Cressida Cowell

Author Cressida Cowell recently attended a literacy reception held at Clarence House and hosted by our patron HerRH The Duchess of Cornwall. Cressida is perhaps best known for her novel How to Train Your Dragon, which was recently made into a film. In her interview, Cressida tells us what inspires her writing and what she thinks of the library cuts.

What inspires your writing?

Mostly it’s things that interested me as a child, or subjects that I know I would have been interested in myself as a child, rather than my children’s own interests. That being said, That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown (a picture book I did with Neal Layton) was directly influenced by the time my daughter lost her toy dog and I eventually found the dog in the freezer! 

A lot of your titles involve dragons, why dragons?

I think there is something fascinating about dragons to children and all cultures across the world really have been fascinated by them for centuries. There is something about dragons that really grips the imagination of children – the possibility that they could really exist and the idea that maybe we don’t know everything.

In my books I presume that they really did exist and if they really did what would they be like. I have also tried to make them logical, with lots of different species of dragons to try and make the fantasy feel very real.

I used to imagine dragons really existing on an island I used to visit on my summer holidays as a child. I would often imagine that there were dragons living in the caves of this very wild and beautiful place. There were local stories that fed into it, myths from around about.

As a parent, do you think you have a role in supporting your child’s literacy?

I think that as a parent you have a vital role and the problem is if you leave it up to the school, it becomes very “school-y”.  I also think there’s a danger with some parents and schools that we focus on the mechanics of reading. Parents think that because their child is reading a longer book or a more grown-up book that this is somehow better, but it isn’t necessarily the case. Picture books, for example, can have very sophisticated text and vocabulary and if that’s what’s exciting the child, then that’s what is important.

I also try to extend my children’s reading. I even do this with my 13-year-old: I started reading To Kill a Mockingbird with her and I think that she wouldn’t have thought of reading it herself but she will now. Sometimes parents think they have to abandon reading together when their children get too old, but I think it is something you can do moving on.

Do you go on tours of schools?

I do as much as my own children can allow! As my children get older I will be able to do more and more. This year I’m doing a two week tour of schools which I am very excited about as it gives the children the chance to see who it is that does the writing, and it shows them that it may be something they can do too.

I have a lot of schools writing to me, saying that they have been reading my books in schools. I think that’s a wonderful thing – that the teacher is taking some time to read a whole book to the class.

That’s part of the reason why I am trying to develop with the publishers a literacy programme, trying to fit it in my books on Vikings with the National Curriculum work on Vikings. I have teachers write in and say they are studying my books as there are a lot of angles – reluctant readers, the books are attractive to boys, the Vikings, the made-up language. So, I’m hoping that we can produce a package for teachers to use the books in the classroom.

Do you think TV and computers are a distraction from reading books?

They are, but I don’t ban television, although I do try and limit it a bit! I can’t help but think it’s all stories – television and film are still stories and storytelling, they can still fire the imagination. It’s just sometimes nice to have a portion of the day as a reading time for children, and I think that’s something worth keeping up with the demands on children’s time.

Michael Gove recently announced that children as young as 11 ought to be reading 50 books a year. What are your thoughts on this?

I am not keen on stipulations, because books should be a pleasure rather than a chore. My instinct would always be to try and fire children’s imaginations, which is what charities like yourselves are trying to do. Gove is right on the quantity, in that the greater the quantity and, importantly the variety, that children read, the better. 

It is also important to make children realise that there is a pleasure to be had from books, but also to get them interested in different kinds of books and it’s often up to you as a parent to read with them and get them excited. There’s a place for audio tapes too, getting children to read through that. Get them into the story line and they’ll go back to the book.

Do you try and ensure your books also have educational benefits?

I’m very interested in attracting children who might not be readers yet. I get a lot of dyslexic children reading my books and a lot of reluctant readers, even though they are in no way “dumbed-down”. I don’t think you need to make things too simple, I think children like a level of complexity as long as the storylines are very exciting and have loads of cliffhangers.  I also put in loads of pictures and if you do all that I think you can use interesting vocabulary, you can challenge the reader to think about things and you can introduce moral issues. The trick is for me to try and make children think this is fun and exciting and also give them something of value too.

There is a lot in the news about library cuts at the moment. What do you think the future for libraries is?

I’m very sad to hear about the lack of funding because like many I went to the library the whole time. It’s such a valuable resource to the country and to just wave goodbye to it… We are not a manufacturing country, we rely on our creativity as a country so much that I think we ought to be valuing the things like libraries that support that creativity.