Oct-17-2009 Breakfast with Gregory Maguire @ Library Owl

Illustrator's Breakfast with Gregory Maguire

Vancouver Children's Literature Roundtable holds lots of events at Vancouver. One of the activities is "Illustrator's Breakfast". The committee invites authors and illustrators to UBC's University Golf Club to make a book talk. Dr. Kathy Shoemaker, my course instructor of "Illustrated Materials for Children", gave her class a treat by inviting all of her students to "Illustrator's Breakfast". I am really thankful that Dr. Shoemaker still let me come with her class although I'm just auditing the course.

Kids Books also put up a stand to sell Maguire's books there. His latest book Matchless is also provided on the scene, which will not be on the market until a couple of weeks later.

Maguire is famous for his creativity of making old stories new. Matchless is a story written from the perspective of a boy who showed up in the story of The Little Match Girl. As for Wicked, it is based on the story of Oz, but focused on the lifehood of The Wicked Witch of the West, instead of Dorothy, the girl came from Texas. I can see why there is a big controversy on making an old story new. But as Maguire said in the book talk, "the story is yours, you can do whatever you like to it," as he did the same thing in his childhood by adding Captain Hook and Dingoo into the story of Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz.

BTW, it is also a great opportunity to meet with all the famous people connected with Children's Literature in Vancouver.

溫哥華兒童文學圓桌每年都舉辦相關多與兒童文學相關的活動，其中之一就是與繪者共進早餐。Dr. Shoemaker邀請她所有Illustrated Materials for Chidren課程的學生在10月17日早上與Gregory Maguire (Wicked的作者）共進早餐，並分享Dr. Maguire的人生經歷和創作理念。個人非常感謝Dr. Shoemaker提供我這個旁聽生一個機會參與這樣有趣的講座。尤其是當天的服裝要求是dress wicked，就像是參與了一頓萬聖節早餐一般。

當天Kids Books (溫哥華當地相當有名的童書店）也在現場設攤販賣Maguire的相關著作，可請作者簽名留念。Maguire的最新著作Matchless（2週後才準備上市的新書）也在現場販售。

Maguire以將舊故事新說聞名。Matchless將賣火柴的女孩的故事重新述說，以一名在故事中出現的貧窮男孩為主角。Wicked則將綠野仙蹤的故事從壞巫婆的角度出發，述說西方巫婆的一生。就像是Maguire所說的，創造力是自己的，就像是他在小時候玩角色扮演時將虎克船長與小叮鈴加入綠野仙踨的故事一般，舊瓶新酒又未嘗不可呢？