Whenever I tell people that I make picture books, one of the first questions they ask is, “Do you write and draw, or just draw?” And, I don’t know whether they mean it like this, but it’s the ‘just’ draw bit that gets me.
My knee-jerk response when people ask whether I ‘write or just draw’ is to rush to say, “I do both,” as if I have to justify myself or prove to someone that I can be as clever with words as I can be with pictures. They then go on to ask whether ‘there are any that they would know.’ As if, amongst the millions of picture books printed and distributed since humans could print and distribute, mine may be one that they had have seen before. But, I can’t help myself, looking for some sort of validation, I say that I’ve worked with Jackie French, Jimmy Barnes, and Peter Helliar and 9 times out of 10 the response I get is, “Oh, no, I don’t know those. Do you know
Maybe it’s because I feel I got lucky, that I shouldn’t be here, that I’m somewhat of an imposter in this world of writing and drawing and ‘being published’. But, rushing to prove myself to other people – I write, and draw, and work with people who are ‘successful’ – feels like a response worth letting go. The goalposts of “success” or validation in any professional endeavour will always change – the first book was a milestone, the second was another milestone, winning awards, being published internationally, the bar keeps being raised so it’s always just beyond reach. But, it’s also not like I’m ungrateful for the journey so far – this work has been fundamentally life-altering for me; not from a financial perspective but through the way it’s changed the sort of person I’ve become and continue to grow into.
Maybe, instead of justifying my ‘success’ to those that enquire about it, I should just respond with, “Yes, I’m very lucky to be able to do this work – is there a book that you hold dear from your childhood?”