World Book Day 2025: Sir Lenny Henry returns to West Midlands to start new chapter

It was a chance for Sir Lenny to speak to pupils from schools with high free school meal eligibility and low literacy rates, many of whom were getting their first-ever experience of a literature festival, about his love of books, how he got into reading and also do a full performance reading of his latest kid's book "Tyrone's Cool Crown".

The kids were treated to an interactive and fun performance from Sir Lenny as he did the voices for the characters from the book, where Tyrone goes for his first haircut and despite not wanting to go, he is comforted by his Grandad and made to feel like a king afterwards.

He also shared his passion for books and the importance of seeing yourself in stories, telling the youngsters in attendance to tell stories, even if they couldn't write, and to enjoy reading, something he said he was very passionate about.

He said: "The festival is called Reading for Smiles and it's about encouraging kids to read, which I'm really behind, and since I started writing books about six years ago, I've found that kids have been incredibly responsive to stories.

"They just love using their imagination and putting themselves in stories and I think it's a really important thing as literacy among kids has gone down slightly over the last few years and I think it's all our jobs to try and get that up again.

"You should encourage your kids to read, read to them, get them to read to you and also get them to tell stories as it's really important to get kids to use their imagination and make up stories as well as read them."

Sir Lenny said his own reading journey was one he loved telling, going to Dudley Library with his Auntie Pearl and being encouraged by her to take out any book, read it and then put it back, and said it had got him very much into reading and was writing his own stories at school, even during maths and geography lessons.

He said his own stories around Tyrone and with Tunde, the boy with wings, had been influenced about his own childhood and wanting to see himself in a book.

He said: "In the Boy with Wings, I just wanted to see a little kid and I wanted it to be the sort of story I would want to read, so I thought that wouldn't it be great if there was a little kid in Dudley who looked like me and suddenly discovered that he had superpowers.

"It was just me letting my imagination go free and there's now three Tunde books, one of which is a World Book Day book, and with Tyrone, it was about how when I was five, I used to be scared of the barbers because I thought it might do me damage and I wanted to write a book which would offset that.

"It was all about writing a book about how barbers are cool and they're not going to hurt you and we have a great history of storytelling through hair and there are lots of different types of black haircuts, which Salomey Doku does a wonderful job of in the book where she does a splash page with every kind of black hairdo."

Hosted by the Black British Book Festival, the Reading for Smiles Children’s Book Festival featured live author readings, interactive theatre performances, creative workshops, and arts & crafts, all designed to inspire a love of reading. 

Sir Lenny said the festival and the concept of World Book Day were invaluable for inspiring young people to enjoy reading and writing and said he'd have loved to have something similar when he was their age.

He said: "Put it this way, when I was at school and I was this age, a man dressed as an apple and a woman dressed as a toothbrush came to my school, and I'm 66 and still talking about it, so can you imagine if an author comes to your school and reads you a story and talks about how to tell stories?

"Imagine if a film cameraman comes to a school and shows you the inside workings of a camera or a traveller like David Attenborough comes to a school, then most of the kids may become an author, a film cameraman or a cartoonist or a traveller.

"Today, these things are important to kids and I'm glad to have been a part of this today."

Sir Lenny spoke about the inspiration of authors such as Mallory Blackman and Roald Dahl and said if they had come to his school and told a story, it would have inspired him to be a writer as a kid, as well as saying that parents, uncles and aunties should get more involved to help encourage writing and reading.

He also said that he was still inspired by events like this and interacting with youngsters and said he hoped it could inspire them going forwards, as well as talking about exciting times for him on his own writing journey.

He said: "I love events like this and I love looking out at the audience and seeing all kinds of kids and it's really good to see all manner of kids out there listening because you hope that, one day, they're going to make their own stories and that's really important.

"I'm going to be writing another Tyrone book and another Tunde book and they should be out later next year and I'm also doing more acting and doing a play at the Soho Place.

"Best thing of all, there's going to be a play of The Boy with Wings, which is being written and adapted by Arvind Ethan David and promoted by the Polka Children's Theatre, and I can't wait to see it as it's going to be at the Birmingham Rep and I'm going to be in the Midlands to promote that play soon."