The Snowman

Product Information

Together they fly through the night sky on a breathtaking and magical journey, until the sun comes up and it's time to go home. The Snowman has a similarly ordinary domestic setting, but it takes off into fairy tale and soaring fantasy. This edition of the classic tale from Raymond Briggs features stunningly rendered new artwork based on the 1982 film, alongside beautifully written story narration. John Coates was best-known for co-founding the TVC London animation studio in 1957 together with George Dunning.

As well as illustrating books for authors such as Allan Ahlberg, Raymond Briggs has written and illustrated many of his own books, including the hugely successful children's strip illustration books Father Christmas (1973) and The Snowman (1978). This timeless story captures the wonder and innocence of childhood and is now recognised throughout the world. Raymond Briggs was born in London in 1934, and studied at Wimbledon School of Art and the Slade School of Art, London. The two find a sheeted-down motorcycle in the house's garden and go for a ride on it through the woods.In the sequence, Bowie was filmed in the attic of 'his' childhood home and discovering, in a drawer, a scarf closely resembling the one given to James towards the end of the film; [7] he then proceeds to narrate over the opening with his own small variation of Briggs' monologue. When he began to draw, he was interested in ‘above all, what the figure was doing and thinking and feeling … the illustrator is interested in the storytelling aspect of the picture’.

The cultural highlight is Fungus’ visit to the ‘public liberality’, its shelves bulging with novels such as 'A Room with a Bogey', 'Cider with Bogey' and (my favourite) 'A La Recherché Du Bogeys Perdu': ‘Oh what dross! It was first produced by Contact Theatre, Manchester in 1986 [26] and was adapted and produced by Anthony Clark.The orchestral score was performed by the Sinfonia of London and the song was performed by Peter Auty, a St Paul's Cathedral choirboy. Raymond Briggs confirmed that the boy in The Snowman seemed to reside in the South Downs area, near Brighton, suggesting that both the boy and the snowman are likely from Brighton. This is Briggs’ most playful work, full of mock footnotes, comical reversals, asides to the reader, while ‘Bogeys frequently think in … misquotations’. This brand-new edition of the timelesstale features artwork from the original and beloved animated film in better, sharper, quality than ever before, and freshly written text.

The song "Walking in the Air" is sung in the film by chorister Peter Auty, [12] who was not credited in the original version.Raymond is honoured with a BookTrust Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his outstanding contribution to children's literature. In 2021, Blake told the Financial Times that he wanted to incorporate the lyrics with "a symphony that expressed the complete innocence and beauty that we are all born with. It has been re-released several times by Palace and later PolyGram Video, and Universal Studios Home Entertainment UK after Palace went out of business.

The film was produced using traditional animation techniques, consisting of pastels, crayons and other colouring tools drawn on pieces of celluloid, which were traced over hand drawn frames. A set of four containing 'The Snowman Pop-Up', 'The Snowman' (Ladybird), 'The Snowman- The Party' and 'The Snowman' (Ladybird). The sequel entitled The Snowman and the Snowdog was dedicated in Coates' memory shortly following his unfortunate death from cancer.He has equally never been afraid of topical political issues, as in his irony at government preparations for nuclear war in When the Wind Blows (1982), or the savagely depicted protagonists of The Tin-Pot Foreign General and the Old Iron Woman (1984), which appeared in the aftermath of the Falklands War; black and white sketches of soldiers being shot, burned alive and buried, juxtaposed with highly sexualized Ralph Steadman-like images. The Snowman: A guide to the music of this festive classic - and who actually sang 'Walking in the Air' | Classical Music". Fungus is another of Briggs’ working men, grumbling about his job of scaring ‘the drycleaners’; waking babies, plunging houses into darkness, and raising boils. Blake suggested that the film should not feature dialogue, but instead a through-composed orchestral soundtrack. If you have concerns about how we have used your personal information, you also have the right to complain to a privacy regulator.