truly uninhabited. It's a tiny little lifetly uninhabited. Cen, was it? No, not that is quite a Big island. Right. No this is called Little Collins a. Oh they okay, that's. Bagnet's daughter Staffer And it's completely uninhabited. And you bought it. Yeah. because he needed this dual existence whereby he was a h He was a city gent. was I didn't I didn't I never Well but it was it was his heart place when he retired. Well not when he retired, sorry, When he died When he died his hospital bed was just covered. You know when somebody dies and he was ill in hospital for quite a long time and you you cover the hospital bed with photos of things that he loved His hospital bed was just covered in photos of the island Gosh. because that's what he loved. Where did he find it? He was He o he was I don't I think he hadn't. It's difficult to explain my dad to other people. Yeah, it was I suppose it was his total dream and because he loved birds. I mean, incredible bird life there and he knew that. and there were puffins and this extraordinary you know sort of bird life. didn't even know there was a source of water on the island Yeah. Well like you didn in a lake like Well not a lake, like a bigake Okay if you're going live on an island Y you need water. We didn't know whether there was water right didid not know. When he bought it. No, Right. Okay. I mean, it was quite hard to find bottled water in those days as well. It wasn't you couldn't buy like five meters of it in Tescoos. Yeah, but he did know that people had lived on it Yeah, so he must have known that people that there was a sourcere. you know, my dad was, yeah, he I'm going to dwell on this are you Yes, because it's obviously absolutely intrinsic to what was to follow. Yes. Because not only the Viking angle the Viking elements Viking Scotland. but also of course the imagination running wild, you've already met I went to a place, you probably know. I went to a place at this Easter called Alien Shoner whichich is also on the west coast of Scotland. Yeah and is also fairly isolated. Yeah. But remarkably because you just mentioned Peter Pan it's where JM Barry wrote the screenplay for the film. Yeah. So I know what you speak of, that sense of It doesn't surprise me at all It doesn't surprise me because those places feed and inspire the imagination J just extraordinary those spepectaces. And also an island is like a child's view of what a world could be. It's like a child, you know, and this is the island was not isn's other you know, you can see Staffer, you can see Iona You can see ala It's like an archipelago, it's like a small world, you know And And I used to draw maps of this kind of miniature world and You know, my dad would tell me stories of the Scottish tribes because the Viking tribes then turned into Scottish clans and of how they fought each other and tricked each other and tales of the Lord of the you know it's an intensely imaginative place. And it's a wild place and it's a place you say You know, was I frightened And of course, I was incredibly inspired. and it's the most beautiful place in the world. And I think a child has a very strong sense of beauty and of how beautiful it is. But it was also it could be terrifying. I'm reading a book at the moment about the Par Kight of a woman in the Polar Kight And it reminds me so much of the island, how the weather can turn. a moment. In a moment. And then you are in a situation of real danger, real absolute immediate danger. I've been in a boat in storms, you know? with my dad where I've been absolutely petrified. It gives you a real sense of the smallness of humanity of human beings in the face of great a nature that is greater than you are. I love that But there's also with an island. I've never really clocked that children love islands, don't they? I've never really spotted that before. presumably because They're sort of intellectually digestible. You can imagine you can imagine becausecause the boundaries are visible almost, Yeah, yeah yeah. can sort of Everything's here now. Yeah don't need to worry about Yeah all the uncontrollables and all the unpowable you just Yeah. Yes. Well your friends presumably were going to sort of Ant and places like that for the summer. This was the nineteen seventies. Okay. It was unusual even in London for people to be going to the Antie. I mean some people did. I suppose. But you know, the nineteen seventies Well they weren't going to isolate They weren't going to isolated Scottish islands. No, that was was unusual. Yeah I think that was unusual And yeah, the Neverland is a map of a child's mind. That's just popping into m. That's also Peter Pf. Peter Pan Bumham I mean proper pososh, your background. I don't know if I've ever met anyone called Cresada who's not proper Pos I don't meet very many people called Ca. I think there's one in rivals at the moment. Oh yeah, there is Just for just to keep it up to date, just keep the conversation. There's not many people calledresa also though, because at least you're right, it's proper poshe, but also Cresada behave very badly You know, I think it does mean deceitful woman. Does it? Yeah. great. does. Yeah, she behaves badly. Trollus and Ccedor. but I like to think that she was actually very resourceful rather than, you know. Um rather than a yeah Yeah, no, I don't talk about that very much by the way. And the reason I don't talk about that, you know, proper posture is because it's because I'm spending a lot of time going out there and telling children that you can do this.. Wherever you're from. And so I don't dwell on that because because that is true. ourur current children's laaureate is I'm not saying it's not difficult. It's not difficult. It's not harder if you're from You know, a background that isn't you know hasn't got books in the house. and there's so many more difficult difficulties to overcome. And I spend my whole life kind of campaigning for libraries because I meet so many children who are just as smart as every other kid. Of course. you know, but they just don't have the same access to books or access to libraries or whatever But you know, it can be done you know, our current children's laaureate, you know, Frank, Cotwal Boys, you know, he grew up in Liverpool, not from. So if if I bang on about that too much or if I talk about it too much, you know, children take that on and they think it's not for me, it can be alienating. Yes. and that's why I try not to dwell on No, I understand