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Author Information
JON SCIESZKA
 Jon Scieszka was born in Flint, Michigan on September 8th, 1954. He grew up with five
brothers, has the same birthday as Peter Sellers and the Virgin Mary, and a sneaking
suspicion that the characters in his Dick and Jane reader were not of this world.
Those plain facts, plus his elementary school principal dad, Louis, his registered nurse
mom, Shirley (who once took Jon's Cub Scout den on a field trip to the prenatal ward), Mad
Magazine, four years of pre-med undergrad, "The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show",
an M.F.A. in Fiction from Columbia University, Robert Benchley, five years of painting
apartments in New York City, his lovely wife Jeri Hansen who introduced him to Molly Leach
and Lane Smith, GREEN EGGS AND HAM, his teenage daughter Casey and almost teenage son
Jake, ten years of teaching a little bit of everything from first grade to eighth grade,
and the last twenty years of living in Brooklyn...are just some of Jon's answers to the
questions, "Where do you get your ideas?" and/or "How did you become a
writer?"
I don't know, just because, none of your beeswax, and flapdoodle poppycock and balderdash
are some more of Jon's answers to questions you can imagine on your own.
Jon met up with Lane Smith around 1986 or so, and nothing has been the same since. Their
first book, the wiseguy fairy tale retelling, THE TRUE STORY OF THE 3 LITTLE PIGS! was
initially rejected by most publishers as "too weird" and "too
sophisticated". Published by Viking in 1989, THE TRUE STORY has now sold over a
million copies, been translated into ten languages, and been called a "classic
picture book for all ages".
Jon and Lane's THE STINKY CHEESE MAN AND OTHER FAIRLY STUPID TALES (1992) took the world
of the picture book a few steps further. Goofing with the conventions of fairy tales and
even being a book, THE STINKY CHEESE MAN became a household word, sold another mess of
copies in multiple languages, offended a few purists, and still managed to win a Caldecott
Honor medal.
MATH CURSE (1995) further stretched the notion of what subjects make good picture books,
selling more books faster than either 3 LITTLE PIGS or STINKY CHEESE, and winning a whole
slew of awards --all for a book full of mathematics.
More recently, Jon and Lane have resurrected fables (in the smart, funny, and a little bit
wicked way Aesop would have wanted them) in their latest collaboration, SQUIDS WILL BE
SQUIDS (1998). No telling where they might take the picture book next.
In his picture books and his chapter books, Jon has always trusted the intelligence of
kids. He sees his Time Warp Trio series of chapter books as both a tribute and an offering
to all of those kids (often labeled "reluctant readers") who are looking for
something entertaining and smart to read. Jon's hope is that the Time Warp books will help
kids connect to all kinds of other books. But he's also pretty thrilled with just the idea
of librarians reading the Time Warp titles out loud: KNIGHTS OF THE KITCHEN TABLE; THE
NOT-SO-JOLLY ROGER; THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE GOOFY; YOUR MOTHER IS A NEANDERTHAL; SUMMER
READING IS KILLING ME!; and SEE YOU LATER, GLADIATOR. The avalanche of Time Warp fan mail
and children-voted state reading awards for the Time Warps are the happy proof that these
early chapter books have found their readers.
Someone once wrote, "Jon Scieszka has forever changed the face of children's
literature." And while there is still some confusion over exactly who that someone
was, and whether children's literature does, in fact, have a face, most would agree-from
THE TRUE STORY of the 3 LITTLE PIGS! to SQUIDS WILL BE SQUIDS, since Scieszka put pen to
paper, children's literature sure has been. . . different.
Favorite Answers to Frequent Questions Yes, I always comb my hair like this.
Well, let's just say that I'm one year younger than my older brother and two
years older than my next youngest brother.
I think I came up with the idea for The True Story of the Three Little Pigs! after
rewriting fairy tales with my second grade class. I took off a year from teaching and sat
at a desk and wrote. All of the stories, including The True Story, were rejected a bunch
of times.
Lane Smith (the illustrator of The True Story and The Stinky Cheese Man) and I were
friends before we worked together. I knew she would do a great job because we like a lot
of the same cartoons and books and ideas. And we laugh at each other's bad jokes all of
the time.
I never know exactly how long it takes to write a story. I read a lot of stuff, think
about different stories all the time, scribble thinks down on paper, type them up, change
them, type them up again, think some more, add things....
