Nicholas Allan

Nicholas Allan

About Author

Nicholas Allan's wonderful illustrations and characteristically irreverent humour make him a great favourite with children. Some of Nicholas' most recognised picture book titles include: Jesus' Christmas Party, Heaven and The Queen's Knickers.

Nicholas says 'People may think it's irreverent to talk about the Queen's knickers but it's a subject people do wonder about and through the eyes of a child, it's funny not tacky.'

Nicholas Allan's work has been acclaimed for its warmth and understanding and for his ability to be simultaneously comic and serious.

He has always enjoyed writing and when he was only fourteen, wrote a full-length novel about a murder in a public school. Six years later he wrote a radio play The Visitor, which was accepted by BBC Radio 4.

He gained an honours degree from Slade School of Fine Art, where he studied life painting for four years and also made films.

Since then he has shown work in several art exhibitions. After finishing his MA he moved to London and took on a variety of jobs including working as a waiter, a typist, a switchboard operator and a mural painter.

He also worked for a short time at Chatto & Windus in the Editorial Department before he began writing children's books. Hutchinson published his first picture book, The Hefty Fairy, in 1989.

Nicholas' Hilltop Hospital has now been made into an animated series on CITV. There are eight tie-in books currently available, which feature stills from the animated series.

Nicholas' Demon Teddy won the FCBG Children's Picture Book of the Year Award 1999.

Interview

FATHER CHRISTMAS COMES UP TRUMPS

RED FOX

NOVEMBER 2013


Nicholas Allan has made a name for himself in creating irreverent and funny picture books, including The Queen's Knickers and Jesus's Day Off. Now he has followed up his recent Christmas story, Father Christmas Needs a Wee, with another Christmas-themed title, Father Christmas Comes up Trumps.

In this latest story, Father Christmas is facing another dramatic Christmas Eve dilemma. He needs to be really, really quiet as he delivers children's presents but after a massive dinner that included three helpings of brussel sprouts, his tummy isn't feeling quite right.... Father Christmas wants to trump....!


Nicholas Allan says he began creating picture books about Father Christmas because he wanted a "secular book" to sit alongside his earlier titles, which include Jesus's Christmas Party which is about the nativity. "Christmas is such a magical time for children and I remember it being like that for me as a child, especially as my birthday is around then."

His childhood, before the age of nine, is remembered with great fondness and Allan says this could be why he likes to focus his work on stories that appeal to younger children.

He was born and brought up in Brighton in a house on the front, overlooking the sea. "We spent a lot of time on the beach and in the garden that was shared by all the houses in our street. It had hills and secret places, there was a thicket that was a bit like a maze, and a long tunnel that went under the main road to the beach."

His childhood, he says, "was the only period in my life when I was really happy and after that came an awareness of death". Aged nine, he had pioneering surgery on his heart and, while it was successful, there were several people in the cardiac ward where he was treated "who didn't make it". He says, "I think it changed how I saw things. Before that was the only time I remember the sense of pure joy, a sense of happiness without anything beneath it."

Allan describes creating picture books as "a kind of tonic", something that combines his love of writing and art and which takes him away from the everyday world. "I have always loved both drawing and writing. I studied art and then did a writing course at East Anglia but found that whenever I did one without the other, I missed the other, so doing both in picture books is very fulfilling."

He says he chooses to write about "things that make me laugh; its not really about what will make children laugh although they do laugh about things like bottoms as well".

Allan likes to provoke a reaction with his work, too. "When I was writing The Queen's Knickers, over 20 years ago,it was quite edgy and provocative for that time so that make it much more fun for me to write it. I wrote Where Willy Went, about a sperm, because I thought it would be a funny one to write. I do like anything that has a bit of an edge rather than being bland, or to be funny; I want it to interest me."

He adds, "There are other books I'd love to write, especially about religion, but publishers try to avoid that subject. When I wrote Jesus's Day Off, it took seven years to get it published because publishers were worried about how people might respond to it. Jesus's Christmas Party had similar problems and it was banned in a few bookshops."