that. Too much. Be ye. I mean, it's a tough one, isn't it? because it seems to be quite a recent development that we've It's two things that drive me nuts when people talk about food and books as being middle class pursuits because they're not, and they shouldn't be. So Jamie Oliivan is not middle class. He gets a lot of jip from people for being a bit rreified and the same way with books books should be universal. and in this country they were a little bit more universal, perhaps than they are now. Way more universal. wayay more universal. You know there was much more Well we've been struggling the book world with the decline of school libraries. I mean I wouldn't The reason I know so much about this is because of my job. If it wasn't for my job, I wouldn't see the research, I wouldn't see the stats. But a kid who reads for pleasure is so much more likely to be economically, let alone educationally successful. you know the more your literacy goes up, the more likely you are to vote, to own your own home, to , you know, it's so K But it's all to do with pleasure, reading for pleasure. How does a kid read for pleasure if there isn't, you know a library in their primary school? Yes. You know, how do they do that?'s terrifying. It's just terrifying. And this has become a passion for you And a little later in life I mean after No Has it always been a passion for you? No, I mean, work wise, you weren't able to I mean as a writer, you want your books to reach as many people as possible. But the advocacy, I think, started after the success became Ridicul or not? My first book a book that I wrote The B Pep thirty Bu Peeps Library Bu Peeps Lbrary book. Yeah. yeah, a picture book introducing children to the library. Of course. You know, so where did that come? The whole quest, Well, I went to the library every week. L most people where did the knowledge People did. A a lot of people did in the seventies You know, that was very whatever you know, house you grow up in It was very you know, you went to the library, even you know, middle class families didn't necessarily buy books like they did. Books have got cheaper Yeah. And so what has happened is that, you know the middle classes used to kind of be the defenders great defenders of the libraries, you know, they can afford their house. Yeah. I mean I think that's just my own. I love it I' never thought of it that way around before. Yeah. And I always knew even when I started out and this was You know, shhoot thirty years ago, I always knew books were in trouble. It's a quest for me the quest to get children reading You know, because I think that the key skills that reading gives you, I mean I was listening to your podcast with Russell T. D. I love Telly. I watch loads of Tell And yeah. We can't lose what books give you, which are Empathy, creativity and intelligence Granger knows when you're a procurement manager for an office park, you're not managing one building. you're managing all of them. And to stay ahead, you need to see through walls and around corners. Lights about to fail, filters ready to clog, HVac on its last leg, If you wait until something breaks, you're already behind. Count on Granger for quality products, easy reordering, and twenty four seven support Call one eight hundred Ganger, click Granger. com or just stop by. Granger, for the ones who get it done Where do you think the evangelical side of this comes from, then? What for me? Yeah Well because that's interesting. It's because because I feel very strongly that we need the children of the future to be even more intelligent, even more empathetic, and even more creative than ever. If they're going to face some of the challenges facing us all, if we're not you know, if we've got to see hope for the future I'm a big believer in hope. We need to train up. Look at you, guys. You need a little. I'm a big believer in hope. I just always think of that line in clockwise, the John Clees line in Cla says I can with I can deal with the despair. It's the hope that gets me every time. Since arrsenal just won There you go. Anthing is possible. This is absolutely true. This is absolutely true. I believe in Yeah I ask about the evangelizing because for you, clearly, books were not a sort of an escape from a an unpleasant childhood or I mean for many people they were. I don't think you went to boarding school until sixth form, did you? No. So because I was at boarding school and books let me not be at boarding school for a while and for people from much tougher upbringings to the mind, books sometimes become a wonderful escape, particularly books in the kind of territory that you explore and the kind of writers that you love the most That escape You are an escapist author who didn't need to escape from anything, really I love that. You are assuming that. Well I am assuming that because you talk so fondly about your father and you. But you know, things are of course more interesting and complex than that. No I know that. a writer I mean, it would be very it's much better for you know happiness is always a mix. These happiness and complications are always mixed together in an interesting way and I wouldn't have anything to write about. My signing ceues are full of children and often now young adults who don't necessarily fit in You know, the heroes in my books are always Often they accidentally turn out to be, you know misfits and people who don't necessarily fit in with their peer group. was that And that was definitely I think, I mean, I'm just assuming yeah no it was. because it can't be an accident. It can't be It can't be an accident It isn't an accident. I'm interested in And thingsings that other think a little bit differently and Kids who don't fit in are kids who are bullied and who are maybe struggling in a school environment which can be more complicated U Yeah, and can be difficult for a child who is a bit different. Of course. Yeah. And that's very that's one of the great That's one of the very great things about being writer is if you get to meet somebody who said those books meant something to me when I was having a difficult time and you know hiccup or wish or one of my characters was my friend when I didn't have any friends. You know there are books about very much about that. Do doesnn't get much better than that No wrers not. What books were in that space for you when you were looking? Well, I' read lot of read a lot of fantasy books when I was a kid. Wizard Aiversity, Jred in