He earns most from the children's writing, although he says some of that is down to his scruples: 'I've turned things down, you know,' he says. His children's novels bob about on the surface of the prize jamborees: Krindlekrax won the Smarties prize, and Ridley is currently adapting it for the cinema Kaspar in the Glitter was nominated for the Whitbread Children's Award, while Scribbleboy was shortlisted for the Carnegie. He has the fluffiest eyebrows on an amazingly hairless face.Īpart from his screenplays and adult novels, he also writes for the theatre, paints, exhibits his photographs and writes poetry. But Ridley is baby-faced rather than East End tough-looking, despite being dressed in black from top to toe. He and his brother used to spend Saturday nights looking out of their window to see men 'glassing' each other on the way home from the pub on the corner. For example, he talks readily about the gap between him and his family, his parents' bemused sense of what it is their son does for a living, but there is a rawness that comes across when he describes it.īorn in December 1967, Ridley has lived all his life in the East End of London.

Meeting Ridley in person, you get the strong sense from him too of feelings that are still being worked out.

So, in Zip's Apollo, the newest Ridley, shopping trolleys can read human minds, although, like newborn babes, the trolleys have to make sense of the emotions around them. The scribble- language is all pervasive, but children will enjoy it.His stories have a futuristic edge, psychology masked by flashing lights, emotions for the techy generation. Bailey's mum reappears at the end of the story. Very little is made of the boys disabilities, but they make good role models.

While the characters are extreme, the emotions are real and very warm, and Bailey learns there are others with worse problems than his. In so doing, he gets himself and Ziggy into big trouble, and the original Scribbleboy must re-materialise to get them out of it. The original Scribbleboy has disappeared, and in his unhappy state, Bailey becomes the new Scribbleboy and produces even more fantastic scribbles. A more over-the-top bunch would be hard to find. Ziggy must use a wheelchair, and though he and Bailey are quite ordinary boys, their parents and friends are most definitely not. Bailey, who stutters and has massive problems (mum has walked out and dad has gone peculiar as a consequence) forms the Scribbleboy Fan Club along with his new friend, Ziggy Fuzz. So fantastic are these 'scribbles' that Bailey Silk, new kid in town, faints when he sees one for the first time. Set in a depressing, concrete jungle of a city, the story tells of Scribbleboy, an artist who has painted 'scribbledacious' drawings all over the dull concrete surfaces.

Scribbleboy by Philip Ridley