August 25: Today in the History of Children’s Books

🎂 Born 1959: Lane Smith

Amer­i­can chil­dren’s pic­ture book author and illus­tra­tor (1959). He is a rep­re­sen­ta­tive fig­ure of con­tem­po­rary pic­ture book post­mod­ernism and col­lage art, and is good at using impas­to oil paint­ing, scraped tex­ture, typog­ra­phy and absurd and iron­ic nar­ra­tives that sub­vert the tra­di­tion­al fairy tale par­a­digm.

• Top Award and Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Works:
• A Col­lec­tion of Hilar­i­ous Sto­ries of the Stinky Cheese Boy (The Stinky Cheese Man and Oth­er Fair­ly Stu­pid Tales(1992, by Jon Sci­esz­ka) — Award­ed 1993 Calde­cott Hon­orA post­mod­ern mile­stone in pic­ture books that com­plete­ly decon­structs clas­sic fairy tales. The book dis­rupts the tra­di­tion­al copy­right page, table of con­tents, and sto­ry struc­ture, trans­form­ing sto­ries such as “The Ugly Duck­ling,” “The Princess and the Pea,” and “The Gin­ger­bread Man” into absurd and hilar­i­ous short sto­ries.
• Grand­pa Grim­m’s Gar­den (Grand­pa Green(2011) — Award­ed 2012 Calde­cott Hon­orThrough the great-grand­son’s stroll through the maze of top-notch gar­den tree sculp­tures pruned by his great-grand­fa­ther, the old man’s life, from his child­hood on the farm, his mil­i­tary ser­vice, to his encounter and love, is trans­formed into a series of lush and tran­quil plant sculp­tures, poet­i­cal­ly show­cas­ing the mem­o­ry and inher­i­tance of life.
• A Child from a Tribe (There is a Tribe of Kids(2016) — Award­ed 2017 Kate Green­away Medal (CIL)Inspired by the col­lec­tive nouns for var­i­ous ani­mal com­mu­ni­ties in Eng­lish, the film depicts a young boy’s won­drous jour­ney of find­ing com­pan­ions in nature, inte­grat­ing into the com­mu­ni­ty, and ulti­mate­ly return­ing to his tribe.
• With “Big Pet“The Big Pets) win the lau­rel wreath Gold­en Apple Award at the 1991 Bratisla­va Inter­na­tion­al Bien­ni­al of Illus­tra­tions (BIB); and won the award in 2012. The Car­le Award for Artists.
• His rep­re­sen­ta­tive works also include “The True Sto­ry of the Three Lit­tle Pigs” (The True Sto­ry of the 3 Lit­tle Pigs!), “A Per­fect Day“A Per­fect Day).

| Birth | Lane Smith | Lane Smith (Wikipedia) |

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🎂 Born 1959: Ian Falconer

Amer­i­can pic­ture book author, illus­tra­tor, stage and cos­tume design­er (1959–2023). He illus­trat­ed cov­ers for The New York­er for many years and designed stage visu­als for the New York City Bal­let, becom­ing a glob­al sen­sa­tion for his high­ly designed min­i­mal­ist black and white char­coal lines paired with his sig­na­ture pure red and pure black flat col­ors.

• Top Award and Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Works:
• Olivia (Olivia(2000) — Award 2001 Calde­cott Hon­orList­ed in “1001 Chil­dren’s Books,” this book tells the sto­ry of Olivia, an ener­getic, opin­ion­at­ed, and artis­ti­cal­ly tal­ent­ed pig, and her dai­ly life. She dress­es up cats in var­i­ous cos­tumes, imi­tates Jack­son Pol­lock­’s paint­ings on the walls, and builds enor­mous sand­cas­tles on the beach. The book show­cas­es the vibrant ener­gy of young chil­dren with its pre­cise humor and min­i­mal­ist col­or scheme.
• The series also includes oth­er notable works such as “Olivia Saves the Cir­cus” (Olivia Saves the Cir­cus), Olivia Does­n’t Want to Be a Princess (Olivia and the Fairy Princess­es).

| Birth | Ian Fal­con­er | Ian Fal­con­er (Wikipedia) |

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🎂 Born 1944: Bartolomeu Campos de Queirós

A renowned Brazil­ian chil­dren’s and young adult lit­er­a­ture writer, poet, and aes­thet­ic edu­ca­tion the­o­rist (1944–2012). He was an impor­tant rep­re­sen­ta­tive of con­tem­po­rary Latin Amer­i­can chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture, known for his extreme­ly beau­ti­ful and pro­found poet­ic prose, philo­soph­i­cal con­tem­pla­tion of child­hood mem­o­ries, and the pure beau­ty of lan­guage.

• Inter­na­tion­al Awards and Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Works:
• respec­tive­ly at He was short­list­ed for the Hans Chris­t­ian Ander­sen Award (HCAA) for Best Writer twice, in 2008 and 2010..
• Grand­pa’s Glass Eye­ball (O Olho de Vidro do Meu Avô— A famous chil­dren’s essay: It tells the sto­ry of a lit­tle boy who, through his grand­fa­ther’s blind glass pros­thet­ic eye, embarks on a poet­ic obser­va­tion of the world, death, mem­o­ry, and light and shad­ow. The text is full of philo­soph­i­cal thoughts and child­hood warmth.
• His rep­re­sen­ta­tive works also include “I Know Because I Heard” (Sei por ouvir diz­er), The Big TreeA Árvore(and “Select­ed Sto­ries and Poems for Teenagers”) and “Select­ed Sto­ries and Poems for Teenagers”.

| Birth | Bar­tolomeu Cam­pos de Queirós | Bar­tolomeu Cam­pos de Queirós (Wikipedia) |

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🎂 Born in 1978: Catia Chien

A Brazil­ian-Chi­nese illus­tra­tor and artist (1978). Born in São Paulo, Brazil, she lat­er moved to the Unit­ed States. Her style blends vibrant Latin Amer­i­can col­ors with sub­tle, poet­ic East­ern aes­thet­ics, and she excels at using heavy acrylic tex­tures and neg­a­tive space to express vast emo­tion­al spaces.

