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Sergeant Mugworth and Algy Buttons (Kids’ Night In)
James Brian Jacques was an English novelist known for his Redwall series of novels and Castaways of the Flying Dutchman series. He also completed two collections of short stories entitled The Ribbajack & Other Curious Yarns and Seven Strange and Ghostly Tales.
Brian Jacques was born in Liverpool, England. He was known by his middle name, Brian as his father and a brother were also called James.
His father loved literature and read his boys adventure stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Edgar Rice Burroughs, also The Wind in the Willows with its cast of animals.
Brian showed writing talent early. Aged ten, assigned to write an animal story, he wrote about a bird that cleaned a crocodile’s teeth. His teacher didn’t believe that a ten-year-old wrote it and caned the boy for refusing to admit copying the story.
He had always loved to write, but only then did he realize the extent of his abilities. He left school aged fifteen, (as was usual at the time) and set out to find adventure as a merchant sailor.
His book Redwall was written for his “special friends”, the children of the Royal Wavertree School for the Blind, whom he first met while working as a milkman. He began to spend time with the children, reading books to them. However, he became dissatisfied with the state of children’s literature, with too much adolescent angst and not enough magic, and eventually began to write stories for them. He is known for the very descriptive style of his novels, which emphasize sound, smell, taste, gravity, balance, temperature, touch, and kinesthetics, not just visual sensations.
His work became published after his former English teacher showed it to publishers, telling them “This is the finest children’s tale I’ve ever read and you’d be foolish not to publish it.” Soon after Brian was offered a contract to write the next five books in the series
In 2005 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters by Liverpool University.
A prize was also created at Bristol Grammar School, the “Brian Jacques Award for Most Improved Creative Writing”
He lived with his wife and 2 sons in Liverpool.
In 2011 he was admitted to hospital for emergency heart surgery, but sadly died of a heart attack shortly afterwards.
Sergeant Mugworth and Algy Buttons (Kids’ Night In)
James Brian Jacques was an English novelist known for his Redwall series of novels and Castaways of the Flying Dutchman series. He also completed two collections of short stories entitled The Ribbajack & Other Curious Yarns and Seven Strange and Ghostly Tales.
Brian Jacques was born in Liverpool, England. He was known by his middle name, Brian as his father and a brother were also called James.
His father loved literature and read his boys adventure stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Edgar Rice Burroughs, also The Wind in the Willows with its cast of animals.
Brian showed writing talent early. Aged ten, assigned to write an animal story, he wrote about a bird that cleaned a crocodile’s teeth. His teacher didn’t believe that a ten-year-old wrote it and caned the boy for refusing to admit copying the story.
He had always loved to write, but only then did he realize the extent of his abilities. He left school aged fifteen, (as was usual at the time) and set out to find adventure as a merchant sailor.
His book Redwall was written for his “special friends”, the children of the Royal Wavertree School for the Blind, whom he first met while working as a milkman. He began to spend time with the children, reading books to them. However, he became dissatisfied with the state of children’s literature, with too much adolescent angst and not enough magic, and eventually began to write stories for them. He is known for the very descriptive style of his novels, which emphasize sound, smell, taste, gravity, balance, temperature, touch, and kinesthetics, not just visual sensations.
His work became published after his former English teacher showed it to publishers, telling them “This is the finest children’s tale I’ve ever read and you’d be foolish not to publish it.” Soon after Brian was offered a contract to write the next five books in the series
In 2005 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters by Liverpool University.
A prize was also created at Bristol Grammar School, the “Brian Jacques Award for Most Improved Creative Writing”
He lived with his wife and 2 sons in Liverpool.
In 2011 he was admitted to hospital for emergency heart surgery, but sadly died of a heart attack shortly afterwards.
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