Turning to his recent, more secular, approach to Christmas in his Father Christmas books, Allan says it was the title, Father Christmas Needs a Wee, that came to him first. "I felt that it lent itself to a rhyme although I hadn't done a rhyming text at that stage." In this earlier story, Father Christmas finds himself desperate for a wee after drinking the many drinks that people have left out for him on Christmas Eve. It's also a great counting book.

Allan says, "I hadn't planned to write another Father Christmas book after finishing Father Christmas Needs a Wee and I feel Father Christmas Comes Up Trumps is quite a different story. It's about not making a sound, so it's a completely different idea from the first book. This book is also a little more complicated because there is more going on, there are lots of different noises coming from different directions; up, down, under and over and that does make it more difficult to illustrate."

How his stories begin varies; it might start with an image or the idea for a title. It can also start at any part of the story. "As soon as I begin, I draw the ideas with pencil and write the words to develop the story. It's an organic process for me, I write text and images together; I find it hard to imagine working on these separately on a picture book."

When he begins writing, the stories always change, he adds. "I knew that in Father Christmas Needs a Trump, Father Christmas would need to be silent but that there would be noises coming from somewhere. At first I thought that he'd knock something over or something would fall at the wrong moment, but eventually the idea came for the noises to come from Father Christmas himself."

Allan uses a fountain pen, "a cheap one I had at school and still use" to write and draw his picture books because writing with a fountain pen is a slower process than writing with a biro, he says. "I do pen and ink drawings, then I create a dummy book with the pictures and pencil in the text and rough illustrations before doing the final illustrations." His Father Christmas books are both painted in oils, rather than his usual water colours, because he wanted the books to look brighter.

He adds, "It can take months and months to complete a picture book, it's a tough way to live, especially when you throw away work you've just spent a month doing. Other authors do roughs and show it to their publisher before they do the final version but I don't feel I can work like that."

Allan tends to complete a manuscript before he shows it to his publisher. "I get to quite a late stage of writing before I will let anyone see it. That's because, if you tell someone you want to write a story about x and y, they don't always see it the way you do. I once told an editor about a story I wanted to write, she said it would never work but I wrote it anyway and then she bought the story. If I'd have listened to her it would never have got written."

He adds, "Most of what I write is never actually published because either I don't like it or my editor doesn't like it." He estimates that "only about two percent" of what he writes gets into print.

Allan says, "I work really hard on all my picture books because I want to create books that won't disappear from the bookshops a year after they're published; I want my books to last at least a bit longer than me!"

Away from his writing and illustration, Allan has trained as a magician and he uses magic during his picture book events. He says, "My favourite trick is to take two pieces of coloured tissue paper, I tear them up into pieces and when I open it up it's turned into a pair of elaborately coloured knickers. My sleeves are always rolled up so children have no idea where the knickers have come from!"

 

Nicholas Allan has made a name for himself in creating irreverent and funny picture books, including The Queen's Knickers and Jesus's Day Off. Now he has followed up his recent Christmas story, Father Christmas Needs a Wee, with another Christmas-themed title, Father Christmas Comes up Trumps.

In this latest story, Father Christmas is facing another dramatic Christmas Eve dilemma. He needs to be really, really quiet as he delivers children's presents but after a massive dinner that included three helpings of brussel sprouts, his tummy isn't feeling quite right.... Father Christmas wants to trump....!


Nicholas Allan says he began creating picture books about Father Christmas because he wanted a "secular book" to sit alongside his earlier titles, which include Jesus's Christmas Party which is about the nativity. "Christmas is such a magical time for children and I remember it being like that for me as a child, especially as my birthday is around then."

His childhood, before the age of nine, is remembered with great fondness and Allan says this could be why he likes to focus his work on stories that appeal to younger children.

He was born and brought up in Brighton in a house on the front, overlooking the sea. "We spent a lot of time on the beach and in the garden that was shared by all the houses in our street. It had hills and secret places, there was a thicket that was a bit like a maze, and a long tunnel that went under the main road to the beach."

