| CILIP Carnegie Kate Greenaway Medals Winners Announced 25th June 2009 |
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Siobhan Dowd wins posthumous CILIP Carnegie Medal FEET FIRST!
WRITER’S FINAL WORDS Siobhan Dowd wins posthumous CILIP Carnegie Medal Two years after her untimely death from breast cancer at the age of 47, Siobhan Dowd’s fourth and final novel, ‘Bog Child’, has been awarded the UK’s premier accolade for children’s writing: the CILIP Carnegie Medal 2009. This is the greatest endorsement of the quality of Siobhan’s writing yet, comments her editor and publisher, David Fickling. The CILIP Carnegie Medal has real integrity and is unique amongst literary awards: there is no prize money; it does not reflect the commercial interests of publishers and book-sellers; it does not depend on votes or the celebrity status of the author. Judged by librarians who spend their lives connecting young people to good writing it is the purest recognition of quality writing for children. Siobhan wrote her fourth and final novel ‘Bog Child’ in Spring 2007, completing it just as Waterstone’s named her one of only three children’s authors amongst their 25 ‘Great Writers of the Future’. ‘Bog Child’ is set in Northern Ireland at the height of the Troubles. The story opens in 1981 close to the North-South border as teenager Fergus McCann makes an illicit raid to the South to gather peat with his uncle and discovers a child’s body buried in the bogs, perfectly preserved for 2000 years. The child’s history unfolds as Fergus struggles with the normal challenges of being a teenager: his driving test, ‘A’ levels, his ambition to study medicine and first love for the flighty Cora. But this is also a time of war in Northern Ireland and Fergus must deal with exceptional circumstances: his parents arguing over the Troubles, the mounting pressure on him to take sides in a raging sectarian conflict; and a brother on hunger strike in the Maze Set against the bleakest of backdrops, ‘Bog Child’ is also profoundly heart warming, comments Chair of the Judges, Joy Court. This is thanks to Dowd’s extraordinary ability to illuminate the dark corners of human existence. The reader is drawn totally into Fergus’s world; the turbulence of adolescence is vividly portrayed and equally vividly evoked is the political conflict of the time. Her story is told with great sympathy without ever descending into sentimentality, and there’s a surprising amount of humour too. A truly outstanding novel of great humanity. In 2006 her fictional debut ‘A Swift Pure Cry’ was published, bringing her instant critical recognition along with several awards: the Eilis Dillon award in Ireland for a first children’s book and the Branford Boase Award. It was also shortlisted for the Booktrust Teenage Prize and the CILIP Carnegie Medal. ‘The London Eye Mystery’ was eventually published in 2007 winning the NASEN & TES Special Educational Needs Children’s Book Award and the Bisto Award in Ireland. In May 2007, Waterstone’s named her as one of their ‘25 authors of the future’.
FEET FIRST! Inspired by a wild hare and her own large-ish feet, Edinburgh-based illustrator Catherine Rayner has won the 2009 CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal, the UK’s most prestigious award for children’s book illustration Catherine, 27, wins the 2009 Medal for only her second published book, ‘Harris Finds His Feet’ in which Harris, a small hare with big feet goes out into the world with his Grandad, from whom he learns not only how to hop high into the sky and run very fast, but also about the joys of growing up and of independence. Of this year’s winning book, Joy Court, Chair of the CILIP Kate Greenaway judging panel comments: Harris is a triumph, from the way he moves and his expressions to his velvety fur and his oversized feet. His relationship with his Grandad is beautifully evoked as are the times of day and the textures of the exquisite landscapes around him, in a book which oozes charm and glows with colour.
Catherine Rayner was born in 1982 in Harrogate and studied Illustration at Edinburgh College of Art. She fell in love with the city and now lives there with her fiancé Colin, and a small menagerie of animals: Shannon the horse, Ena the grey cat, and a speckly guinea pig called Marvin. In 2006, Catherine was named Best New Illustrator at the Booktrust Early Years Awards, and in the December of that year, ‘Augustus and His Smile’was selected as one of five picture books to be recommended on Channel 4’s “Richard and Judy Christmas Party”. In 2008 she was selected as one of the ten best new illustrators for Booktrust’s “Big Picture Campaign”, an initiative designed to put picture books firmly in the public eye.
Awards announcement info: www.ckg.org.uk/2009awards Press releases: www.ckg.org.uk/pressdesk
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