Mr Miniscule and the Whale

Julian Tuwim (1894-1953) was one of Poland''s leading poets. He won fame not just for his adult verse but also for his rhymes for children, many of which are classics known to every Polish child. He also wrote satirical verse and loved word games, inventing palindromes (whole sentences that read the same forwards and backwards), lipograms (whole paragraphs that leave out a particular letter),and tautograms (sentences where every word starts with the same letter).

Nobody knows if he ever set out to sea to see a whale. Bohdan Butenko (born 1931) is one of Poland''s top illustrators, whose drawings appear in more than 200 children''s books. He is also famous for his animated cartoons - especially featuring Gucio the clumsy hippo and Cezar the sensible dog - as well as for his stage sets and television design.

He has won many prizes, among them the 2012 Order of the Smile - a special medal awarded by children to adults who are particularly kind to them.