Wizards Aversseity, I'm just thinking Peppy Long stocking. I like stories with strong female heroes, which there weren't that many, frankly when I was growing up and People Longstong is very strong very empowering U Especially your friend. I felt quite powerless as a child. Right. Yeah. And so I loved reading stories about children who were heroes who could be powerful. Okay. And I give you know, a lot of my heroes have magic powers literally in Wizards once and which way to anywhere. I think that's because children And I got told off an awful lot at school for for for well, for moving around for really still, for being dreamy, for not understanding the assignment. Yeah, for being For not necessarily fitting For not being a cookie cutter. Well not y, yeah, not doing the homework and not because I was particularly oppositional, but because I didn't know what it was and I didn't know yeah. So I identify with those kind of kids and my sister was dyslexic and so I had a firsthand experience about what that was like Did you have teachers that did appreciate you? Did you have sort of? No, I did, I really remembember the ones who did Miss Mellllowows, thank you. Miss Mellow. Reaching back sounds like a character, doesn't it Miss Sounds like a ro dark character. It does It does. She'd be nice, wouldn't she?. Yeah, and she gave me a special book where I could Write what I wanted in the handwriting and the spelling didn't matter A So yeah, no, I think I had a strong I think yeah, I think most writers are writing from a more complicated position. Otherwise you wouldn't write something that resonated with other people. Life is not entirely happy of course. Of course if you are lucky enough. Just tell me a bit about your mum as well, if you would, because she was also busy was Um Passionate herself. Yeah. ye. Both the adults, the adults were busy Yeahah. Yeahes she when I was very little, she was very young and very young, eighteen, nineteen, and she went back to university when I was little, studied English. Yeah, the adults, I mean, I think this was a nineteen seventies thing as well. They were very busy. And also there was There There was a lot of I don't know where you grew up. was I was born in seventy two. Okay. So it was not far behind you. Not far behind. The kind of notion of childcare was very much you got on with it as kids. Yeah Open up the front door I you got kids out. Yeah. and then just even in town. Oh even in town. Yeah. I went to school aged six all the way across London with my little sister agge five. Gh on Nober eleventh. You were taking a stay things You were taking your sister, you holding her. But that that was normal. Anybody growing up in the nineteen seventies would recognize that. That was totally normal So so yeah, I was in charge of the entertainment section, I reckon as the eldest of three and the eldest of my cousins. And so yeah, the adults were busy and They were my mother was, yeah. she studied English at university and she's campaigned for the Magie centers. She's a real driving force behind those. They were very dynamic the adults very shose into books very they were, u ye, inspiring And also yeah, yeah, we were Well you So you left your own devices in a way and you would entertain yourself you would do that by by drawing and writing. D that start. Can you remember that beginning or has it always been that I was always yeah, drawing always drawing a lines and creating and and And yeah, on that island, I was definitely in charge of entertaining everybody else. I remember reading aloud to the other kids books that I loved and making them laugh and you know them saying just one more chapter. and yeah And so that definitely began there. Um, yeah This is sorry that I'm just sort of tallying this with the thing I read about you then your enthusiasm for things like Chaucer a little later when you got to when you got to St when you got to Marborough, I suppose. wasas it before that? And you have the same enthusiasm for the quite high literature that you had for the stories that you were sharing with children Yeah I had a really I mean, I loved thingsin and maybe that's why I didn't maybe that's why I didn't fit in. Wh knows? Yeah, not everybody. Yeah I was deeply enthusiastic act Ch. I was very. I think that's wonderful I absolutely ate it. I was deeply into that sort of thing. But I was also into Batman, two thousand eightD, you know, peanuts, You know, I was very visual. I with asterisks. Russell T. Davy said he was really into asterisks. I loveved that. veryy influenced by it I love the Roman history told in, you know because Viking history so I love. I would say what you call Bino my brother had a subscription to the Bino and I got to read that. You know, so I you know, high culture, low culture, I didn't care. I was just really into everything onene of those great and maybe one of the reasons I didn't fit in was precisely that when I had teenagers. I realized that they, you know, teenagers hang back They've got the so the memo about how you I said then. pererhaps it was the enthusiasm rather than the actual interests that were the Yeah that marks you out. That kind of you can't contain your enthusim. I mean that's not cool. That is not cool I'mids. Hello. I'm Cresida, you know. Come and read Chauceer amazingly, amazingly that didn't necessar S me the soest just g in the school. I have no idea why. Butah, the thing is actually later in life, you know what? peopleople find that I have found quite endearing Well it But we forget what it's like to be school. You have to get through school. You have to get through school where it is not cool.. But you were obviously clever. You were obviously clever because you went to Staint Paul's, which was furious still is furiously academic, a veryic environment. It is. Is this where hands were placed on your shoulders metaphorically to tell you that perhaps or even perhaps actually, literally the things that you found most engaging and exciting were not really the sort of things that you should be doing. Okay So So I I have mixed it because that' so You're right. I I was a smart and very interested kid. And I loved u I love the feminism of St. Paul's. be know and I really appreciated that And I can appreciate that looking back as well. You know, it' Growing up as a woman in or young girl in the nineteen seventies actually shoot growing up even now, even now little two year old and three year old boys interrupt little two year old and