Julia Donaldson is Britain's bestselling author, beating even JK Rowling, and The Gruffalo has won the hearts of children around the world. Unveiling her latest character, the former songwriter talks to Clare Dwyer Hogg about unlikely success, losing a son – and why she's like the mouse in her most famous story
- Children’s hour: Julia Donaldson in a side room off her kitchen which is filled with colourful props. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod for the Observer
- Cross the threshold into Julia Donaldson's home and it feels as though the house is greeting you as much as its owner. It's friendly. Worn floorboards, high ceilings, doors ajar to rooms with big comfortable furniture. There are books, knick-knacks, lots of photographs pinned to boards. Donaldson leads the way to the kitchen that has an alluring entrance into a side room, all shelves, with bright props spilling out of boxes. Her husband Malcolm appears, offering coffee, and as Julia settles down at the table she says wistfully that the place is a little bare. "The house may look cluttered, but it's actually…" She looks around. "There was loads of…" She points to a row of cupboards, bare on top. "All the broken things, but which looked beautiful from a distance, were up there…"
- Julia Donaldson doesn't speak in rhyme. Of course she doesn't. But it almost wouldn't be surprising if she did, given her status as towering giant in the world of children's books. Many of her 160 books, which span plays, picture stories, novels and educational books, are in rhyme, and her name has become inextricably linked to jaunty verse and easy rhythm. In real life, though, she manages to articulately conjure up a vision of what she's describing, while often not quite finishing sentences and half-saying words. It's as if her sentences leave a whimsical trail in the air, waiting for the listener to catch the thread and weave their own end.
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