Pilkey, Dav << PIHL kee, dayv >> (1966-…), is an American author and illustrator best known for his humorous and satirical books for young children. Reviewers and educators have praised his engaging cartoonlike illustrations and clever wordplay.
Pilkey first became known for his “Captain Underpants” series, in which two fourth-grade students turn their mean principal into a comic-book hero called Captain Underpants. Pilkey began the series with The Adventures of Captain Underpants: An Epic Novel (1997). An animated children’s motion picture called Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie was released in 2017.
Pilkey’s popular “Dog Man” series, begun in 2016, is about a crimefighter who is part dog and part man. Pilkey wrote and illustrated the graphic novel series. A graphic novel is a book-length story that combines pictures and text. A related graphic novel series, “Cat Kid Comic Club,” began in 2020.
Pilkey also wrote and illustrated the “Dragon” series for beginning readers, starting with A Friend for Dragon (1991). Under the name of Sue Denim, a play on words for “pseudonym,” Pilkey wrote and illustrated a series of “Dumb Bunny” picture books. The series follows the adventures of a family of rabbits, starting with The Dumb Bunnies (1994). “Big Dog and Little Dog,” his series of board books for very young children, began with Big Dog and Little Dog (1997).
Pilkey also wrote the “Ricky Ricotta” series, beginning with Ricky Ricotta’s Mighty Robot: An Epic Novel (2000). The books feature a timid mouse who teams up with a robot to fight evil. In the “Super Diaper Baby” series, the same two fourth-grade boys from “Captain Underpants” invent a child superhero named Super Diaper Baby. The series began with The Adventures of Super Diaper Baby (2002).
Pilkey’s nonseries books include the picture books When Cats Dream (1992) and The Paperboy (1996). Pilkey also wrote and illustrated The Adventures of Ook and Gluk, Kung-Fu Cavemen from the Future (2010), a graphic novel for young readers. In 2021, the book was taken out of print because of its stereotypical depictions of Asian people, for which Pilkey apologized.
David Murray Pilkey, Jr., was born on March 4, 1966, in Cleveland, Ohio. He became a freelance writer and illustrator in 1986. Pilkey’s first book was World War Won (1987), an animal story in verse.