three year old girls twice as much as the other way around, you know. Cool Yeah. But you know, growing up, yeah I think I was lucky to go to a school with because yeah I love that. I love the feminism of Puse. But it was a school where you know the arts, I think the ambition for I don't know what it's like now, but the ambition and quite rightly, I can see why You know the ambitions there were definitely success was being a doctor, an engineer. All of the areas which I would say this is talking in stereotypes. the st typically male dominated areas. Right wasas there ambition andefinitely to go to either Oxford or Cambridge or one of those places. So they said to you that you were too clever or too academic to do A level art. Yeah. That is what you're talking about. That is exactly Wow, you've really done your research. canan I just say? Fis. Yeah, Dressed And that's why you shifted school at S. Yeah, yeah, because I wanted to do art at A level. I'd say when you went home and said, I really want to do art at A level. I'm going to they won't let me do it at Staint Paul. so I want to go somewhere else. Yeah, they were very supportive that's thought Interesting So I thought they might have been. I think they probably realized by this stage in your life that you weren't likely to be contained within the St. Paul's shaped Paradigm. That's interesting. yeah Yeah, and also but I so wasn't that you know, I was I still massively struggled with organization. Yeah. So Iy Cressy. Yes. Yes, I read that as well. I't just make that up so people listening. that's part of the capacious research that I've done. N No, I didn't I was I was in trouble a lot at St. Paul's, you know for not getting in the homework. I hadn' a clue, you know, what the homework was, how to get it in on time. and that was making me unhappy. it really was. O levels and GCSEs now, it's an organizational exercise until you can You know, but by the time you get to A levels and you can sort of specialize, it it's difficult for a kid who struggles with organization I mean, there was no I'm not sure I'm sure you can be sort of diagnosed with stuff nowadays. God knows if you have Organisation are issues that are very profound, but that was not an option obviously in the nineteen. Well I was wondering about that because there's something really heartbreaking about people who are not willfully naughty And what we do when we're young and we're getting into a lot of trouble, think we think that we must somehow be willfully naughty because we keep getting into trouble. And yet what you're describing and we would probably call it neurodiversity now Yeah But what you're describing is getting into trouble and therefore becoming the naughty person or the messy person Yeah. Due to things over which you have next to no control, it's heartbreaking that When you think about it? it is, isn't it? Thank you. That was interesting. come on. I there's the first time for everything. But you see, yeah, no that's when you put it like that and you put that I put that very much into the heroes.. that's what happens with the heroes in most of my books is that they for different reasons, they get in trouble whole heart. Yes, exactly. things like that. Yes. And the reader is there going, but they shouldn't be in trouble. But they were doing the right thing or they thought they were helping Well they can't helping. can't helping like that Ituse the dragon's fault? Yeah, Yeah. no, that happens a lot to herear. I a strong sense Yeah. It's injustice. Sorry. It's injustice that you're addressing. It's fundamental injustice and of some childhoods. Yeah And I'm in that. I'm very interested in that. I'm interested in injustice in general. I think children are interested in injustice. Lually. It's a simple moral Universe sometimes for a child, they know what's right and wrong and they know and quite often the people who are doing right end up being treated like they were the ones doing wrong. and that runs through your work, right black backteristic and massively through. and what's What's interesting also is I'm able in children's books often are often I mean, this is another I Children's book are often underestimated underestimated. And I write I've been extremely lucky in how to train your Dragon to be able to I write a twelve book series. I was interested in what Russell T. Davis says about writing for television where you're able to write a long story in long episodes. So I'm able to write about you know, things that are yeah, unjust You know hicicku up at the beginning, the first four books of how to train a Dragon. It's a sort of smaller world for Hiccup. This is what happens as we get oldlder. Anyway. So he's fighting for injustice for his friend Fushlegs's being bullied. And then as you go through the series and it gets a bit you know, he's then fighting against his Um whole world who believe in in he You know, they're enslaving the dragons, they're, you know, doing all of these kind of bad things and this I mean, this is also true. There's a huge Viking slave trade in B back in times, Dublin was a big centre, so I'm addressing huge issues in how to trade your track and books of social injustice, which Hiccup then has to address. Anyway, yes. So and that probably does begin maybe yeah Granger knows when you're a procurement manager for an office park, you're not managing one building, you're managing all of them. And to stay ahead, you need to see through walls and around corners. Lights about to fail, filters ready to clog, HVC on its last leg? If you wait until something breaks, you're already behind. Count on Granger for quality products, easy reordering, and twenty four seven support Call one eight hundred Granger, click Granger. com or just stop by. Granger For the ones who get it done. So you get to Mellborough, where your best friend is I didn't know this until today is Lauren Child of Charlie and Lola Yeah. So Yeah That's moing. That's sort of a little small world moment, isn't it Well, is it Is it or isn't it Hckup? There are no accidents. I don't know. There aren't accidents because in a way, of course we were drawn to each other because of our kind of interests. And Lauren's father was the art teacher at Marborough and he was a phenomenal art teacher. He was incredibly charismatic very, u, you know, very inspiring. A third of the u of the children who took A level took Art at A level, which is unusual. I know. Picularly He must have been good. Yeah, he