A troubled family and progressive ideals: How common ground helped the Duchess of Sussex find her illustrator

Today sees the publication of Meghan Markle’s children’s book, The Bench, billed as celebrating the special relationship between fathers and sons, and inspired by a poem she wrote for Prince Harry when their son Archie was born. While this is the first literary venture from the Duchess of Sussex, her illustrator, Christian Robinson, is already an established talent - but also shares both personal experiences and aims with Meghan.

For the 34-year-old Robinson, who grew up in LA and is now based in Sacramento, it’s the latest stage of an extraordinary journey from poverty to award-winning stardom. Late one night, when he was just five months old, his father left Robinson and his four-year-old brother at their grandmother Mary Lee’s one-bedroom apartment. She told the American Today show that it was “raining, pouring rain. And Christian was dressed in a diaper and his brother had a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.”

The boys moved in with Mary Lee, and shared the small apartment with their aunt and two cousins. “We had limited space, limited means,” said Robinson. “But I like to say that where I found space was in creativity. Was in making pictures. Was in being able to imagine the kind of world that I wanted to see.”

Robinson’s mother, who was dealing with both addiction and mental health problems, was in prison for most of his childhood. He recalled that it was “very painful” seeing his mother falling into trouble and being taken away. “It always felt like a punishment. When someone you love is serving time, it feels like you’re also serving time. You’re also being punished.”

Robinson later channelled those feelings into Milo Imagines the World, a book he created with Matt de la Pe?a about a boy who likewise visits his mother in prison. That was “a healing experience”, added Robinson. However, he doesn’t have contact with his mother now; last the family heard, she was living on the streets, in LA's Skid Row. While the circumstances are different, he must be able to sympathise with Meghan’s similarly strained relationship with her father.

Though Robinson’s first ambition was to be a paleontologist, thanks to Jurassic Park, his gift for illustration was apparent early on. Aged four, he drew a family on his grandmother’s grocery list - which, she said, “gave [her] cold chills.”

But he wasn’t a natural bookworm. He told PBS that he actually struggled to read, so was “drawn to books with pictures. I just loved that...so much could be communicated with just an image.” Drawing was also a way of controlling “the circumstances around me,” he explained.

Robinson was soon creating paintings and sculpture, too, and eventually decided to pursue a career in animation. He studied at the California Institute of the Arts, and then scored an internship in Pixar’s consumer products department.

His mentor, Ben Butcher, invited him to observe a meeting with director Pete Docter, and asked Robinson to prepare some sketches of the characters from film Up - but in his own style. Docter loved the drawings and asked Robinson to make a book for Up. Robinson told The Brown Bookshelf that it was “unreal, the kind of stuff you’d daydream about happening to you.”

He kept illustrating, while taking odd jobs to pay the bills, and put his work up on his blog. That led to agent Steven Malk asking if was interested in making children’s books. It was a “life-changing experience,” said Robinson, who then embarked on his first project: Harlem’s Little Blackbird by Renée Watson. The book is about a girl born to parents who were former slaves, and who uses her success as a singer to support the civil rights movement.

As a black artist, Robinson has spoken about his passion for telling stories that reflect a diverse world, and how important it is for children to see themselves represented in books. That’s evident in his choice of titles, including Josephine, about the entertainer Josephine Baker, and Last Stop on Market Street, about an African-American boy and his grandmother - both of which earned him Coretta Scott King Book Awards. That definitely fits with Harry and Meghan’s campaigning aims via their company Archewell.

Although Robinson usually collaborates with an author, in 2019 he solely created picture book Another, and in 2020 followed it up with You Matter. He also contributed to Sunny Day: A Celebration of the Sesame Street Theme Song, and created a fabric collection for Cotton + Steel called Spectacle.

Robinson begins his illustrations with tiny doodles, he told PBS, creating a miniature storyboard out of Post-It notes. He then decides on design and colour, and creates the backgrounds to the characters.

He works in his home studio - a converted garage - in Oak Park, Sacramento, which is near San Francisco. He cohabits with his elementary school teacher boyfriend, John, and rescue greyhound, Baldwin.

During the pandemic, Robinson created the series Making Space on Instagram, giving kids fun exercises to help them express their emotions. He’s also spoken about his ambition to produce a graphic novel, and possibly to return to animation, or try films or music videos.

That might well happen after his profile gets another boost from this royal collaboration. The Bench sees a softer version of Robinson’s work, as he uses watercolour illustrations for the first time, and includes images like a black father cuddling with his son on a bench, and a redheaded father in uniform (presumably Harry) lifting his child in the air, watched on by a tearful mother (Meghan).

It suits the candidly emotional, but still artfully posed, version of family life that we’ve seen from the Sussexes of late, and will likely add heft - and credibility - to Meghan’s vanity project, which is characterised by her author dedication to the “man and boy who make my heart go pump-pump.”

Speaking about the illustrations, Meghan praised Robinson’s “beautiful and ethereal work”, which captures “the warmth, joy and comfort of the relationship between fathers and sons from all walks of life.” She added that it was important to them both to depict that bond “through an inclusive lens,” but hoped it would resonate with all families.

Should The Bench sell well (as seems highly likely, unless a publishing row disrupts it), it could be the first in a series from the Duchess - and, in skilfully supporting this gauzy but woke worldview, Robinson is the perfect partner.