Interview with Louise Bladen

October 30th, 2019
When did you decide you wanted to become an author, what prompted this? 

In my early 30’s I was diagnosed with breast cancer.  I had a term off from my teaching (classroom music) job to have the operation and re-think my life.  I spent quite a bit of time in book shops, looking for ‘answers’ to having cancer and one day came across Pamela Allen’s Bertie and the Bear (1976).  It made me laugh so much and I adored the pace and rhythm of the words and the synthesis of text and picture, especially the unsaid parts of the story communicated by the drawings alone. I started exploring other children’s picture books and fell in love with the medium.  Babette Cole’s Doctor Dog and all her books were also a great inspiration. I just wanted to be able to write (and draw) for children in that way.  It looked so easy after all!!!!  Of course, once I sat down and tried to write something, I understood just how difficult it was.  When I say ‘fell in love”, I mean, all over again as an adult.  I adored books as a child.

How did you come up with the idea of your book? 

I had been on a ten day meditation retreat, that is, meditating 8 hours a day and I felt so relaxed, calm and clear, I thought maybe I could translate some of my experience into a picture book so that children could understand the process.  Maybe to plant a small seed in their minds for later on in their adult lives.  After I had written it, I had a long hard look and thought that maybe the mix of meditation and children wasn’t a good one.  I had already written quite a few stories and sent them off to publishers with no success, so I put What’s In Your Mind Today? in a drawer and left it there for a few years!

What was your favourite childhood book? 

My Dad used to read to us most evenings before we went to sleep so I loved all the books he loved, ranging from Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm through to Rudyard Kipling.  However, the picture book I loved the most was Pookie the flying rabbit series written and illustrated by Ivy Wallace (Collins 1946).  The pictures were so magical, colourful and detailed.  Muffin the Mule was another by Annette Mills (Uni of London Press 1949).  All of the Enid Blytons from Noddy to The Famous Five were great favourites and I loved the Biggles series (WE Johns) as well.  I also enjoyed the Joan Anglund books, A Friend is Someone Who Likes You  (Collins 1958). The list goes on with Winnie the Pooh, and Little Women.  Reading a book was bliss to me as a child.  When I could stop playing the piano (a chore) I was usually to be found up a tree eating an apple, book in hand, hoping no one would find me anytime soon.  In one (very small school) school I went to, I had read all of the books available in the school library.

I still have all of these books at home (not the ones from the school library!)... much battered of course.  I constantly buy children’s picture books and when asked if I am buying them for my family, there are some strange looks when I admit that they are for me.  Every now and then I am ashamed of how many I have and have a bit of a purge and give them away to friends’ children.

If you could tell your younger self any advice, what would it be? 

Start meditating and writing now!

How has your background and location shaped your work? 

My Dad was in the Australian Army and we were always shifting house, we lived in 25 different houses over the first 17 years of my life.  I was always the ‘new girl’ in the class and this, combined with often living out in the countryside (where army bases often are), I had to learn to become self-sufficient and resourceful.  Playing music and reading became my favourite activities, perfect for someone who is basically quite shy.  I had learned to be happy with my own company and that combined with the self-discipline of music was a great benefit to helping towards developing a regular practice of meditation later in life.

I think the musical and teaching background has certainly influenced my admiration for and production of rhyming text.  I know it is not everyone’s cup of tea, but children adore it.  They love predicting what word might be used to rhyme with a previous one and it helps them to memorise songs and text much more quickly.  I think they derive comfort and fun from the structure.

Are there any people who you think have helped or inspired you to improve as a writer? 

Joan Anglund (and all of the above mentioned authors).  Remembering how much Joan’s work influenced me as a child made me realise that not all children’s books have to be exciting adventures like Harry Potter.  As mentioned, I was at first doubtful that What’s In Your Mind Today? would be of any interest to any children.  I thought it just wasn’t exciting or funny enough.  However, there is room for many different kinds of books and a great need to stimulate and feed the inner spirituality of children.  I think they are closer and often more responsive to this than adults.  We are too pre-occupied with making a living and bringing up our families, we lose touch quickly with our inner selves.

What is your writing process? 

In my head I am saying the text to the children who are reading it.  It is very much an aural experience for me, I guess a natural part of being a musician.

It is nearly always stimulated by an emotion or a feeling.  I like to really feel the emotion I am wanting to convey. Then I see colours and a few words emerge from the blend of colour and emotion.  I put those in some semblance of a sentence or poetry line and add more .  I often use the thesaurus and with rhyming text the online rhyming word lists are extremely helpful.  Sometimes I will have a rhyming word, or even a series of them already selected and I have to rearrange the whole line or verse to accommodate it somehow.  One thing leads to another and it can become a bit of a puzzle, as soon as one word has to be changed, it leads to others changing etc.

If you didn’t write, what would you do instead? 

Watercolour painting (another great way to de-stress).

What’s been your favourite feedback? 

My favourite feedback is hearing from Mums and Dads who read my book to their children each night, and say that it helps them to calm down and go to sleep.  I even have an adult friend who reads it to himself each evening!!

I also love hearing from classroom teachers who use the book as a basis for meditation in the classroom.

Finally, give us a fun fact about yourself that nobody knows!

In my childhood, getting new shoes was always a major event and a very special occasion.  New leather school shoes were exciting enough,  but when it was time to have new party shoes, then the scale of excitement increased by about 100%.  Black patent leathers were always chosen and the box containing the new footwear nestled snugly in tissue paper would be proudly borne home with frequent peeks for large inhales of the wonderful aroma. Once home I would head for my wardrobe where I would take out the new purchase and formally introduce them one by one to all the older shoes in my cupboard, asking them not to cry as they were being replaced!

What's In Your Mind Today?

No matter what kind of thoughts we have in our minds, there is a way to let them all go. 
A fun and gentle first guide to mindfulness and de-stressing for children and adults alike.

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