must have been good because it's difficult to get people to take art serious. Definitely. Yeah, even now. I mean good. you know, the art subjects are massively take up, particularly well in both state and take up of art at G says's massively gone down Anyway He was a incredibly charismatic art teacher. And you became tight immediately, you two came very and and presumably sort of pushed each other to start exploring your own creativity, sort of showing each other stuff. ye. And she was already drawing characters that yeah. And yeah, she was drawing characters that later turned into Charlie and Lola We've remained very good friends and I loved that when I read that. I don't know why it had a lovely symmetry to it that friendship. It it' sort of Nice to be able to speak to somebody who understands this mad world you've ended up in so completely as well. Yeah Yeah, my daughter Maisie my daughter Clemy is her g daughter. My daughter, Maie An Clemy also work Lola in the television series, they were the voices of Lola in the television series. Yeah, because so I've heard them say Sorin Lawrenson Sorry. I'veard say Sorah and Lawrence. You would' have heard them say Sor and Lawrence love Thes yeah. But obviously the academics kicked in a bit because you end up at Keybool College, Oxford. So was there a moment of application or did you just sort of stumble happily towards success Heo. I um I only answered There was an entrance exam and I only answered one question. three. Right. Have I told that story before? No not this story in particular. I love the because those entrance exams don't really exist anymore, do they? In quite the same way. But they were looking for something that wasn't necessarily linked to how hard you'd been working for the last two years. They were looking for a brain that they wanted to train or a brain that they thought they could work And they were looking for somebody who was, yeah, fascinated in the subject Yeah. and I was so I wasn't a very good timekeeper and I was absolutely passionate. I think it was the question I answered was on was on DH Lawrence and I just went on so long that I forgot about the other two questions. And And I was lucky in the sense that a lot of a lot of A lot of people might have just thought, o, this person can't take his exams and therefore we're not going. Whereas what they thought was good Lord, this person has a relationship with DHL. Yeah, yeah, yeah has a relationship anyway. and then so I was amazed to get an interview. And then I turned up and yeah, and they said, what would you have answered on you know, and so I just told them what I the other two wasn't I wasn't interested in the other two questions. it was just I I really did struggle with organisation. I get around to around? I was so excited about GH Lawrence. I mean, if I'd started with Shakespeare, I probably would have gone on for the whole time about Shakespeare, but I just, yeah U so yeah. so what I mean I was lucky with that. Well was lucky I suppose lucky that it was been marked by someone that appreciated you, but you'd kind of hope that a paper like that would have been marked by somebody who pick up on your passion and your Yeah your depth of knowledge. And then you got there. So would it I mean, would it have been as you were nearing graduation, would people have been thinking maybe a career in academia? would you Oh my goodness. Yeah. I don't know. At one point, yeah, somebody did yeah, one of my tutors did suggest that quite early on. One of my teachers there was in fact, Frank Cotral Boyce Okay. Yeah, who is the current children's n?. And I don't think it was him who suggest I went into academia. but He was incredibly inspiring to me because he was he was already writing for bookside and he was very he was very intellectual. He' incredibly intelligent guy, Frank. But he was also he gave some he gave one tutorial on two thousand and AD. Okay. Elstraser. Yeah, it really was. but it was interesting, it was empowering for me to see someomebody who is making a living at something. You know, upp until then I suppose I'd seen English as quite an academic subject. But to see somebody who was actually making a living in that area wasn't something I'd seen before. Right. You know, I hadn't I didn't you know, my dad was working as a businessman. you know, my grandfather was a politician and was, you know, my You know, these people I didn't that's what see anybody that's what jobs were. I didn't see u jobs as being, you know Yeah being And also your father had this dichotomy. So there is job and then there is the life of the mind. Th there So then there is They' very neatly demarcated, aren't they? what you saw at Oxford was that actually you can have both in the same Yeah, package. Well, yes, I mean, only in really Frank. I mean the rest it was all Chaucer and learning Anglo Saxon, you know, which luckily I loved. And the Vikings, you really. Yeah, yeah, I loved it. But there wasn't the creativity So you begin to think, maybe there's a job here. Maybe there's something I can do that would allow me to indulge all of the things I really love. I think paid Yes They're still There still is not enough understanding of the creative industry, you know, the creative industries You outperform the rest of the economy by double. but we just don't value that enough We really don't. We you know Th those dragon movies are being made in Elstreet Yeah right now. You've just finished rap rapping on that or whatever you know doing whatever you do. I think that's a rat. I can't remember It's a rat It's a rat. It's a rat. It's a rat. And that's hundreds of jobs. I mean, even if you watch the bloody creditss at the end of one of them Theres so many people involved that isn't everybody and then there's all the other stuff going on. as big a rightless almost a Victorian attitude too.. A bit like the teachers you had who thought you were Do something worthwhile. Yeah. when in fact you weren't. Exactly.'s just don't and then you not talking about the knock on we're fantastic at, you know, arts, music You know, and then you're talking about the knock on jobs in our museums and, you know, the tourist industry, you know, they're still You know in that, you know, that everybody's, you know, that guy who died hundreds of years ago, Shakespeare you that Stratford on Avven. it's, you know generates more cash. Yeah it's National economy than anyone who's still alive. Exactly. We good at this stuff. So when did