Jan Brett Biography

     Jan Brett is both an author and an illustrator.  This means she has written the words and made the pictures for all of her books.  Currently, she lives in a town by the sea in Massachusetts with her husband, her pet hedgehog named Buffy, four ducks, and 14 chickens!  Although she owns all of these animals, her favorite animal is a horse.  In fact, at one time, she consider being in the Olympics as a horse rider!! Mrs. Brett has been drawing horses since she was a little girl and she tries to include a horse in each of her books.

     Jan Brett has been writing and illustrating books for over twenty-seven years.  However, she knew that she wanted to be a writer and illustrator ever since she was in kindergarten.  At the age of six, Mrs. Brett began practicing her drawing skills.  She drew every chance she got and she even drew instead of watching TV.  Mrs. Brett says, " Drawing is like tennis, or playing the piano, or playing basketball.  The more you practice, the better you get.  Anybody can learn how to draw." 

     Each book takes about one year for Mrs. Brett to complete.  Sometimes it takes her one hour just to draw one inch!  In order for her animals in her books to look so real, she works and works on them until she feels like she can just walk onto a page and actually pet the animals.  The book that was the hardest for her to finish was Noah's Ark because it has over 400 animals in it.  For each page, Mrs. Brett starts by drawing the pictures first with a pencil and then she paints them with watercolors. Her husband helps her by typing the words for the story on the computer.

     When Mrs. Brett was in art school at the Boston Museum School, she would spend hours and hours studying different types of art.   Now when she illustrates books, she uses these memories to help her create her work.  She also travels to different countries to inspire her as she writes and draws. Norway, Japan, and Africa are just a few of the places where she has been.  

***All information for this biography was taken from the following websites:
http://janbrett.com/biography.htm

http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/jan-brett-interview-transcript