Julia Donaldson to talk of Gruffalo, storytelling, recitation at JLF

New Delhi: Julia Donaldson, author of some of the world's best-loved children's books, will take the audience at the Jaipur Literature Festival on a journey of storytelling, performance and recitation besides talking about her popular creation -- The Gruffalo.

At a session "In On Page, On Stage and On Screen" on January 27, Donaldson, her husband and paediatrician Malcolm Donaldson and actor Daryl Shute will be in conversation with Nupur Paiva on the vibrant and exuberant parallel world for young readers that The Gruffalo has created.

She will speak on writing for children, the strong performative element in her work and the process of transforming The Gruffalo and other books into a film by Magic Light Pictures.

Pan Macmillan India is hosting Donaldson's first promotional tour to India which began on India January 18 and will continue till January 30.

She held interactive sessions in Delhi and Kolkata and will also travel to Mumbai.

Besides "The Gruffalo" and "The Gruffalo's Child", Donaldson has also written "What the Ladybird Heard" adventures.

Her poems, plays and songs and her live shows are always in demand. She was Childrens Laureate 2011-13 and has been honoured with an MBE for Services to Literature.

Some other books of Donaldson published by Pan Macmillan are "Room on the Broom", "Monkey Puzzle", "The Smartest Giant in Town", "Tyrannosaurus Drip", "Princess Mirror-Belle and the Dragon Pox", "Tales From Acorn Wood: Fox's Socks" and "Charlie Cook's Favourite Book".

The Gruffalo is one of the world's best-loved monsters. Since it was first published in 1999, the award-winning story of his encounter with the little brown mouse in the deep dark wood has continued to delight children and adults the world over.

The Gruffalo has gone on to become very popular and both mouse and monster have become stars of stage and screen as well as story-time favourites.

So where from the inspiration for the Gruffalo come?

Donaldson says in her website, "A book was going to be about a tiger but I couldn't get anything to rhyme with 'tiger'. Then I thought up the lines: 'Silly old fox, doesn't he know/There's no such thing as a ...' and somehow the word 'gruffalo' came to mind to fill the gap."

According to her, "the gruffalo looks the way he does because various things that just happened to rhyme (like toes and nose, and black and back)."