• Top Award and Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Works:
• Pic­ture books illus­trat­ed by Matthew Burgess “fire­works” (Fire­worksAward­ed 2026 Calde­cott MedalHe has won the Gold Medal from the Soci­ety of Illus­tra­tors, USA.
• The Jaguar and Me (A Boy and a Jaguar(Alan Rabi­nowitz) — This is the true and inspir­ing sto­ry of a young boy who suf­fered from a severe stut­ter from child­hood, but was able to com­mu­ni­cate flu­ent­ly with ani­mals and even­tu­al­ly grew up to become a renowned zool­o­gist and con­ser­va­tion­ist who pro­tects wild jaguars.
• The Last Long Walk (The Longest Lets­gob­oy(By Der­rick Barnes) — With an extreme­ly ten­der and pro­found touch, this book depicts the mov­ing jour­ney of an aging, loy­al dog from the per­spec­tive of its last walk in the for­est with a lit­tle girl, its farewell to life, and its trans­for­ma­tion into stars to pro­tect its own­er.
• His rep­re­sen­ta­tive works also include “The Lit­tle Bear’s Red Moon” (The Bear and the Moon), The Things I Want to Do (Things to Do).

| Birth | Catia Chien | Catia Chien (Wikipedia) |

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🎂 Born in 1950: Jōko Iwase

Japan­ese chil­dren’s and ado­les­cents’ psy­cho­log­i­cal real­ist nov­el­ist (1950). Her works are known for their plain, restrained, and unadorned writ­ing style. She is adept at cap­tur­ing the sub­tle lone­li­ness, fam­i­ly rifts, and the pro­tec­tion of self-esteem expe­ri­enced by teenagers dur­ing their tran­si­tion to adult­hood. She has won the Noma Chil­dren’s Lit­er­a­ture Award and the Sankei Chil­dren’s Pub­lish­ing Cul­ture Award mul­ti­ple times.

• Rep­re­sen­ta­tive works and con­tent:
• My Father’s Face(『おとうさんのかお』) and That warmth will nev­er fade.(『そのぬくもりはきえない』) — It pro­found­ly depicts the inner mono­logue of mod­ern chil­dren in the process of fac­ing fam­i­ly changes and search­ing for the true face of their par­ents.
• Oth­er mas­ter­pieces include “Lit­tle Sea” (“小さな小さな海”) and “My Friend Hours” (“ともだちのときちゃん”).

| Birth | Jōko Iwase | Shigeko Iwase (Wikipedia) |

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🍃 [other]

event	fig­ure	Details/Awards	Wikipedia/Data Links
born	Vir­ginia E. Wolff	Amer­i­can young adult free verse nov­el­ist (1937). In 2011, she won the NSK Neustadt Prize for Chil­dren’s Lit­er­a­ture.Her rep­re­sen­ta­tive work is “Lemon­ade Girl” (Make Lemon­ade(1993) is writ­ten in free verse and tells the inspi­ra­tional sto­ry of 14-year-old Lashorn, who works as a nan­ny for a young sin­gle moth­er to raise mon­ey for col­lege tuition. The two sup­port each oth­er in pover­ty and turn the bit­ter­ness of life into sweet “lemon­ade”.	Vir­ginia Euw­er Wolff
Death	Tom Felins	African Amer­i­can pic­ture book illus­tra­tor and his­to­ry painter (1933–2003). He was skilled at using ink wash­es and tex­tures to depict African and African-Amer­i­can his­to­ry and cul­ture. His rep­re­sen­ta­tive work is *Moa Means One* (…).Moja Means One: Swahili Count­ing Book(1971) and “A Dif­fer­ent Kind of Greet­ing: The Swahili Alpha­bet Book” (Jam­bo Means Hel­lo(1974)Two-time Calde­cott Hon­or Award win­nerHis epic word­less paint­ing, “The Mid­dle Pas­sage” (The Mid­dle Pas­sageIt records the bru­tal his­to­ry of the slave trade.	Tom Feel­ings
Death	Mar­garet Goff Clark	Amer­i­can his­tor­i­cal nov­el­ist for chil­dren (1913–2004). His rep­re­sen­ta­tive work is *Free Cross­ing* (…).Free­dom Cross­ing(1980) tells the thrilling his­tor­i­cal adven­ture of 15-year-old Lau­ra, who helps escaped slaves cross the Nia­gara Riv­er to Cana­da in her home­town of New York State dur­ing the 1850s, dur­ing the era of the Amer­i­can Under­ground Rail­road.	Mar­garet Goff Clark
Death	Diane Hoh	Amer­i­can teen mys­tery and thriller nov­el­ist (1937–2025). His most famous work is *The Play­ground of Hor­rors*.The Fun­house(1992) Set in an amuse­ment park, it presents a clas­sic Amer­i­can teenage adven­ture full of sus­pense and mutu­al assis­tance among friends.	Diane Hoh