Comic timing: a celebration of comics

Boredom? KAZOW! Struggles with learning to read? ZOOSH! Looking for something to do with the kids this weekend? SHAZAM! (okay, that’s enough now...)

The trigger for all these exclamations is a not-to-be-missed comic event at The Story Museum, Oxford, this Saturday. Its name is a work in progress (eager comic fans are welcome to pitch ideas) but as the event is the country’s first children’s comic festival, anything could happen.

From 10am until 5pm the Pembroke Street museum’s Comic Story Exchange will stage a celebration of stories, reading, art, drawing and all things comic-related. Colour, stories and originality are welcome – and children can bring along their adult sidekicks too.

Powering the event is The Phoenix – the 32-page weekly comic for children aged 8 to 12, featuring seven or more exciting story strips, a puzzle competition and a new non-fiction zone in each issue. The Beaumont Street-based comic institution aims to get girls’ and boys’ neurons fizzing by enticing them into the world of reading and storytelling, as managing director Caro Fickling explains. “The idea behind this event – and The Phoenix’s mission – is to enable children to get lost in the joy of stories.

“The episodic, graphic nature of the visual storytelling is a less traditional way of getting children reading, thinking up characters and stories. It’s accessible, creative and should be a brilliant way to fire up imaginations.”

With such swashbuckling tales as Danica Starborn’s Secrets of the Universe, Pirates of Pangaea and Planet of the Shapes, it is no wonder avid readers such as Hamish Reed Currie, pictured, cannot wait to get stuck in.

“It sounds really fun and I CANNOT wait to go!” says Hamish of the event.

“I love The Phoenix so much because when I’m bored at school, I think about it and I get really happy and the week flies... until Friday when my next Phoenix arrives!”

And Hamish is in good company, because many of the great and good of the Oxford literary scene have explained that their love of words and stories was born from comics. Author Philip Pullman, for example said: “Comics formed a vital and vigorous part of my childhood reading. The Eagle was the main British comic, of course – to anyone born just after the war, as I was, it came as a great burst of life and fun and colour in a rather drab world.

“There was something so clean and powerful about the storytelling in a comic – so direct, so swift and easy, as if the delight and excitement of the story passed immediately into my blood.”

Just as jam-packed as the comic itself, Saturday’s line-up includes a hunt for phoenix feathers, the chance to create something for the “Wall of Awesomeness” as well as prizes up for grabs and a free copy of The Phoenix for every visitor. Highly-rated children’s comic artists, writers and publishers from the farthest corners of the universe will share their wealth of knowledge, including Sarah McIntyre, The Etherington Brothers, Neill Cameron and Adam Murphy.

Listen to stories being told, join a comic-creating workshop with one of the artists and feed the imagination with plenty of Phoenix ice cream on sale in the courtyard. Entry to Comic Story Exchange is a pocket-sized £2 with the 45-minute workshops an additional £3 each for children only. Advance tickets are sold out but a limited number of spaces will be available on the day. And, for older comic fans, Saturday also hosts a fantastic Oxford Comic Festival event at Waterstone’s. Science fiction comic 2000AD has teamed up with the book store’s Oxford branch for a free meet-and-greet event with Grant Perkins and editor Matt Smith. Saturday is looking as jam-packed as any issue of The Phoenix already. Holy Moly!

• The Comic event is at The Story Museum, Pembroke Street, Oxford, 10am-5pm. It’s £2 per head, including copy of The Phoenix for every child. Advanced tickets are sold out, but some tickets will be available on the door. Call 01865 552675.
• Visit thephoenixcomic.co.uk for more about the comic.
• Visit storymuseum.org.uk