28 Saturday, March 8, 2014 East Anglian daily Times feature The bad boys of books: A force for good or a bad influence?

hildren love to read Horrid Henry and Dennis the Menace are two of about kids who break the rules – whose fiction’s naughtiest anti-heroes. Soon, in irrepressible spirit can’t be crushed by teachers Colchester, their respective authors will battle it or parents. out in a contest to decide who deserves the title C For the past 63 years, The Beano’s Dennis the Menace has been the King of the Bad Boys. PAT PARKER spoke to wildest of them all. But Dennis has a rival in the shape of Horrid Henry Francesca Simon and Steven Butler about – a dastardly boy locked in constant mischief-makers in children’s literature battle with his goody-goody brother Perfect Peter. So who really is the King of the Bad Boys? At Colchester’s firstsight gallery William,” she says. “I think children resentment, perpetuating the cycle on March 16, we may find out. As are drawn to anarchic spirits. We all of conflict. part of Essex Book Festival, Horrid have these rebellious impulses, but “Henry and Peter are locked into a Henry’s creator, Francesca Simon, children do in particular, because system the parents have created,” and Steven Butler, writer of Diary their lives are so circumscribed.” she says. “Children as young as four of Dennis the Menace, will take to Not that she thinks Henry is bad, recognise this. By saying to Henry, the stage to battle it out on behalf exactly – just impulsive. “I don’t ‘Why can’t you be more like your of their respective characters. think he sees himself as naughty – brother?’ it’s guaranteed to make “We’re going to come on with he just sees himself as the centre of him want to be less like Peter. banners waving, and we want it to the world. He’s extremely selfish, They’re well-meaning, devoted be quite adversarial, with lots of and single-minded in pursuit of parents, but they don’t know what one-upmanship,” enthuses whatever he thinks he deserves. to do with Henry. They can’t accept Francesca, whose Horrid Henry He’s greedy and lazy. But he’s not the child they’ve been given.” books have sold more than 18 bad – in a sense, that’s falling into The sibling rivalry between the child in the world hasn’t done or has taken all that on board. million copies worldwide. the trap his parents have laid.” brothers is and is one dreamt of. He just vents his “I thought all parents would love “The audience gets to ask us lots By continually praising Perfect many children aggression in a funny way.” Peter, but they don’t. And I think, of questions before they vote for Peter, says Francesca, Henry’s will recognise. The brothers are two sides of the ‘I’m giving you what you supposedly their favourite, and we hope there’ll hapless parents stoke up his Francesca same coin. “I realised about four want – this perfectly-behaved child be lots of cheering and booing.” believes the years after first writing Horrid – yet you recoil from him. Why?’ American-born Oxford graduate stories offer Henry that he and Perfect Peter are “I think he triggers something Francesca created Henry back in children “a actually two sides of every person from their own childhood selves. 1994, and has had ample time place of safety” in the world. They’re opposites. If He’s the goody-goody they didn’t since to ponder why such to explore hidden, you pushed the two of them like as children. There’s something characters are so appealing. forbidden emotions. together, you’d have quite a normal very primal about this fight between “There’s a long tradition “Henry gives the person.” Henry and Peter – someone once of children’s classics which illusion of wickedness, To her surprise, Francesca told me it’s like Cain and Abel.” deal with rebellion from but he hasn’t done has discovered that, Does Henry have any redeeming Huckleberry Finn and anything that every despite his perfection, features? “Well, he’s funny – and Tom Sawyer to Just parents are not all that he’s very creative. He spends so fond of Peter. much time avoiding homework, it “Parents dislike would be easier for him just to do it. ■■Dennis the Peter. I don’t know And he has a real zest for life. Menace and his why that is, “The main thing about Henry is dog Gnasher. because he’d be the he’s impulsive – he almost never child we’re all plots things. He just responds to a socialising our given situation, often a perceived children to be. You injustice. He never thinks, ‘Today, can listen to I’m going to make my teacher’s life yourself all day as a misery’. That would leave a sour a parent – ‘Sit up taste. He doesn’t go to a museum straight’, ‘Don’t intending to knock over all the eat with your exhibits. Mayhem just happens mouth open’, along the way. That’s why he’s ‘Do your funny. Otherwise, he’d just be a homework’, sociopath.” and Peter She has no time for parents who accuse Henry of being a bad influence. “I find that absolutely hilarious. I think he’s quite the reverse. He allows children to explore emotions safely. They get all the thrill of bad behaviour and none of the consequences. “It’s a bit like adults reading detective fiction. It doesn’t make us want to East Anglian daily Times Saturday, March 8, 2014 29

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■■From left, Horrid Henry meets fans at Waterstones book shop in Ipswich in 2007; Dennis the Menace is moved on from the House of Commons after distributing his Menacefesto. The Beano was celebrating its 60th anniversary; and Dennis the Menace’s dog, Gnasher, has his teeth cleaned by Vets in Practice star Trude Mostue. Pictures: archant library/pa become criminals ourselves. I think Did she feel angry about her stems from many years ago when in something else, she took me out anxious to eradicate any suggestion parents who enjoy Horrid Henry peripatetic childhood? “Probably. I her son’s friend came to tea. “He to dinner,” he tells me. “I’d made the of homophobia in the portrayal. with their kids are sending them a always did very well in school, but said how much he liked coming to decision I wouldn’t say anything Steven has been careful to do very powerful message, which is, ‘I as I got older, the thought of our house, and I asked why, about the fact I wanted to write likewise. “I’m gay myself, so I was know you sometimes hate your starting over again became wondering which of my many books, because it’s so needy and keen to avoid any hint of that, and I brother. I know sometimes you hate increasingly hard. I hated moving qualities he admired. And he said, pathetic. But half-way through the took anything which could be me, but I’m big enough to deal with house – I’ve lived in the same house ‘It’s because you let children pour meal, Francesca said, ‘You strike me construed as bullying out,” he says. it. I can cope with in London for over their own ketchup’!” as the kind of person who would “The Softies are old before their your passionate 20 years.” Horrid Henry is a global want to write’, and I very gingerly time. They’re strange to Dennis – emotions and it’s I don’t think Henry After studying phenomenon, and has spawned a TV said, ‘Well...’ And she said, ‘Go for it bookish, boring, smarmy, self- fine’.” is a bad influence. I medieval English cartoon series, a film and a stage – just go for it’. So I did. important children. Walter is quite As a child, was at Oxford, play. Steven Butler was cast as “It’s a very unlikely friendship, an unpleasant character – very Francesca more think he’s quite the Francesca stayed Henry in the original stage but we both have a wicked sense of calculating and spiteful, and a rival like Henry or in England. She production, and he and Francesca humour, which comes across in our to Dennis. Walter is from a wealthy Peter? A bit of reverse. It’s like adults married a became friends, despite the age books,” says Steven. family and looks down on Dennis, both. “I’m quite a reading detective software difference (Steven is 31). They shared a sense of being an who’s working class, so it’s a fierce person,” she developer in 1986. It’s indirectly down to Francesca outsider. “Francesca was this permanent battle of power. says. “I wouldn’t fiction. It doesn’t make After the birth of that he is now the creator of the staunchly-feminist, curly, dark- “Walter’s constantly trying to get hesitate to their only child, Dennis the Menace’s diaries. The haired Jewish girl on the blonde, everyone else into trouble, whereas intervene if us want to be criminals Joshua, in 1989, actor, dancer and circus performer bikini-clad West Coast, and I grew Dennis just wants to have fun, and something she started to had always wanted to be an author up in a tiny village in Kent, where Walter stands in his way. Dennis happened on a bus write children’s but had never completed a novel. anyone who wore red was isn’t nasty. He’s just wild and or the Tube. At school, I was the stories. “When I had to leave the cast considered weird, and if you liked chaotic – a lovable rogue.” best-behaved child in the world, but “It was at a time when my friends because I was contracted to appear any music except your average pop As Steven has played Henry on I was very badly-behaved at home.” were having second children and I you were considered crazy. stage, and become the writer of Much of the inspiration for Horrid started noticing that people were “I was this quirky, grungy rock kid Dennis’s diaries, he’s well-qualified Henry stemmed from her own categorising them – ‘Oh, she’s such who wore lots of brightly-coloured to have an opinion on which is the unsettled, bohemian childhood. She a good baby’, ‘My God, he was awful’ clothing and didn’t fit in at all.” naughtier. His vote goes to Dennis. was born in St Louis in 1958, then – and I started thinking about a It’s this sense of not quite “Whereas Henry’s misbehaviour is the family moved to California. She family system of a good child and a belonging, he says, which helped almost never calculated, Dennis’s was the eldest of four children, and bad child.” him understand the frustrations of can be. Also, because Dennis comes there was always a battle for space. She has written about 90 Horrid Dennis the Menace. from a comic book, he is freer than Her father was a freelance Henry stories. The latest, Horrid After Francesca encouraged him Henry. He could make a flying screenwriter. “He was writing films Henry’s Krazy Ketchup, to write, he came up with a story machine that could fly around half the time and plays the other called The Wrong Pong, about a boy Beanoland, whereas Henry couldn’t, half, so he’d have one year earning a who is whooshed down a toilet and because he lives in the real world.” great deal of money and another encounters a family of trolls in Steven says that, often, it’s the year earning none. the sewers. most mischievous pupils who win “My mother was very anxious – The Wrong Pong books were a their teachers’ affections. not suited to living with someone great success, so when The “There’s nearly always a character whose income is uncertain. Her Beano publishers, DC Thomson, like Dennis,” he says. “I see them all father had been wealthy when she asked Puffin Books to find an the time. And what’s funny is that was a little girl, but they lost author to write new Dennis the in front of the other children, the everything in the Depression.” Menace books, they put Steven teachers are disapproving, but in Her mother combined home- forward. the staffroom you find that they’re making with civil rights activism. Dennis the Menace first the ones the teachers are really fond “She was a free-thinker and a big appeared in The Beano in 1951. of, because they’re such strong little campaigner” who influenced With his spiky black hair, characters. Francesca’s own politics. red-and-black jumper and his “Even adults like a lovable rogue. The family left Los Angeles for unruly dog Gnasher, he is an That’s why characters like Dennis England when Francesca was six, as iconic bad boy. have stood the test of time.” her father was writing Judy While Henry is constantly at Garland’s last film. When she was war with Perfect Peter, Dennis’s ■■Francesca Simon and Steven eight, they went to live in France. enemy remains the priggish Walter Butler appear in Bad Boys: Dennis Then it was back to California. By and his band of Softies. the Menace vs Horrid Henry at then, she had acquired European Traditionally, Walter was a rather firstsite, Colchester, at 3pm on habits and was treated as a ■■Authors Steven Butler ■ effeminate character, and in modern Sunday, March 16. Tickets £7.50. foreigner. and Francesca Simon. times DC Thomson has been www.justimaginestorycentre.co.uk