Entertainment

Sam McBratney: Best-selling children's author and 'profoundly lovely human being'

Northern Ireland children's author Sam McBratney
Northern Ireland children's author Sam McBratney Northern Ireland children's author Sam McBratney

WHAT'S the secret to writing a best-selling children's book?

At first glance it might not seem too difficult.

Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney is just 395 words long - half the size of this article - and was his first attempt at a book for young children.

The story came together in just a few minutes, inspired in part by the hares he would see running across fields outside his window overlooking Lough Neagh.

But of course the reality was much more complicated.

This was in fact Sam's 57th book, penned at the age of 50, and those few minutes of inspiration were followed by six months of perspiration as every word and punctuation mark battled for its place.

First published in 1994, it tells the story of Big Nutbrown Hare and Little Nutbrown Hare - the names being the first ingredient of the magic recipe - as they compete to express how much they love each other.

From 'I love you as high as I can hop' to 'I love you across the river and over the hills', the measures get ever larger until Big Nutbrown Hare kisses his young son goodnight and whispers the now-famous phrase: 'I love you right up to the moon - and back'.

McBratney said he had two guiding principles.

First, it should be a story that a child would want to hear again and again, and an adult wouldn't tire of reading either.

And, crucially: "I wanted to capture a moment of tenderness between a parent and child, and I wanted to do it with a light touch."

Add some beautiful watercolour illustrations by Northern Ireland-based artist Anita Jeram, and a timeless book design, and the result has been more than 50 million copies sold in more than 50 languages, as well as a range of gifts, a television adaptation and stage play.

Not that this incredible success ever went to Sam's head.

Described by his publisher as "a profoundly lovely human being", Ireland's biggest selling writer managed to continue living in relative anonymity with his wife Maralyn and their tortoise Mabel in a house near Lisburn.

Born in 1943, the son of a compositor at the Belfast Telegraph, he had grown up in post-war austerity on Belfast's York Road and went to Friends School after passing the 11-plus.

At Trinity College Dublin he would carry a notebook around with him him to jot down his thoughts, and he later created a cast of characters to populate bedtimes stories for his three children.

"I believe that people are writers by temperament. There are people in this world who want to organise their experience through using words and I'm one of them... I don't know what I think until I see it written it down," he told the BBC a few years ago.

He became a teacher and worked across the north's education system, including Strandtown PS in Belfast and Limavady Grammar.

After tea each night, he would then retire to the wooden shed at the top of his garden, switch on the electric light and Super Ser heater, and write.

His first novel, Mark Time was a tender "pre-puberty love story" set in Belfast. It was finally published in 1976.

A variety of other books - from ghost stories to science-fiction - followed and a year before Guess How Much I Love You he won critical acclaim for his young adult novel The Chieftain's Daughter, set in fifth century Ireland.

The success of his first picture book - the suggestion came from his editor - allowed him to write full-time.

Further books featuring the Nutbrown Hares continued to delight children, with a sequel, Will You Be My Friend?, published just this week.

The enduring appeal of the original also continues to spawn celebrity fans and copycat versions, while its universal expression of love abounds in Valentine's messages, wedding vows and funerals.

But what most satisfied Sam, as he once told the Reading Rockets literacy programme, was “the idea that you know somewhere in the world tonight some mom or dad is going to be reaching down a copy of a book that I wrote and reading it to the most precious thing they have in the world".

"For writers that’s the holy grail.”

Sam McBratney died aged 77 on September 18. He is survived by his wife of 56 years, Maralyn, sons Adam and Patrick, daughter Sarah and grandchildren.