Ella Wydrzynska

For over 50 years, the Booker Prizes have recognised the best fiction for adults. Now, we're delighted to announce the Children’s Booker Prize, supported by AKO Foundation.

Find out more: thebookerprizes.com/children

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

Neither Rhyme Nor Reason To make poems rhyme can sometimes be tough as words can seem to be from the same bough, yet each line’s ending sounds different, though, best covered up with a hiccough or cough.   Was this upsetting to Byron or Yeats? Dickinson, Wordsworth, Larkin or Keats? Did they see these words as auditory threats? Could they write their lines without caveats?   What does it matter when all’s said and done if you read this as scone when I meant scone? It’s hardly a crime. There’s no need to atone: language is a bowl of thick minestrone.   So mumble these endings into your beard – this poem should be seen, rather than heard. Brian Bilston

Here’s a poem called ‘Neither Rhyme nor Reason’.

Poem title: At the Intersection The poem is divided into two overlapping circles. The left-hand circle is titled ‘me’ and the text reads: the day we went out to have an ice-cream, we said nothing just let our silence melt in the air as we walked across the common our love never tiring at all The right-hand circle is titled ‘you’ and the text reads: we should have talked it over but nothing ever seems to get in your fat head. You are so common that I wish we’d never met at all and I’d married Tim instead In the intersection of the poem (where the two circles overlap), the text reads: we have nothing in common at all

The mathematician John Venn was born on this day in 1834. To commemorate the occasion, here’s a poem in the form of a Venn diagram.

I am very sad to hear that Brian McHale has died. A great scholar: leading light of narratology with a brilliant stylistic rigour. He was always supportive and engaged with my own work. His wonderful books remain but he will be missed. RIP.

Allan Ahlberg, beloved children's author, dies aged 87 Working first with his wife Jane, and later with illustrators including Raymond Briggs and Bruce Ingman, he wrote more than 150 books Author Allan Ahlberg, who delighted generations of children with colourful characters and nimble rhymes, has died aged 87. Working with his wife Janet, an award-winning illustrator, Ahlberg produced a host of bestselling nursery classics including Burglar Bill, Peepo!, and Each Peach Pear Plum. After Janet’s death in 1994, he worked with illustrators such as Raymond Briggs and Bruce Ingman, with his career coming full circle in a series of collaborations with his daughter Jessica including Half a Pig and a pop-up set of anarchic variations on the tale of Goldilocks. Continue reading...

Allan Ahlberg, beloved children's author, dies aged 87

wonder if decades of mocking media studies as a Mickey Mouse subject has anything to do with this at all

Photo of Tom Lehrer

My last living musical hero is still my hero but unfortunately no longer living. RIP to the great, great Mr. Tom Lehrer.

PALA2025 is edging ever closer!! Looking forward to seeing you at Aston University, Birmingham, soon!!

cartoon for the guardian by Stephen Collins - script as follows: [Scene is a darkened LOFT. Amongst the boxes and junk are FOUR KNACKERED OLD FANS - three tower fans and one circular, with cracked grey plastic and buttons missing. One fan, TOWER FAN 1, is a bit taller than the others, and is addressing them] 1 TOWER FAN 1: Right lads, get ready. 2 TOWER FAN 1: This is our time. 3 TOWER FAN 1: The time when we remember who we are, and why we’re here. 4 TOWER FAN 1: We are the four crap fans in a British person’s loft, and we are here to make absolutely no difference whatsoever. 5 TOWER FAN 1: I know what you’re thinking, lads: 6 TOWER FAN 1: Surely this will be the year they finally replace us? 7 TOWER FAN 1: Our plastic’s gone all brown... I haven’t oscillated since 2018... 8 TOWER FAN 1: Dave here sounds like a spitfire and blows like a sad cat’s sigh… TOWER FAN 2: Cheers mate 9 TOWER FAN 1: But no. These people are British, and every year, they forget the sun exists. By the time they remember, new fans will cost *four million pounds* on Amazon. 10 TOWER FAN 1: So we’ll be back down there... shovelling thick air across the moaning faces of a species that cannot comprehend the concept of air conditioning, or even just closing the curtains when it’s hot out... 11 TOWER FAN 1: ...while they incessantly bang on about normally hot countries which this country is now temporarily a bit hotter than. 12 [The loft hatch opens and a person comes up the ladder] PERSON: APPARENTLY IT’S HOTTER THAN GREECE, LISA

