From the Start, to Fred’s Stride

BY PATRICK VAN HOESERLANDE ILLUSTRATIONS PETER BOSTEELS

In the previous edition, you read Skubba and Fred’s 50th story. From the very beginning, I had decided to limit the number of stories about our two young friends discovering diving together to just those 50. Not that I have no imagination left, or that Peter’s ink has dried up. No, ending with 50 just seemed like the right decision. The stories were written for our youth divers, but feedback from the readers showed that many fans were actually adults. Someone even told me that her grandfather asked for the Hippocampus magazine just to be able to read this series of stories. As they say, you are as young as you feel. Since several people were curious about the how’s and why’s, I decided to reveal our “behind the scenes” secrets.

The idea of writing the stories came to mind when it was suggested at an editorial meeting that more information for young divers should be published in the magazine. Why not stories?

I got the inspiration from the adventures of my somewhat distant childhood and the way I taught as a youth diving instructor. Youth divers learn best if they are allowed to experiment themselves, so I challenged them in story-like sessions. Writing the stories, in turn inspired my pool sessions.

The stories also gave rise to the book, ‘Youth Diving for Young Divers’. Some of the stories from the textbook have been reworked into full-fledged stories. Sometimes a topic spontaneously presented itself while searching for topics for other articles. For example, we did a ‘Save the Sharks’ competition which led to a page in the lives of our two friends.

The names of the boys date from much further back. Over 10 years ago, I met a Dutchman with the peculiar name Skubbafred. Well, unsurprisingly, that name stuck.

The characters were consciously chosen. Skubba is a water-loving kid that only thinks of diving. Although he is the duo’s daring and sporty half, I didn’t want him to come across as an athletic boy. Most young divers are a bit sporty, but they’re not all swimming champions. So I definitely did not want Skubba to be one either. Fred, on the other hand, is afraid of water. He did not think about diving at all but was looking for a subject to satisfy his scientific curiosity. Skubba’s experiments excited him and so their friendship grew. He may be a bit of a nerd, but he deliberately doesn’t look like one.

Nella came later on the scene as an instructor. I also found inspiration in an instructor at our youths diving school, and the name came from the female version of the Flemish diving league, NELOS.

Text alone does not attract young readers, so I had to find an illustrator. Peter Bosteels was a bullseye. We never consulted how the boys had to look. I only explained my ideals and then he started drawing. Peter drew the characters from his imagination after reading a story. And I described the characters in the stories that followed as he drew them. A perfect symbiosis.

Our friends are internationally known with a Dutch and an English version, and I hope they will be translated into other languages too. Anyhow, we will never know if Fred actually dived. I leave that to your imagination.

It was a pleasure to write the stories and Peter enjoyed illustrating them. I hope as readers, you liked them as much as we did.