The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award has been around for eight years. It aims to foster worldwide interest in children’s books.

 

Authors, illustrators, storytellers and active promoters of reading are among those in the list for receiving the prize.

 

This year’s winner is Belgian illustrator and children’s book author Kitty Crowther. She will receive the Literature Award and a nearly $700-thousand cash prize in Stockholm in late May.

 

Born in 1970 to a British father and Swedish mother, Kitty Crowther now lives outside Brussels with her two sons.  She was born with a hearing impairment and began to talk later than most kids. She says it was like living in a bubble and floating within her own worlds. Many of Crowther’s childhood experiences find their way into her children’s books. 

 

[Larry Lampert, Chairman of the Jury]: 

“She supports weakness, tries to help and shows that weakness and solitude isn't dangerous, it is something within everybody. And that there are always ways you can go and strengthen yourself and find a better world, a better life.” 

 

Some of Crowther’s role models are Beatrix Potter, Elsa Beskow and "Moomins" by Tove Jansson. Crowther’s simple style shows light strokes that are full of movement and emotion. 

 

Above all, the award recognizes Crowther’s enchanting and traditional storytelling, which is full of humanity, sympathy, and Swedish culture.

 

NTD News, Stockholm, Sweden.