Edward Ardizzone

Information About the Life and Work of Edward Ardizzone

Author, writer, artist, illustrator, 1900 - 1979.
Born in China, 1900.
Father Italian, Mother Scottish.
Moved from China to England at the age of five.

Edwards first home in the UK was in Ipswich, he later moved to London.

Prior to becoming a full-time artist he had a very unsuccessful career in an office.

His early work was to see him specialising in scenes of weird characters and low life hanging around London pubs and street corners.

But thanks to perhaps his young son and daughter things were about to change, he had devised for their amusement a children's book titled
Little Tim and the Brave Sea Captain, which was published in 1936.

The success of this first book was to establish him as a leading author-illustrator, his work is regarded by many to be brilliant, partly due to his unique drawing style, which concentrates on the essentials of line and form, cleverly leaving the reader to fill-in the rest from their own imagination, others would perhaps say the appeal of his work is down to its charm and child-like simplicity.

In his lifetime he illustrated approximately 160 books by other authors, such as
Charles Dickens, H. E. Bates, John Buchan, Walter de la Mare, etc.
But he will always be remembered for his own children's books,
which we have listed below.

Little Tim and the Brave Sea Captain (1936), Lucy Brown and Mr Grimes (1937),
Tim and Lucy go to Sea (1938), Nicholas and the Fast-moving Diesel (1947),
Paul the Hero of the Fire (1948), Tim to the Rescue (1949), Tim and Charlotte (1951),
Tim in Danger (1953), Tim all Alone (1956), Johnny the Clockmaker (1960),
Tim's Friend Towser (1962), Peter the Wanderer (1963),
Diana and Her Rhinoceros (1964), Sarah and Simon and No Red Paint (1965),
Tim and Ginger (1965), Tim to the Lighthouse (1968), Johnny's Bad Day (1970),
The Wrong Side of the Bed (1970), Tim's Last Voyage (1972),
Ship's Cook Ginger (1977).

To the collector of his work the following two autobiographical titles
will be of interest,
The Young Ardizzone, An Autobiographical Fragment (1970)
and Diary of a War Artist (1974).

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