Peoples Archive is pleased to present the stories of Quentin Blake as the newest addition to our website.
Quentin Blake was born on the 16th of December 1932. He grew up in Sidcup, Kent and attended Sidcup Grammar School. Whilst at school he was encouraged to send his work to "Punch" magazine and after a couple of years of sending in drawings and a visit to the "Punch" offices in London he was published for the first time at the age of 16.
After reading English at Cambridge he moved to London to do a postgraduate teaching diploma as he felt that a career in art would not offer much security. He also began going to life drawing classes at Chelsea College of Art and it was here that he met Brian Robb who eventually offered him a teaching job at Chelsea, he then taught at both Chelsea College of Art and the Royal College of Art, where he was head of the illustration department from 1978 to 1986.
Over the course of his career Quentin Blake has continued to publish in "Punch", "The Spectator" and many other magazines. The first children's book he illustrated was "Drink of Water" by John Yeoman in 1960 and he went on to form many successful collaborations with authors including Russell Hoban, Michael Rosen, Joan Aiken and perhaps most famously Roald Dahl.
Quentin Blake has won many prizes and awards among them the Whitbread Award (for "How Tom Beat Captain Najork & His Hired Sportsmen"), the Kate Greenaway Medal (for "Mr Magnolia") the Kurt Maschler Award (for "All Join In") and the international Bologna Ragazzi Prize (for "Clown") and the Hans Christian Anderson Award for Illustration in 2002. In 1988 he was awarded an OBE for services to children's literature and made a visiting professor and senior fellow of the RCA. In 1999 he was appointed the first ever Children's Laureate and in 2002 he published a book called "Laureates Progress" recording much of the work done during his two year tenure.