Okay, I'll tell you the date I was born -- September 8, 1954 in Flint, Michigan, second
oldest and the nicest of six boys. Now I'm married, I have two kids and live in Brooklyn,
NY.
I went to school in Culver Military Academy, Indiana where I was a Lieutenant; Albion
College, Michigan where I studied to be a doctor; and Columbia University, New York, where
I got a M.F.A. in fiction. And yes, I always thought about being an author.
Sure I had regular jobs before I became a full time author. I was a lifeguard. I painted
factories, houses, and apartments. I wrote for magazines. And I taught elementary school
in New York for ten years as a 1st grade assistant, a 2nd grade homeroom teacher, and a
computer, math, science and history teacher in 3rd -8th grade.
My favorite things to read are fairytales of course, myths, legends, comic books, graphic
novels, history, poems, novels, science books, picture books, short stories, newspapers,
funny bits, codes, hieroglyphics, encyclopedias, dictionaries, subway ads, sides of cereal
boxes, matchbook covers, mattress tags, and any little scraps of paper with writing on
them.
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LANE SMITH
 LANE SMITH was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma on August 25th, 1959. His family moved to
Corona, California when he was three, but spent the better part of every summer back in
Oklahoma. "My family would take the old Route 66 highway. I think that's where my
bizarre sense of design comes from. Once you've seen a 100-foot cement buffalo on top of a
donut-stand in the middle of nowhere, you're never the same."
Lane has one brother, whose name is Shane. "Shane and Lane. My Mom thought this was
funny. Really. A real hoot. However, HER brothers were named Dub, Cubby, Leo and Billy-
Joe! My Dad's brothers were Tom and Jerry! I SWEAR this is true!"
"I had a great childhood. We lived in the foothills, and my brother and I spent all
of our after-school time exploring, building forts, collecting lizards, etc. My favorite
time of year was Fall, when the wind would start up and the air grew colder. I lived for
Halloween and I loved the old Universal studios' monster movies. Shane and I would watch
them, then read each other horror stories with titles like Tales to Tremble By. The
foothills were full of dry bushes and desert trees and in the Fall we'd get a lot of
creepy looking tumbleweeds blowing through our backyard at night. I used to lay awake in
bed and imagine what wild adventures might be happening in the hills. I think some of
those memories later evolved into THE BIG PETS.
Lane supplemented the money his parents were putting towards his college tuition by taking
a job at Disneyland. "I worked at Disneyland for about five years as a janitor. Only
we weren't called janitors, we were called custodial hosts. One of my duties was to clean
out the attractions at night. It was great to be left in the Haunted Mansion all alone.
Another duty was to clean up after someone if they got sick on the Revolving Teacup ride.
Like I said, it was great to be left in the Haunted Mansion all alone."
After he graduated from college with a B.F.A. in Illustration, he headed for the Big Apple
with a small portfolio of illustrations.
Since then his work has appeared on the covers of The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times
Magazine, The Boston Globe, Sierra, American Bookseller, The Progressive, Time, Newsweek,
Mother Jones, and Ms.
"A lot of reviewers have misidentified my technique as airbrush or dyes or even egg
tempera. I think this is because it almost looks as if it was sprayed with paint with
little dots of color and texture visible. Actually, my work is rendered in oil paints. I
paint on board, building up several thin glazes of the oil, sealing them between coats
with an acrylic spray varnish. This not only dries the oil instantly, but also causes a
chemical reaction between the oil and the acrylic. Normally, it would be a mistake to
combine two opposites like this and in fact it was a mistake the first time I did it, but
I liked the results. I'm a big fan of artists who play with surfaces. I love texture and
grunge. The trick is to know when to stop. Sometimes I keep adding more and more layers
until I've ruined the piece. Usually I stop when the painting starts to look interesting.
Then I go in with a fine brush and add details, lights and darks, etc. It's a laborious
process, but it's unpredictable and it keeps me interested and surprised. Of course, I'm
influenced by other illustrators too, like N.C. Wyeth, Maurice Sendak, Arthur Rackham,
Edward Lear, Gustav Dore and Tomi Ungerer. I hope I can follow the path these dark
illustrators have walked, or at least use the sidewalk that runs alongside it."
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Write to Jon and Lane:
Send email to stinky@chucklebait.com.
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