Interview with Michael Morpurgo

How did your involvement with the Wicked Young Writers’ Award come about?
Many years ago I had been a judge on another award for young people’s writing – The WHSmith Award that ran for about 30 years. When this award stopped because of lack of funding and the fact that teachers were so overburdened with the demands of the curriculum and testing and didn’t have time to encourage this kind of creativity within schools, I always felt that the award had left a big gap. When the organisers of this new award – Wicked Productions – who have created the musical Wicked, approached me to be a judge on this new award for writing, I was really pleased. What makes this award unique is the breadth of its appeal spanning a wide age range and allowing children and young people to write on any theme and style.