british fan chat

Revealed: Thousands of UK university students caught cheating using AI Guardian investigation finds almost 7,000 proven cases of cheating – and experts says these are tip of the iceberg Thousands of university students in the UK have been caught misusing ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence tools in recent years, while traditional forms of plagiarism show a marked decline, a Guardian investigation can reveal. A survey of academic integrity violations found almost 7,000 proven cases of cheating using AI tools in 2023-24, equivalent to 5.1 for every 1,000 students. That was up from 1.6 cases per 1,000 in 2022-23. Continue reading...

Revealed: Thousands of UK university students caught cheating using AI

I told you we’d be back

PALA is thrilled to finally be on Blue Sky!! Feel free to follow and/or suggest followees! 🥳🎉

Registration Register for PALA 2025 Early bird registration continues until 16 May 2025.

pala2025.com/registration/ Very excited to announce that #pala2025 registration is now open!

what does ‘misbehaviour’ sound like? in new open access work i ask this question in the context of school discipline policies, looking at how ideologies of ‘im/proper language’ and ‘im/proper behaviour’ coalesce and get co-constructed with one another. doi.org/10.1080/0962...

ICYMI: As an exercise, I tried critiquing the "good at creative writing" OpenAI model's short story as I'd critique a human-authored story.

Initial symposium to book submission: 10 months. One reviewer said the timescale was ‘wild’ and they were not wrong! Thanks to our brilliant contributors. Out with @edinburghup.bsky.social later in the year

Really looking forward to this, Amélie!

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Registration now open for Aston Stylistics next 2024-25 ASRG seminar series talk by @AliceHaines on the narratorial representation of sleep in 'The Pickwick Papers'. Online, Wednesday 5th February, 4-5pm, all welcome!

events.teams.microsoft.com/event/56085a...

This is my go-to when parents ask me how to get their kids to read (because this is just something authors know). It’s *amazing* to me how much resistance it gets. Likewise “let them read books about spaceships, ninjas and magic.”

How to Avoid Mixing Your Metaphors   It’s not rocket surgery. First, get all your ducks on the same page. After all, you can’t make an omelette without breaking stride.   Be sure to watch what you write with a fine-tuned comb. Check and re-check until the cows turn blue. It’s as easy as falling off a piece of cake.   Don’t worry about opening up a whole hill of beans: you can always burn that bridge when you come to it, if you follow where I’m coming from.   Concentrate! Keep your door closed and your enemies closer. Finally, don’t take the moral high horse: if the metaphor fits, walk a mile in it. Brian Bilston

Today’s poem is called ‘How to Avoid Mixing Your Metaphors’.

I can never understand why children's books get left out of "great book" lists. The books we call "children's books" are really books written for an audience that includes children, but excludes no-one. They are books for EVERYONE - and if you exclude them, you miss the most important books of all!

All - Bluesky Directory A curated collection of all things relating to the Blue Sky social media platform.

Looking for people to follow? Here’s a directory of 4,500 starter packs which you can search by keyword! blueskydirectory.com/starter-pack...

Congratulations, Chloe! I cannot wait to read this 🤩

A picture of me (Ella) next to a purple microphone in the studio at BBC Radio Lincolnshire. I have shoulder-length dark brown hair, maroon glasses and am smiling at the camera.

Hi all! Since we're reintroducing ourselves:

• I'm a stylistician specialising in postmodern children's books 📚

• I completed my PhD in 2023 & am now developing my thesis as a monograph for Routledge (so watch this space!) 📖

• I have a background in radio & podcasts 📻

• I adore musical theatre 🎭