Dame Lynley Dodd is a staple of Kiwi childhoods.  

The beloved children’s author is best known for her Hairy Maclary series, the first of which was released over 40 years ago. 

She’s sold millions of books worldwide, and just this week she was honoured at the New Zealander of the Year Awards. 

Dodd was granted the Legacy Award for fostering a love of literature in generations of children.  

While she admits it sounds a bit silly, Dodd admits to feeling slightly guilty at the level of acclaim and the legacy she’s built. 

“Well I obviously, I think, been spending all these years thoroughly enjoying myself producing these books,” she told Jack Tame. 

“It sounds a bit, you know, I’ve been indulging myself, and I have, doing these things, but no, it’s been great fun.”  

Dodd’s love of wordplay and language stems back to her childhood, as her parents were, in her words, much into words, and there was an “awful lot of fun” with language in her home.  

“Both my parents were fond of books, and also fond of fun, and so, you know, obviously there were serious times as well, but there was a lot of fun with words,” she explained. 

“My father and I used to make up games, make up sort of imaginary animals and all sorts of silly things and have nonsense conversations about them.” 

The language used in her home was also a contrast to the things she was given to read at school, which were “incredibly old-fashioned". 

“There were, you know, millions of gnomes and fairies and bits and pieces, and it was talking down kind of language,” Dodd told Tame. 

“And I got a bit bored by those books, and it was only much later on, when I met books like Dr Suess’, I suddenly realised you could be mad with language and have a fantastic time.”  

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