Children's literature

Netflix, Spotify, iPads, YouTube and Instagram are just a few things that didn't exist when the Children's Laureate was set up 20 years ago.

In 1999, the main obstacle in getting children interested in reading was their own attention spans.  Read more

Lauren Child thinks children's book publishing still gets a bad deal. It's one of the reasons the best-selling author-illustrator and current Children's Laureate - her tenure ends this year - is so happy to be a judge for this year Oscar's Book Prize. "There's still a lot of snootiness about children's books. Just look at the teeny-weeny percentage that get reviewed compared to adults.  Read more

The loving and attentive reader of children's books knows that the best of them are not one-dimensional oversimplifications of life but stories that tackle with elegant simplicity such complexities as uncertainty, loneliness, loss, and the cycle of life. And anyone who sits with this awareness for a moment becomes suddenly skeptical of the very notion of a "children's" book.  Read more

The lives and works of children's book creators can offer plenty of drama and intrigue even to the most grown-up of readers.  Read more

Shirley Hughes has written and illustrated more than 50 books for children. She won the Book Trust

At www.booktrust.org.uk a UK organisation which promotes books, supports writers groups, awards literary prizes and offers factsheets on Getting Published and Tracing Copyright, and a directory of UK publishers. Also free information service about books, authors and publishers. Phone mornings 020 8516 2977.

's inaugural lifetime achievement award in 2015; her book Dogger was voted the most popular winner in the first 50 years of the Kate Greenaway medal for illustration. The latest instalment of her bestselling series of Alfie books, Alfie and His Very Best Friend, is published in September.  Read more