IN 1983, children’s writer Anthony Browne was looking for a novel way to publicise his latest story, Gorilla.

When a TV producer suggested Browne should be filmed talking about his work inside the gorillas' enclosure at Howlett's Wild Animal Park, the illustrator agreed to go along with the plan.

As Browne entered the cage, park owner John Aspinall threw in some rose petals, which gorillas enjoy as a snack, and one of the beasts sank his teeth into the writer’s leg.

Despite the searing pain, Browne soldiered on with the filming for 20 minutes before being taken to hospital. The incident did not put him off drawing gorillas in his picture books, and his series about Willy, the tank-top clad chimpanzee, is enjoyed by children around the world.

Earlier this month, Browne’s popularity as a picture book author was recognised by Booktrust when he was appointed the new Children’s Laureate, a post he will hold for the next two years.

Speaking from his home in Kent, Browne, 62, told The Guide he was delighted with the positive feedback he has received following his appointment, and adds: “No-one is more chuffed than me. I will try to visit schools and libraries and talk to children and teachers and librarians.

“I particularly enjoy talking to children because they are such an enthusiastic audience. It’s something to do with the education process, but children are encouraged to leave picture books behind at quite an early stage.

“At the same time, children get self-conscious and think they can't draw when they get older. In one of my books, The Shape Game, a family visits an art gallery and afterwards their mother shows them how to play (by turning a squiggle or an outline into a detailed drawing), and I want children to keep playing that game because their visual creativity is released and encouraged.

“I want children to draw for drawing's sake, or draw to communicate – that ultimately is what drawing is about.”

Browne, who grew up in Yorkshire, won the Hans Christian Andersen Medal in 2000, the highest international honour in children’s literature.

He is reluctant to suggest that his books have an over-riding theme or message, but adds: “One of the points I would like to get across is that we are not alone as children,” he says.

“There are thousands of others experiencing the same fears and joys.

“We are all different. but we are all the same. Children identify particularly with Willy. He is a universal character partly because he is a chimpanzee, and no-one knows how old Willy is, so all kids can identify him.”

When I ask Browne to identify the mystery monkey who appears in the night to play football with Willy in Willy the Wizard, the author says he prefers to maintain some ambiguity, so that children can follow the clues in his illustrations to provide their own explanation.

Like Michael Rosen, one of his predecessors as children’s laureate, he supports the proposal for a centre for children’s books in Oxford, and hopes to visit the city during his tenure.

“I came to the Oxford Literary Festival to talk about Little Beauty, my last book and got a great welcome – I thought everything was very well organised.”

Before we finish, I can’t stop myself from asking Browne for more gory details about his close encounter with the gorilla.

“My wife was pregnant with our first child, so it wasn’t a good time,” the illustrator recalls.

“But I didn’t lose my fascination with them – now I like to see them in the wild.”

Young readers will be relieved that a nasty chomp didn’t put him off.

The Children’s Laureate is run by reading charity Booktrust. For more details visit childrenslaureate.org.uk