you first think Wend did because because then you go off on a on a, you know, you do do an MA Bon, you go to Stt Martin's Sch. I go to China and teach. Oh I didn't know that. Oh yeah, I went to China and I too actually that was before university. That was a big experience for me because it was Yeah, I went I taught in China. Yeah Anyway, what yeah When did you sort of first frame the thought that I could write a I could write books? profession for a job for people Um Uh I'm looking back through time. I suppose I was beginning to think that through the I mean I worked in publishing very clullally. I was terrible. We need to be quite organised in publishing Because you need to organise the writers. You do need to be quite organised. And I think it was the first time that was very that was very That was difficult because for the first time, at least at school I could kind of compensate by being very interested in what I was doing. but there I really was not good. I was stuck There was no hiding place. in publishing There is no hiding place. There' nowhere el hide. nowhere to hide. I still remember hiding sort of letters behind a filing cabinet. I was the worst assistant in the whole world. I really was terrible. And so yeah, so I think I realised I couldn't I couldn't make a living at that And so yeah, I went back to art school and yeah, I was beginning to think that maybe that was something that I could do Yeah. And you've never stopped writing. I mean throughout your childhood and through I mean, even when you were being a sort of earnest undergraduate, were you still doing your own things? Were you still writing and illustrating your own stuff or did this never starting Yeah even at school as a young person. Yeahah, I remember I was I wrote a book with a friend called And Gora of the Shetland Isisles. Great time which was like a thank you. It was sort of romantic novel. We were trying to write a romantic novel. Yeah, no, I was always writing, always writing as a kid. So got you've got the St Martin's training, you've got the MA and narrative Iillustration at Brighton in your back pocket. and yeah. and you come out of the blocks at a hundred miles an hour, really in terms of getting published and getting Yes and no. It gone? Yes and no. I would say yeah, no I was very lucky I entered a u I entered a prize called the McMillan Children's Book Prize and I met an editor So I was very lucky. My friend Lauren who is incredibly talented. It took her much longer to get published just because she didn't, you know, most people you know, but I was lucky in I happened to meet an editor through that children's book prize thing and it's not you know, sure. it's not about long time is it? Well, yeah, but but sometimes you know, I think You know, incredibly sort of celebratedors writers. it can take a long time to get published. So I was lucky in that. but my first I mean five or six books were picture books and I would say they were only moderately successful. Yeah, I didn't mean that when I said a hundred miles now, I just meant that you didn't have a long sort of get. No as you say, it's ind. unusual. So you know, to anybody who's out there written something and you know, that is very unusual It certainly wasn't You know, for the first, I had little children. I recall I wasn't You'd married Simon Cowell by this point I had not that seing I know how many times in your life I was just going leave it hanging actually for the podcast. I was just going to let the listeners puzzle over that one for themselves. Yeah But so you'd married, you'd had children, you' books on the. But in the same year that Little Ba Peep's library book came out, you did the first Hiccup book. Is that right? The Viking was How much later was that? That was a couple of years A couple of years later. It was a pitch book. and again, it was not It was not again I'd say this because I think kids today particularly imagine you immediately boom a success. L like a firework. And also that writing you don't want to give, you know, it is a job that you have to do because you love it because average pay of a writer is just terrible. And I don't want to give, you know anybody I think the phrase is the raw impression. Not particularly wow is how you have described your first five books reception. I mean, I loved no, I mean, I loved doing them. Yes No exactly the recept Joy to be but I just, you know, you have to You have to go you know, you can write the most incredible books read it. And sometimes you know, you don't just don't have that you know bill for whatever reason, people are not going So it is something you have to go in into I think, because you because you love it. you have to write for yourself. Sorry. You write for yourself and then hope that other people enjoy it as much as you do in or not. Yeah, no, I think ice bace I think you are often or you're trying to work out thing definitely you are Actually in the wizards of Wce books, I said that, you know, a story is a crucible and it changes The person who the characters within it and the person who's reading it and the person who is writing it all at the same time. And I think that's what the best stories do do you're looking for an answer yourself. you're questioning, you're on a journey, you're literally on a quest when you're writing a book. The best books do that. That's what I'm trying to do every single time I write a book. But I am thinking about, how it's going to land, but I deliberately set out to make myself think or make myself laugh or make myself cry or move myself or ask questions and challenge myself when I'm writing a book When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant, you keep production lines moving and quality on track because there is no room for slowdowns. With Granger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts, and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place so nothing gets in the way of getting the job done Call one eight hundred Granger, click ranger d. com or just stop by. Granger, for the ones who get it done When did Hiccup and toothless first appear in your in your consciousness Well, Hiccup, you're right, it started with Hiccup The Viking Wh who was se, which was a picture book. But where did he come from? Moderately successful? Oh well, I mean, clearly,ry actually I didn't do this consciously at all. And again, I think I mean, it's going to sound so pretentious when I say it, but who cares? I'm just gonna go