Interview: Dav Pilkey's Captain Underpants — Saving the School Day for AD/HD Kids
Interviewer: Kim Watts
Dav Pilkey refuses to get serious. At 36, he spends his time drawing comics and daydreaming, thinks wedgies are hilarious, and loves toilet humor.

He's also one of America's most successful children's book authors. His series, Captain Underpants, has sold over 14 million copies.

Underpants' elementary school heroes, George and Harold, share Pilkey's educational history: they're rambunctious, creative pranksters who have AD/HD. "But if you ask me," Pilkey writes in his fourth Captain Underpants novel, The Perilous Plot of Professor Poopypants, "George and Harold simply suffer from I.B.S.S. (Incredibly Boring School Syndrome)."

Like Pilkey, who spend many of his school days in Cleveland, Ohio banished to a desk in the hall for class clowning, George and Harold simply "take it upon themselves to 'liven things up' for everybody" and chronicle their comic misadventures with the treacherous teachers and angry administrators who underestimate them.

Elementary school teachers definitely underestimated Pilkey. “I’ll never forget my second grade teacher ripping up my comics and telling me I’d better grow up because I couldn’t spend the rest of my life making silly books,” he says.

In an exclusive interview from his studio in Eugene, Oregon, where he now lives with a few furry friends, Dav Pilkey tells ADDitude Magazine’s Kim Watts just how wrong some teachers can be.

KW: Okay, we know you were an AD/HD kid. What was school like for you?

"I don’t think the “AD/HD” label existed when I was a kid. But everybody knew I had problems. I was labeled “severely hyperactive” and had trouble paying attention. I also had reading problems and the dreaded “impulsive” behavior. It seemed like I spent most of my time in the hallway.

I went to small parochial schools that were probably not the best for dealing with an “exceptional” kid like myself. My teachers were there to teach. I was there to make everybody laugh. Not a good mix. My teachers wanted me out of the classroom so they could do their jobs, and I wanted to go to the hallway to draw comic books. So in a way, everybody got what they wanted.

I did have one teacher, Mrs. Pierce, who actually liked me. I remember getting in big trouble for writing an essay that criticized our school. Mrs. Pierce was the only teacher who stood up for me. She even spoke to the principal on my behalf and after it was all over, she told me that she thought I was right and the school was wrong.

No teacher had ever stuck up for me before. Mrs. Pierce’s kindness and open-mindedness made for a more creative atmosphere where you weren’t afraid to use your brain."

KW: Why do you think most teachers failed to notice the special parts of you that were talented, creative and bright?

"They did notice. They knew about comic books for sure--but all of my creativity (including the comics) was seen as “disruptive” and they didn’t want to encourage that kind of thing.

There’s got to be a way to include kids who are more visual or artistically inclined--like maybe loosening up the criteria for what qualifies as an “essay” or a “report”. Why not let the kids turn in homemade comic books for their essays? I mean, if a kid can create a five-page comic book about Abraham Lincoln--why shouldn’t that count? Or they could put on a play about the three stages of H2O, or make a painting of the Revolutionary War (and be able to describe everything that’s going on).

That should be good enough, right? Who knows…some of that stuff might actually “sink in” more than a five-page written essay or a multiple choice quiz."

KW: Captain Underpants, the alter-ego of the awful Principal Krupp, seems to be the kind of adult kids secretly long for--an educator who really can save the day. Which adult in your life saved the day for you?

"My parents. It was always so good to come home from school and be safe. They actually encouraged me to make comics, and would sit down and read each one when I was done. They always laughed in all the right places, and had good things to say about MOST of my stories (my folks were real conservative, so Captain Underpants’ potty humor didn’t really fly in our house)."

KW: Your parents encouraged you to be creative and self-confident. If you were the parent of an AD/HD child, what would you take from your own childhood experience to apply to your job as a parent?

"If I had an AD/HD kid … ahem, an “exceptional” kid, I’d tell them the “AD/HD” label is not a scarlet letter. I’m really glad that they didn’t have that label for me when I was a kid. One unfortunate thing about my days in school was that my reading problems made me feel stupid. I remember thinking that I wouldn’t do well as a grown-up because I misbehaved and I was dumb.

I think my self-esteem as a child might have been helped if I had known some AD/HD success stories. If I had known that people can grow up with these types of problems and still turn out okay, I might have had more hope. Once kids discover that you can still be successful in life even if you’re not successful in school, I think they’ll develop more confidence and hope."

KW: We’ve heard the same thing from lots of parents of AD/HD kids: children who don’t like to read actually enjoy reading Captain Underpants. Why?

"When I was a kid, I hated reading. But when I had to read (like, for a book report), I had strict criteria by which I judged all potential reading material:

First: The books had to have fairly large type (the bigger the type-face, the fewer words I’d have to read).

Second: Short Chapters. There’s nothing worse than reading for a whole hour and not even finishing ONE chapter.

Third: Pictures! The more pictures, the less actual reading you have to do.

Fourth: Subject matter was important, but not as important as the first three criteria. I loved funny books, but I’d sooner read a boring baseball story if it had more pictures, larger type, and shorter chapters.

When I sat down to write the Captain Underpants books, I knew there were kids out there who hated reading as much as I used to, so I consciously designed the books with those kids in mind.

The humor is a big draw, but I also think it’s because the books are so “un-intimidating”. Some chapters are made up of comic books, some chapters have only one or two pages, some contain only flip-pages, and all of them have lots of silly pictures. Yet with all this juvenile nonsense going on, the books are clearly for older kids. Fifth and sixth graders can carry these books around and still be relatively cool."

KW: So what’s with the Groucho Marx disguise?

"What disguise? That’s my real face!"