Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Match Girl in a mash up with the true story of the match girl strikes of Victorian England? What a good idea.
The Little Match Girl Strikes Back, written by Emma Carroll and illustrated by Lauren Child, is out now from Simon and Schuster.
Lauren’s illustrations are rich in line, shape and texture and take the reader into a monochrome world of Victorian London – in winter, no less. There is an afterword containing historical photographs of the real match girl strikers and the interior of a match factory. If you go to East London you can see the Bryant and May match factory which is currently fashionable accommodation and free from phosphorous.
The book is printed in two colours on a very combustible woodfree paper. It was designed by gaslight using set squares and cast in metal type using the finest, most toxic lead available.
Illustrations © Lauren Child; design by profuselyillustrated.
I didn’t realise that matches were call ‘spills’ in Victorian England.
Films © profuselyillustrated, 2022.
