Background Information
Keeping animals real
Most of Dick’s central characters are animals to whom he gives human characteristics, but he preserves their dignity and animal qualities by presenting them in a truthful and unsentimental fashion, which allows them to behave and respond in natural ways. He never dresses them in human clothes. However he does let them speak …
Animals that talk
Dick’s animal stories rely on his power and skill of putting words into the animals’ mouths. He has fun writing their dialogue and in so doing hopes to entertain his readers. In this programme we see Fly – the sheep dog from ‘The Sheep Pig’ – trying to persuade the sheep to give her the password. All the while she is trying to disguise her real contempt for the sheep. The sheep do not hold dogs in high regard either, referring to them as stupid wolves. Through this dialogue we not only learn more about the fictional characters but also about their animal natures and instincts.
In the moving story ‘Red Setter’, the words of the dog draws the reader into the story ensuring that they witness the human cruelty through the dog’s eyes. The simplicity of the dialogue, juxtaposed with the image of the tethered and abandoned dog, magnifies the cruelty of the heartless owner: ‘Wait for me! Don’t leave me! Come back! Oh wait for me!’
The world through animals’ eyes
Dick often portrays a world as seen through an animal’s eyes – a world he describes as ‘cruel’, and he never avoids confronting the real life-and-death dramas of ‘kill or be killed’ that animals encounter, through fights, injury and cruelty. He hopes that by giving the reader another viewpoint – allowing them to see the world from another perspective – he will encourage them to see things differently and to think about what they see. A reading from the great story ‘Mousebutcher’ dramatically describes the swift death of a proud mouse when the cat’s ‘white teeth cut off his final squeak.’
On a more humorous note, poor Madison the parrot in ‘Harry’s Mad’ is horrified to observe the various ways in which the family choose to massacre their boiled eggs. They do not seem to realise they are eating one of his kind!
Write on!
Dick offers advice to children who want to write. He uses the determination of his character Daggie Dogfoot to encourage them to realise their dreams, to keep trying and never give up, because, like Daggie, sometimes pigs can fly!
Where do Dick’s ideas come from?
- the places where he worked
- the animals he cared for as a farmer
- imagining what animals might say to each other if only they could talk
Though he no longer farms, most of Dick King-Smith’s stories are about animals. The settings of most of his stories reflect his rural roots, and it is the countryside and its inhabitants that continue to influence the content of his stories today.
Dick has woven his own life experiences into the fabric of his stories. For example, his time as a grenadier guard informs the story ‘Saddlebottom’. The story is not told from his perspective but through the eyes, ears and nose of a pig, which produces quite a different viewpoint! He also draws on his observations of people in order to give personality and voice to all his characters, both animal and human. His Aunt Rosemary never knew that she was the model for the incessant chatterbox, Mrs Hogget in ‘The Sheep Pig’! Through his own examples, Dick demonstrates how the viewer could draw on their own lives to inform aspects of their story writing.
Dick’s disciplined approach to the writing process is one followed by many authors and his routine would be useful to follow:
A Writing Routine
- a regular time when you write
- a comfortable place where you can write
- get something on paper at the end of every day
Dick feels that it is a good idea to decide on a title before beginning to write a story.
A good title can:
- help develop ideas for the writer
- be the starting point for a story
Dick enjoys reading and as a child he loved animal stories such as:
- ‘The Tales of Beatrix Potter’, with characters such as Peter Rabbit and Mrs Tiggy-Winkle.
- A.A.Milne’s stories and poems, which featured Winnie the Pooh, Tigger and Kanga.
- ‘Jungle Book’ by Rudyard Kipling which gives voice to the wild creatures of the jungle.
Most of the people and places Dick has written about have been inspired by the people and places in his own life. It was whilst Dick was farming that he came up with his first good idea for a story. One night lots of his chickens were killed by a fox. Dick imagined what it would be like if he could reverse their roles and allow the weak to get their own back, and beat up the strong. The result of this idea was his first publication, ‘The Foxbusters’. Pigs are Dick’s favourite animals and they feature strongly in many of his stories. He thinks they are highly intelligent and very similar to humans; perhaps that’s why he finds it so easy to give them human qualities and make them talk!
