Michael Rosen (born May 7, 1946, Harrow, Middlesex, England) is a prolific English children’s author who has written picture books, nonfiction works, and collections of poetry. Much of his work, often composed in humorous verse, incorporates events and people from his life. He has often appeared on radio and television as well as in schools to perform excerpts of his books.
Michael Rosen is the youngest of three sons of Harold and Connie Isakofsky Rosen. He was raised in Pinner, a suburb outside London. Rosen began to read and write poetry at a young age. In his teens he developed an interest in becoming a doctor, so he attended Middlesex Hospital Medical School for a short time. He changed his mind, however, and left to pursue English at Wadham College at the University of Oxford, from which he graduated in 1969.
While Rosen was attending the University of Oxford, he was very involved in theater, writing, directing, and acting in plays. He wrote his first work, Backbone, while still a student; the play was performed at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 1969. After graduating, Rosen started working at the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), where he wrote scripts for children’s radio and television. He left the BBC in 1972 and dedicated himself to writing while also teaching writing at primary schools part-time until the mid-1980s. He later returned to his studies and focused on children’s literature, earning a master’s degree from the University of Reading in 1994 and a Ph.D. from the University of North London in 1997. Beginning in the 1990s, he taught children’s literature at various universities.
Rosen’s work began being published in the 1970s. His first children’s book, Mind Your Own Business (1974), was a collection of poems. Since that time, he consistently published new works. Some of his poetry collections include Quick, Let’s Get Out of Here (1983), Don’t Put Mustard in the Custard (1985), You Wait Till I’m Older than You (1996), Uncle Billy Being Silly (2001), and Bananas in My Ears (2011). Many of the picture books he wrote revolve around animals, including Rover (1999), Howler (2004), Bear’s Day Out (2007), and Bear Flies High (2009). He even tackled some weightier subjects in his picture books. Totally Wonderful Miss Plumberry (2005), for example, shows how rewarding it is when young students are guided by a sensitive teacher. A more somber example, Michael Rosen’s Sad Book (2004), explores how feelings of sadness affect people, with Rosen writing about how the death of his 18-year-old son made him feel and how he coped with it. Many of Rosen’s books have been illustrated by Quentin Blake.
Rosen also has written and edited works in other genres. He helped Susanna Steele collect the rhymes in Inky, Pinky, Ponky: Children’s Playground Rhymes (1982), and he performed the same job solo for books such as Poems for the Very Young (1993), Walking the Bridge of Your Nose (1994), and Michael Rosen’s A–Z (2009). Rosen’s nonfiction work Balls! (2006) covers the history of and other facts about the spherical equipment used in different sports. His works intended for older audiences include Culture Shock (1990), a compilation of poetry for teenagers that Rosen edited; What’s So Special About Shakespeare? (2007), a book that Rosen wrote on the Bard’s life and works; Fantastic Mr Dahl (2012), which Rosen wrote about famous author Roald Dahl; and The Missing: The True Story of My Family in World War II (2020), in which Rosen reflects on his Jewish relatives, many of whom disappeared during World War II and the Holocaust. Rosen’s memoirs include Carrying the Elephant: A Memoir of Love and Loss (2002); This Is Not My Nose: A Memoir of Illness and Recovery (2004); All About Me (2009), which was aimed at a younger audience; Many Different Kinds of Love: A Story of Life, Death, and the NHS (2021), about his near-fatal battle with COVID-19 and his recovery; and Getting Better: Life Lessons on Going Under, Getting over It, and Getting Through It (2023).
Rosen has received many honors and awards during his career, including the Eleanor Farjeon Award for his accomplishments in children’s literature in 1997 and the PEN Pinter Prize in 2023 celebrating the humanity of his work. In addition, Rosen served as the United Kingdom’s Children’s Laureate from 2007 to 2009.