Graeme Base - Children's Author Extrordinaire

Graeme Rowland Base, born 6 April 1958, is a well known Illustrator extraordinaire, author, composer, musician, singer, playwright, television producer and most significantly, problem solver. He received inspiraton for his work starting at a young age as he was always attracted by the complex, the clever, the weird and wonderful. Not only would he invent complicated puzzles and games, he would immerse himself in the bizzare worlds of Alice In Wonderland and later The Lord Of The Rings, and relish the witty verse of Edward Lear or comedy duo Flanders and Swann.


Somehow he is able to draw animals that are both cartoony and lifelike at the same time. Rich colors and intricate details imbue every scene, on every page, in every book, to the point of wonder. He is perhaps best known for his second book, Animalia published in 1986, and third book The Eleventh Hour which was released in 1989.

He was born in Amersham, England but moved to Australia with his family at the age of eight where he attended Box Hill High School and Melbourne High School in Melbourne, and then studied a Diploma of Art (Graphic Design) for three years at Swinburne University of Technology at Prahran.

He worked in advertising for two years and then began illustrating children's books. Eventually he began to wirte them as well. His very first book, My Grandma lived in Gooligulch, was accepted by the first publisher he sent it to in 1983.

Base acknowledges his blessed life has been the product of hard work but also a good dose of luck. Now aged 50 with three teenage children from his 28-year marriage to Robyn, he shows no sign of slowing down. "I'm never short of an idea" he says. "I've done 12 books in 25 years and I have another 12 books instantly in my head."

photo source:http://resources3.news.com.au/images/2007/11/17/va1237277802286/Author-Graeme-Base-5755086.jpg

When Graeme Base wrote Animalia, the technology needed to turn it into a television show didn't exist, but word of Base's achievements with it and subsequent books such as The Eleventh Hour did reach Hollywood and finally, after many years in the making, a television show based on the book was produced and first aired in 2007.

The show, made with the participation of of the Ten Network, the BBC, PBS in America and CBC in Canada has characters with accents from all over the world creating a show that's international rather than American or Australian.

The show has a subtle message about culture, diversity, and difference.

The website, based on the popular book and television series is just as impressive as the book with amazing illustrations and activities for children.

On the Animalia website, students are introduced to the characters of Animalia, the goal of the Animalia site, Animalia news, and games and activities. The Animalia site brings students on a wonderful adventure where their goal is to collect all of the "core spores" to restore the Core of Animalia. Students collect the core spores by going on several adventures where they will play learning games, discover, and follow directions.

Games and activities include logic puzzles, memory skills, code cracking, map reading, and listening skills. The listening game is called Toucan Talk and asks students to listen to a message in the wrong order, and change the order of words or sounds so that the message makes sense. The site is extremely interactive. Students will love becoming part of the adventure.

His latest volume - Enigma: A Magical Mystery - is reminiscent of The Eleventh Hour in that it is something of a whodunit, and uses such familiar illustrative elements as detailed and eye-catching frames for the double-page spreads, as well as clues to follow in solving the mystery. This time around, we're looking for the culprit who absconded with various magical props belonging to various magicians living in a special retirement home.

As is the case in every Base book, the characters are anthropomorphic animals. In this case, a young badger named Bertie and his grandfather, a retired magician once known as Gadzooks the Great, are central to the story, which is named for Grandpa's magic bunny: Enigma.

Enigma ("a puzzling, perplexing or unexplained thing," according to the Canadian Oxford dictionary) says it all - maybe not for the average 8- or 9-year-old, but certainly for the adult reading this text aloud. It's just one example of Base's ability to cross generations and make his books appealing to all ages. Even if you're not wild about a text written in verse, you'll admire the way he works in rhythms and sounds that show off the English language at its best.

Describing Bertie's Grandpa, for example, Base writes:
From London to the Spanish Steps, from Prague to Kathmandu,
Then on to the Antipodes and back through Timbuktu,
For fifty years he'd wowed the crowds and roundly been admired,
But now he lived a quiet life - Gadzooks the Great (Retired).
Enigma marks the solution for a problem that "had been bugging me half my life" Base says- namely: how to reseal the key to solving a mystery.

In The Eleventh Hour, the key is contained in pages that are sealed shut (although, Base admitted, you could cheat by squeezing those pages just so). Once that seal is broken, however, some of the fun is lost to other readers of that particular book. How to reseal became the question that plagued the author/illustrator.

With evident delight, he said he finally solved it. Turning to the back of the new book, you see curtain-like flaps which expose a section that contains three ingenious dials and a coded alphabet. "When you've worked it out, you can spin these dials like a bike lock," he announced triumphantly. And voilà! The next reader is faced with an unsolved mystery.

The publisher aims this book at ages 4 to 8. Given my own pitiful performance as a sleuth, I suspect that range is kind of low and that the book is better in the hands of 6- to 10-year-olds.