Event overview
Professor Michael Rosen and David Almond OBE in conversation on children’s literature and the IBBY Hans Christian Andersen Award.
Join us for a special evening celebrating Professor Michael Rosen’s nomination for the prestigious IBBY Hans Christian Andersen Award 2026. The award recognises authors and illustrators whose complete body of work has made a lasting, transformative contribution to children’s books, and has been awarded to outstanding creatives from around the world since 1956. Michael Rosen’s nomination for the author category is a testament to his decades-long impact as an author, poet, performer, and advocate for children’s books.
To mark this significant achievement, Michael Rosen will be joined in conversation by David Almond OBE. David has received a string of major international awards, including the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2010. His boundary-breaking work is published, performed, and loved all around the world. Bringing these two extraordinary voices together offers an opportunity to hear from writers whose work has shaped contemporary children’s literature. They will reflect on their own writing as well as the global significance of the IBBY Hans Christian Andersen Award itself.
Michael Rosen was born in 1946 and brought up in north-west London. He studied English Literature and Language at Oxford University and later an MA in Children's Literature at the University of Reading. He has a PhD in the process of writing a work of children's literature from the University of North London (now London Metropolitan University). He has been writing children's books since 1974 – a mixture of poetry, picture book texts, short stories, novels, edited anthologies, and adaptations of folk tales. He visits schools and book festivals performing his works, has a YouTube Channel with over 130 million views, and he hosts a BBC Radio 4 show about language called 'Word of Mouth'. He was UK Children's Laureate 2007-2009.
David Almond OBE FRSL grew up on a council estate on Tyneside. He is the author of Skellig, Counting Stars, The Falling Boy, Puppet, The Dam, The Tightrope Walkers, A Song for Ella Grey and many more novels, short stories, picture books, radio programmes, opera librettos and plays. His work is published and performed all around the world. He has received a series of major international literary awards including The Hans Christian Andersen Award, The Carnegie Medal, The Nonino International Prize (Italy), The Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, Le Prix Sorcieres (France), The Michael L Printz Award (USA) and The James Kruss Prize (Germany.) He is a nominee for The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award 2026. He is Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University. In 2021 he was awarded an OBE for services to literature. He lives with his wife, the author Julia Green, on the beautiful North East Coast.
We are grateful to IBBY for their support in joining us for this occasion, and to Walker Books for generously supporting David Almond’s participation.
Learn more about the Hans Christian Andersen Award for which Prof. Michael Rosen is nominated.
Dates & times
| Date | Time | Add to calendar |
|---|---|---|
| 17 Dec 2025 | 6:30pm - 8:30pm |
Accessibility
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