Today is my stop on the blog tour for Sir Bragalot. This hilarious picture book is about a rabbit whose constant bragging gets him into a lot of trouble! We've really enjoyed sharing this story and today I'm thrilled to be joined by author and illustrator Sharon Davey who is sharing her inspiration for Sir Bragalot.
I met a child who told me he had 13 computers, a cat that could fly and an older brother who lives in the forest in Portugal, 2 minutes after meeting me. I took one look at his Mum’s I don’t know what he’s talking about shrug and thought I can’t wait to hear what you’ll say next. He was my inspiration for Sir Bragalot and his braggy ways.
I wrote the story in 2014 when I was attending Putney School of Art for a short course on Book Illustration with Zehra Hicks and Carolyn Dinan. Long before I really thought I could do illustration as a job and well before I knew what I was doing with writing.
The first version of this story had Sir Bragalot as a tiny dog, a Jack Russell specifically, and his fellow knights were all different breeds of dogs with a Saint Bernard as the King and a pink Poodle as the Queen.
Sir Bragalot was definitely one of the stories that I learnt so much on, even back in 2014. I had so many different versions of the text and I was using the computer to scan in all sorts of textures and colleges for the first time. I probably should be embarrassed with the original scrappy drawings, but it just reminds me how far I have come, illustration wise.
When I got my agent in 2017 and started working on other people’s books, I shelved Oh, Sir Bragalot! until I had learnt some more skills and worked on my writing. I had intended to take it to Bologna 2020 – and you all know how that worked out! but luckily the team at New Frontier had seen the text prior to the book festival and made an offer.
It was a real saving grace for me as a maker to have the cheery world of Sir Bragalot to hide into as the planet was all wobbly. I think of this book as my own lockdown baby. Edited, rewritten, drawn, and printed under the shadow of closed printers, lockdowns, and bubbles bursting. With everyone continuing to work from home and hiding in cupboards from our kids, I think we did so well to make this book at ALL and I’m so proud of how it came out.
From a 2014 playground moment to the 2021 publication date, we’ve all changed and been through a lot! The tale of Sir Bragalot and his fluffy tail is a great place to visit for anyone looking for a leafy kingdom to escape to. Where the dinner table is full of fun characters and the problems are only rabbit sized!
Thank you so much New Frontier Publishing for allowing me to be a part of this tour! And thank you Sharon Davey for the brilliant blog post.