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Come Away from the Water, Shirley

by John Burningham

Interest age: 4 to 7
Reading age: 5+

Published by Red Fox, 1992

  • Adventure
  • Fantasy
  • Funny
  • Picture books

About this book

Shirley is visiting the beach with her mum and dad, but after they’re settled in their deckchairs (on what looks like a pebbly, perhaps slightly cold British beach somewhere), they aren’t that keen to play with Shirley.

Instead, Mum and Dad are full of tellings-off and warnings: don’t get any tar on your new shoes, don’t stroke the dog, don’t bring any of that smelly seaweed home. Yet Shirley is having a huge, colourful adventure, fighting pirates, finding buried treasure and crowning herself queen as the yellow moon rises over the black sea.

John Burningham’s simple yet sophisticated account of a trip to the seaside is both a masterly drawing of grumpy Mum and Dad paying the least attention possible to Shirley, and a vibrant – and wordless – depiction of Shirley’s inner world. Mum and Dad on the beach are drawn in simple pencil with sparse everyday detail; the facing pages showing Shirley’s adventures are rich, colourful and more painterly.

Shirley is literally “seen but not heard” – but that doesn’t stop her inhabiting her own magical, marvellous world. Fantastic.

About the author

John Burningham studied illustration and graphic design at the Central School of Art, graduating with distinction in 1959. Many illustration commissions followed, including iconic posters for London Transport, before the publication of Borka: the Adventures of a Goose with No Feathers, John’s first book for children. It won the prestigious Kate Greenaway Medal for illustration and heralded the beginning of an extraordinary career spanning 50 years.

John Burningham has since written and illustrated over 30 picture books, which have been translated and distributed all over the world. These feature his classic and much-loved children’s books, including Chitty Chitty Bang Bang by Ian Fleming; Mr Gumpy’s Outing, also awarded the Kate Greenaway Medal; Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne; The Shopping Basket; The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame; Granpa, later made into an animated film; Oi! Get off our Train; and various books for adults.

John is married to the illustrator, Helen Oxenbury. They have three children, three grandchildren and a dog named Miles. They live in London.

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