1. Why does the Rabbits' ship have wings?
There is no real reason for this, except that it is a kind of
decorative feature that looks kind of European and mythological (like wings on
helmets or feet in Greek mythology, wings on horses etc.) I think I just needed
a detail to put on that part so there wasn't a sharp corner; it's hard to
explain, but a lot of decisions like that are aesthetic, or to do with things
looking right.
2. Why on the double brown "battle scene page " do the
rabbits make a rapid advance in their technology from swords and muskets
on mechanical horses to guns and missile launchers on war machines?
To create the impression that the battles are getting bigger and
bigger. It is quite unrealistic really (as is most of the book), but in
conflicts between people there is a general pattern of technological
advancement. The idea for me was that the Rabbits are an imaginary people who
have infinite resources, and are able to make anything they can imagine, so
they are very powerful. The oversized guns emphasise this.
3. The stolen children being taken away look half rabbit
and half
"native". Are they mixed race ?
Not particularly, and it is hard to show that level of detail
sometimes, but it is a good assumption that you have made, drawing from
historical knowledge of the circumstances behind aboriginal children being
taken away from their families, because they were of mixed race.
4.Why are ther letters of the alphabet above some of the windows on the
buildings on the grey page towards the back?
This is a bit like the use of numbers; there is no particular purpose
there except to create the impression of an abstract system that we don't
understand. With the buildings, perhaps I was thinking that city buildings are
a bit like filing cabinets, each one processing and keeping a particular kind
of information, and that they could therefore be listed according to letters
and numbers rather than more descriptive names. From the numbats point of view,
it is all quite puzzling. A lot of the little details in the book are like
that, they are meant to simply look puzzling or mysterious, and hard to
understand, because this is what it is like for the numbats telling the story.
(If the rabbits were telling it, things might look quite different.)
Lists of numbers and letters, or other symbols that are not very
colourful, also always for me has a 'dehumanising' effect too, meaning that it
makes life feel quite mechanical, cold and unfriendly. The page is all grey for
that reason.
5. Can you tell us more about Nick - your dedication ?
Nick is a friend of mine who lives in Sydney and is also an illustrator, working
mostly with book covers, animation and computer games. He was one of the first
practicing illustrators that I met when I was just starting out illustrating
stories in science fiction magazines, and he gave me a lot of advice in the
beginning of my working life about how to deal with business and artistic
problems. He was also probably the most interested person in the Rabbits while
I was working on it - he was hugely enthusiastic about it, and understood
exactly what I was trying to do with my illustrations, more so than anyone else
I knew at the time, and gave me a lot of encouragement. So that's why I decided
to dedicate the book to him.