His childhood, he says, "was the only period in my life when I was really happy and after that came an awareness of death". Aged nine, he had pioneering surgery on his heart and, while it was successful, there were several people in the cardiac ward where he was treated "who didn't make it". He says, "I think it changed how I saw things. Before that was the only time I remember the sense of pure joy, a sense of happiness without anything beneath it."

Allan describes creating picture books as "a kind of tonic", something that combines his love of writing and art and which takes him away from the everyday world. "I have always loved both drawing and writing. I studied art and then did a writing course at East Anglia but found that whenever I did one without the other, I missed the other, so doing both in picture books is very fulfilling."

He says he chooses to write about "things that make me laugh; its not really about what will make children laugh although they do laugh about things like bottoms as well".

Allan likes to provoke a reaction with his work, too. "When I was writing The Queen's Knickers, over 20 years ago,it was quite edgy and provocative for that time so that make it much more fun for me to write it. I wrote Where Willy Went, about a sperm, because I thought it would be a funny one to write. I do like anything that has a bit of an edge rather than being bland, or to be funny; I want it to interest me."

He adds, "There are other books I'd love to write, especially about religion, but publishers try to avoid that subject. When I wrote Jesus's Day Off, it took seven years to get it published because publishers were worried about how people might respond to it. Jesus's Christmas Party had similar problems and it was banned in a few bookshops."

Turning to his recent, more secular, approach to Christmas in his Father Christmas books, Allan says it was the title, Father Christmas Needs a Wee, that came to him first. "I felt that it lent itself to a rhyme although I hadn't done a rhyming text at that stage." In this earlier story, Father Christmas finds himself desperate for a wee after drinking the many drinks that people have left out for him on Christmas Eve. It's also a great counting book.

Allan says, "I hadn't planned to write another Father Christmas book after finishing Father Christmas Needs a Wee and I feel Father Christmas Comes Up Trumps is quite a different story. It's about not making a sound, so it's a completely different idea from the first book. This book is also a little more complicated because there is more going on, there are lots of different noises coming from different directions; up, down, under and over and that does make it more difficult to illustrate."

How his stories begin varies; it might start with an image or the idea for a title. It can also start at any part of the story. "As soon as I begin, I draw the ideas with pencil and write the words to develop the story. It's an organic process for me, I write text and images together; I find it hard to imagine working on these separately on a picture book."

When he begins writing, the stories always change, he adds. "I knew that in Father Christmas Needs a Trump, Father Christmas would need to be silent but that there would be noises coming from somewhere. At first I thought that he'd knock something over or something would fall at the wrong moment, but eventually the idea came for the noises to come from Father Christmas himself."

Allan uses a fountain pen, "a cheap one I had at school and still use" to write and draw his picture books because writing with a fountain pen is a slower process than writing with a biro, he says. "I do pen and ink drawings, then I create a dummy book with the pictures and pencil in the text and rough illustrations before doing the final illustrations." His Father Christmas books are both painted in oils, rather than his usual water colours, because he wanted the books to look brighter.

He adds, "It can take months and months to complete a picture book, it's a tough way to live, especially when you throw away work you've just spent a month doing. Other authors do roughs and show it to their publisher before they do the final version but I don't feel I can work like that."

Allan tends to complete a manuscript before he shows it to his publisher. "I get to quite a late stage of writing before I will let anyone see it. That's because, if you tell someone you want to write a story about x and y, they don't always see it the way you do. I once told an editor about a story I wanted to write, she said it would never work but I wrote it anyway and then she bought the story. If I'd have listened to her it would never have got written."

He adds, "Most of what I write is never actually published because either I don't like it or my editor doesn't like it." He estimates that "only about two percent" of what he writes gets into print.

Allan says, "I work really hard on all my picture books because I want to create books that won't disappear from the bookshops a year after they're published; I want my books to last at least a bit longer than me!"

Away from his writing and illustration, Allan has trained as a magician and he uses magic during his picture book events. He says, "My favourite trick is to take two pieces of coloured tissue paper, I tear them up into pieces and when I open it up it's turned into a pair of elaborately coloured knickers. My sleeves are always rolled up so children have no idea where the knickers have come from!"

Author's Titles