for it Yeah I think you partly know what you're doing, but it's quite good to partly not know what you're doing when you're a writer. So I can't say I absolutely knew that Hiccup was me and Stoick was a version of my dad. But after I'd done it, my goodness, I did, you know, I drew that picture of Hiccup A small lonely Viking in a fierce and frosty land, is fsty land. That is Hiccup. And then I drew Hiccup's dad. And yeah, that was yeah, it was a version of me and the father is a version of my dad and the island is a version of my childhood. Yeah, my childhood on that island And yeah, I sense you can't have one without the other. You couldn't have the picture without personality, the way you talk about it, I can't draw, I probably can't write either to be honest. but the way you speak is as if the two are beyond interchangeable, they're kind of utterly inextricable. Yeah. Is that right? Yeah. I certainly if I come to a difficult bit in the books or I will always go back to the pencil or to the pen. or if I'm you know struggling to define a character, I would draw the character, or a location I would draw a map of the place and as soon as you've drawn the map of the place, you know it's treating an imaginary place like it's a real place and you know how long it takes to get from one place to another. So it's so for me the pencil and also it's the unconscious again, the unconscious comes out when you put pen to paper. It's you know, a pencil it's the first instrument that you use As a child And so I think that is why if you're trying to write a moving bit or a poetic bit, I will return to the pencil because the unconscious comes out in that Hiccup is another name for an accident. That is not an accident. That is definitely not an accident. Yeah, that Hiccup is called that And then I mean, it's quite hard to properly articulates not quite the right word because then you know, a few years later, by the sort of two thousand The second half of the first decade of this this of this century, you really, really explode. I mean, did it happen slowly or did it happen almost overnight? because it wasn't the first book that was the first book when you wrote how to train your dragon that went bonkers, but No, no was So it was a slow thing and then everybody went back and bought the whole sereries to that point. I mean,, you tell me how it happened. And when did you think for the first time holy Moly, this is ridiculous, M. Okay, well, how to train your dragon? the fiction, the first So I took a picture book character and made it into this was my first young fiction. And I was really lucky actually, nobody was paying any attention of my publishers I kn if he would pay any attention at my publishers. So I had a very talented designer called Dave MacIintosh and I said to David, I want to make it like it's two hundred page picture book. That's where I came from. So I don't want to just leave holes where the pictures should be. I want to design it organically so that the pictures and the text work together like not quite a graphic novel, but it's like it's a picture book. So it's like the text You know, the action, yeah. And that was quite an unusual I just said about being utterly unexstandable. Uutterly that's exactly what you said. And it's completely so and that was an unusual way and much more complicated way of designing a book. production terms. Yeah, but luckily David was really was really happy to he thought it would be interesting. And so we did it without anybody really concentrating U And it wasn't even my publisher's Book of the mononth at the time. It wasn't a hback. You know, I can obviously remember the name as a book of the harback that was the book of the mononth, you know, because it was yeah a bit painful not to be. But you know but but it immediately I mean, if it felt like I'm always I always identify with You know, and a Hiccup is was is not the kind of He's not the hero like who is the obvious hero I'm always interested in being you know, do Yeah, if you like to call it the underdog or something. So I li the fact it was a bit culty. It was very culty. Right. I mean it was peopleeople took it to their hearts Waterstones actually really got behind it and they put it. a lot of people you know people were hand selling it in the Indies and the Waterstones and things. they kind of loved it. but it was quite culty, I would say. And I was really I liked that. and it found it passionate readership Um parents were reading it a lot to their kids, which I'd deliberately made it. I'd made it something like that. I'd deliberately made made it kind of so that the adult, you know vi sounded like this. ex. I made it a performance. something that worked for adults and children at the same time So it found a real audience But it was not her Megap best seller. No audience. beginning. It gradually was actually it was a long time before the movie even Yes no, I know. So because the movie was twenty ten. and It was beginning to really ramp up a couple of years before that. It was a real slow build And then of course when the movie came out, it really that's when it really did explode. Yeahah, they how to train your raagon h and pushes you into a place that you'd never dreamt of really in terms of profile and access and Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. and got lots and lots of readers who were not necessarily from book reading families or just had not really kids who just hadn't found, you know the book that they loved But they loved the movie and then they thought it was worth trying the books. you know Well that was wonderful But you know, it was very slow, it didn't happen. There was not an overnight Oh And for a long time I didn't think they were going to make the movie either. and you know say they usually don't They usually don't.t even when you've signed deals and options and all of that sort of thing. Yeah. And then of course it gives you the freedom to throw considerably more heft behind your evangelizing. So behind things like freeriting Friday and your passion for a reading charter and all the stuff that you've done with the profile of the success that it's brought. and yeah. and and now he's back. So twelve books of of how to train your dragon. And then of course You did the wizards of Onewitich also I mean smashed it to coin a phrase, all the awards for fantasy novels there and and and beautiful stuff, which, you know must be nice for you to sort of have lots of different