Lucy Cousins: Happy Birthday Maisy!

If someone had told Lucy Cousins when she was starting out that one of her characters would be captivating children for two decades she would have found it hard to believe. Yet loveable Maisy mouse is celebrating her twentieth birthday this year. ‘I didn’t have any idea that Maisy would become what she has become,’ says Cousins, still faintly incredulous.

As a graphic design student Cousins knew she wanted to do ‘something for children’, but she didn’t know if it would be picture books, products or television. With Maisy she has been involved in all three.

It was advice from an astute editor at Walker Books that led to the creation of the best-selling mouse. Cousins was working on a novelty book with a girl character for whom she had sewed and knitted tiny clothes.

‘The editor at the time said “I think your pictures of animals are more fun so go away and come back with an animal for that book.”

So I went away and I drew lots and lots of animals and I drew this mouse, and straightaway the mouse had a character to me. I felt I knew who she was, I knew what she was like, I knew what things she’d do and the attitude she’d have, so she arrived as a fully formed person.

Her first two Maisy books, Maisy Goes Swimming and Maisy Goes to Bed, were published at the same time. ‘I waited a bit and somebody said, “They’ve done quite well. Would you like to do some more?” I thought that would be nice, and then it was, “They’ve done quite well. Would you like to do some more?” And it’s gone on and on.’

Maisy’s friends Charley, Tallulah, Eddie and Cyril arrived in much the same way as the lead character. ‘It just became a case of drawing some more animals and choosing the ones that were a nice variety of shapes and sizes and colours. I chose the images first.

'I thought it would be quite nice to have Tallulah be quite girly in contrast to Maisy, because she’s not particularly much of either sex: she’s just Maisy. So I thought a girly girl would be nice. But I didn’t set out to have a character of a certain type.’

These days, there are dozens of Maisy books of various formats, a Maisy TV series and Maisy merchandise including soft toys, aprons and dishes. At first Cousins struggled to manage all of the projects, but with four children and the desire for a work-life balance, she realised she needed help keeping tabs on what was turning into a mini-industry. ‘I was being asked, “Could you do so many books this year?”, and I couldn’t.’

Now her publishers deal with the merchandising and her artwork is put on computer so it can be reused for board books and sticker books. When she started out she did all her own paper engineering, but eventually she passed that on too.

‘After a while I thought, there are other people who can do that, and actually can do it very well, so I came up with the idea of what I want a character to be doing. Then that gets sent to a paper engineer who comes up with some mechanics to make that work. But at the same time the main Maisy book I’m working on is completely my own thing, so those are all completely original and new.’

‘I do all the sketching in pencil. When I’m doing the artwork I usually do a very rough pencil just to make sure I do Maisy the right size, but then I try and keep it as spontaneous and free as possible. I don’t want to be looking for the line to follow, so I do it roughly.

‘Maisy is the sort of person that I am. I had no interest in girly stuff at all when I was a child.''I hand paint the lettering for the English editions. I use Winsor and Newton gouache, but I’m a bit cross with them at the moment! For 20 years Maisy’s had two yellows, the same red, the same blue and two different greens. And they’ve stopped producing the yellow and the green. So I’m having to try slightly different green and yellow. I’m not happy at all!’

In the early years, having young children herself helped Cousins to find new ideas for Maisy stories. ‘The fact that I was so involved in their everyday lives – what they liked to do, what was funny, what was frightening - meant I had a much clearer understanding of the audience that I was working for. It all worked very smoothly and easily.’

After so many years, though, it’s become slightly harder to find fresh storylines. ‘Usually every time I start a new book I think that I’ve already done everything. But then I do get an idea. Sometimes David, my editor, will come up with an idea, so sometimes it’s a joint effort.’

Apart from the everyday situations that young children can relate to and the bold, Matisse-inspired colours, much of Maisy’s appeal is the character herself, who has crucial cross-gender appeal.

She is the sort of person that I am. I had no interest in girly stuff at all when I was a child. I had brothers and I just wanted to do their things. Even now, I don’t wear dresses, I don’t wear makeup. I just feel comfortable being a bit of a tomboy adult.

And for me, gender is just not an issue in a children’s book character. Maisy was just the character she was. There is so much overlap of things that are important to girls and boys that it just seemed that that was where I felt comfortable, in that in-between place.’

Occasionally Cousins takes a break from Maisy and brings out new books that are different enough to keep her interested creatively, but sufficiently similar in style to be familiar to the intended audience.

Noah’s Ark and the exuberant Hooray for Fish are among her other books that have been popular with young readers; this year she has published Yummy, a collection of nursery tales, and I’m the Best, featuring an endearingly egotistical Dog.

'I’m the Best I really enjoyed because it was with inks rather than paints so it felt new. The line is a pencil drawn line rather than a brush stroke. So I’m starting to feel that I like experimenting to find something different and a little bit fresh.  With I’m the Best, I wanted it to be very, very bold, almost like my sketchbooks. Often when I’m doing my sketches for ideas they have a real vitality to them, and when I’ve redone that page seven times and had a go at a few coloured paintings it’s quite hard to keep that freshness. I’d like to do more work in ink.’

And the nursery stories are just something that I’d always wanted to do because they’re just such brilliant stories and it also gave me the chance to do something a bit more dramatic -- because the stories are very dramatic. That was really good fun to do.

Now, though, it’s back to Maisy. The summer is full of birthday events including Maisy storytelling corners in libraries, a twentieth anniversary DVD with Lucy Cousins and an online party pack on Maisy’s website. A new novelty book, Maisy’s Show, is out in October.

Cousins is currently working on another new Maisy book. ‘It’s about learning all the concepts: colour, shape, noises, letters of the alphabet, so it’s quite a big book. It’s been quite difficult to work out how to do it, how to tie them all together, but I’m really pleased with it.’

Even after 20 years, Cousins doesn’t see a time when she might get tired of her most popular character. ‘I might have to think of something a bit different and a bit new for Maisy. Then I’d be very happy.’ What about a spin-off series for one of Maisy’s friends? She pauses, considering. ‘It’s not something I’ve thought of doing, but maybe if somebody asked me to I would.’ She stops again, and you can almost see the wheels turning. ‘It would be quite fun, actually…’