Polly Dunbar and her puppets - Free event!

Award Winning Author’s Puppets Bring the Write Stuff to Children

Award winning author-illustrator Polly Dunbar and her Long Nose puppets are set to be the star of a magical free event on Thursday 25th April, which will be broadcast live over the internet to tens of thousands of children across the UK.
Young fans of Polly’s books are invited to tune in as she brings her latest picture book, Arthur’s Dream Boat, to life with a little help from the Long Nose puppets, a variety of charismatic hand puppets, full body costumes and masks, all with huge personalities.
The free Authors Live event, run by Scottish Book Trust and BBC Scotland Learning, is suitable for children aged 4-7 and will be streamed live from the BBC Scotland Learning website on Thursday 25th April at 11am. Authors Live is funded by Creative Scotland.
The author and illustrator of many picture books, Polly is the daughter of the distinguished author Joyce Dunbar who she collaborated with on the picture book Shoe Baby. Polly’s Tilly and Friends series of books has recently been made into an animated adventure for CBeebies and her best-selling book Penguin won the Nestle Silver award 2007, The Book Trust Early Years award 2007, The Red House Award 2008 and was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal. Polly is also the co-founder of Long Nose puppets, a touring puppet company who create inspiring, inventive and colourful puppet shows for the very young and have made successful adaptations of the books Shoe Baby, Fly Away Katie and Penguin. 
Commenting on the upcoming event, Polly said:
 “I'm very excited that the Arthur's Dream Boat puppet show will beamed in to hundreds of classrooms! We approach making our puppet shows as though we are making a giant picture book; each scene change is like the turn of the page. With theatre you can bring a book to life with many different layers: music, movement, lighting and of course the key part to bringing a story to life…a live audience!” Jasmine Fassl, Children’s Programme Manager at Scottish Book Trust, said:
“Scottish Book Trust is delighted to welcome Polly and the Long Nose Puppets to Scotland for this exclusive online event. Our young viewers can look forward to letting their imaginations run riot as Polly’s books come alive on the stage through the artistry and rich drama of puppet theatre.”The award-winning Authors Live programme is an exclusive series of authors’ events streamed live over the internet to provide young people, parents and teachers with the chance to get up close and personal with some of the world’s leading children’s writers. Run by BBC Scotland Learning and Scottish Book Trust, Scotland’s leading agency for the promotion of literature, reading and writing, the programme was the first of its kind in the UK. Anyone can sign up to watch and it is completely free.
Over 800,000 people from 153 countries across the world have tuned in to watch the Authors Live events. The programme began in March 2010 with poet Michael Rosen, followed by author of The Gruffalo and Children’s Laureate, Julia Donaldson. The programme has also seen events from world class authors Jacqueline Wilson, Michael Morpurgo, Charlie Higson and Francesca Simon.