imaginary world spinning in your head where you can choose which one you're going to visit today or you can choose which one you're going to visit for the next six months. and and now you're back now you're back with How to train your drag in school? How to train your drag in school? Yeah Is it it like coming home? It's like putting on a pair of comfy slippers or something when you sit down at your desk and stop. Going back to going back to a world that you loved and the characters that you love, Yeah, because they do feel real in your head. They turn out. It feel read in everyone's head. Yeah. well, hopefully you've done it right Yes, yes, yes. It does, yeah It does feel real. Yes, it' it there is a there is a comfort in that going back to characters that you U lot yeah, It's a prequ this is the same No no this isn't this isn't a prequel How would you describe it? So I'm just I'm now picking it up. This is this isn't a prequ. start mid It's sack mid the House of Train of Dragon series and it's not a sequel either. I get so many kids saying, will you write House Trainy Dragon thirteen. And I haven't had time yet, but this starts sort of middle of the series and it's very deliberately, okay I' What's going on not in the books that already written Yes, but what I'm gonna fess up what it is Okay. This is me back to my quest. This is me back to my quest to get children reading R You know because It is a hu this is so much to do with what I do is to do with that And this is because Yeah the latest statistics are terrible. On one in three children reading for pleasure. And so this one these ones they're to fit in with the movies because I' got these live action movies coming out at the moment. So they're a bit shorter they're even more visual and they've got you know dragon profiles and a Dragonese dictionary They're a way in for kids who love the movies And so I'm trying to get them. trying to Delliberately it' utterly undaunting is what it is. Uutterly undaunting. I mean I always make the covers look it look like a sweet. Yes. It's supposed to look like a sweet. Gh And I'll never not see that. Yeah. It's like a sweet look of Brussels sprouts. Yes, yes. you know, so it's and often I have you know, dragons, talons. It looks like an exciting object. It looks like it's been down to the bottom of the ocean and ink slats and The illustrative style is often very scribbly. I kind of scratch through the text so that it's almost like physically dragging. There's a lot of wild mark making that drags the child reader from left to right through the and it's really deliberately done the child into reading. You know, the illustrations are very There's a mixture of illustrations and this is all love hugely thought through clearly, which is to do you know, a lot of them are sort of quite cartoony and emotional because I'm telling I'm telling stories that are funny stories but also adventure stories but are moving you as well.. So they're sort of the cartoony ones drag the child through the story, but they also are very emotional. So it makes you and I draw them very softly and it makes makes the child feel affection for that character. It's But they're also done in a way, you know, Quentin Blake's illustrations for Rd Dahl, which were actually very revolutionary at the time. They're very childlike, so they look like, and they can't but hered They look almost like a child could do them. You know, they couldn't, but you know But it sort of says come in It says, come in, this is a joyful object. This is a play object. You know, these things at the back all look like You know, topop Trump cards, their dragon profiles, it feels like a toy object And then there's the world buildilding illustrations, which make you feel that the world is real But the whole thing is deliberately shorter, very visual fits in with the film Yeah so that to move a kid along from watching movie and into reading the books You know, because yeah. And so that's why I've designed it like that. And this is the second one, how to train your Dragon School fight of the Flame Strike. and it's it's a shorter story. you know, takes, you know place around a single lesson that then turns into a big adventure. but it's very deliberately done to try and get children into could be really how to train have to train a child to read. Yeah ye. I love it. It's a plan. I love it. It's like, yeah. Have you ever had final question? Be it's clear that your ambitions, all the ambitions we've discussed involve getting children to read, notot just your stuff, but just getting children to read. And of course, had you had formal ambitions when you set out, you'd have ticked most boxes you bestsellers, I think over sixteen million copies sold now, blockbuster films countless awards, Do you have any? boxes that still are't ticked, just on a personal professional level, something You know, have you been your publisher's book of the mononth yet? I think once twice. The thing is OkayK, there's a character in friends, their series friends who sort of constantly saying, A I the ultimate fighting champion? Yeah. How I? And the thing is there's always, I think is every child, is every child in the UK reading for pleasure yet No, they're not. Of course they're not And so so I don't I think endlessly and you know, a lot of My goodness, a lot of the themes of my books are about looking after the environment and you know, some of the challenges that, you know, the dragons represent the w in which way to anywhere there's a lot of you know, all of my books have the theme of looking after the wild and kind of leaders do we deserve? and all of those kind of you know, you know, are we looking after the wild in the way that we should? No, we're not. you know, So there's still so much to write about and so much to think about and so much to Do we have leaders who are empathetic, intelligent and creative? You know, are we you know, this is Okay, I'm going to end on a happy not onene of the things about writing for children is how incredibly wonderful it is to interact with children. Okay, this week I did loads of talks and that's great because you go out and meet lots of children. There's a question I often ask kids in the talk and I say, what kind of magical power would you have five year old puts up her hand. And I say, Okay, what's your magical power And she said, My magical power is to have to take other people's magical powers, make them better and then give them back to them Yeah.