interpreted the stories and the characters in these, often building whole worlds around characters, or helping to scaffold more abstract themes and ideas. Alongside new and emerging talent, we also had experienced talent including two times winner of the Carnegie Medal and former children’s laureate, Anne Fine, who contributed the story Children’s Rights, and current children’s laureate Joseph Coelho. Jackie Morris winner of the Kate Greenaway Medal in 2019 with The Lost Words opens the collection with her acrostic poem, Imagine, and A. M. Dassu, author of Boy, Everywhere, which won the Little Rebels award in 2021, contributed a powerful short-story about identity and courage – This is Who I Am.
Expressing our rights
We had traveller author Richard O’Neill, interviewed in this issue, who contributed a brilliant poem about reading. KPMG Children’s Book Ireland winner C. G. Moore also wrote a poem for the collection. C. G. Moore is LGBTQIA+ and his verse novel, Gut Feelings, documents the impact his chronic illness (familial adenomatous polyposis) has had upon his life. This won the KPMG Children’s Book Ireland, children’s book of the year. C. G. Moore’s poem in the collection is
was my dream or if I was trying to please my family.
called They Tell Me. It is based on the right to be heard. Considering why this resonated with him, he said: “I often felt as though there were limited career paths and options for me, and I’d often latch on to what I felt I was expected to do rather than what I wanted to do. I look back and wonder if my dream of being a teacher
“Children often know what they want and how they feel. Adults can have a habit of imposing their view and issues of safeguarding aside, we need to recognise that every child has a voice and it’s our duty to listen to them.” C. G. Moore talks about why he thinks raising awareness of children’s rights is important. “We often assume that adults are infallible and that their views should be adhered to because they are older and therefore wiser, but adults are every bit as fallible as anyone else. “When you have some children living in situations of domestic abuse or living with parents with addiction or even severe mental health conditions, children need to know that they have a right to feel safe, loved and cared for. They need access to these values and it’s our collective duty to protect them and watch out for warning signs to prevent prolonged periods in potentially volatile or neglectful situations.”
Talking about what is next for him after being included in the anthology, C. G. Moore discusses his new book Trigger, and says there are strong themes around rights and consent. He says: “It will publish with Little Island
Autumn-Winter 2023
PEN&INC. 13
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