The premise of a famous author conducting her own live theatre show may sound rather far flung, but that’s exactly what Julia Donaldson, of The Gruffalo fame is doing.

Mind you it's not such a long stretch when you consider that live theatre is where Julia started out, and how she met her husband Malcolm, the two of them touring around Europe busking and writing songs before setting up home in Brighton, having a family and crafting her famous children's books.

“Yes things have come full circle,” Julia muses. "I met my husband during Rag Week at Bristol University and that’s how it all started, busking, then song writing for TV before the first book in 1993.

"But this new show is as professional as it has got. We just wanted to do something a bit different to appearing at bookshops and festivals and just talking about yourself."

So they concocted Gruffalos, Ladybirds and Other Beasts, took it to Edinburgh Fringe and have been touring it ever since both here and around the world, having just returned from South Africa, with stints in New Zealand and Hong Kong already planned for next year.

"We just wanted to bring the characters alive," Julia tells me, "and we very much like being out on the road again.

"You have to love it really because there is quite a lot of work involved in getting a show like this on the road but we get a real buzz out of it and meeting the children after the shows is always lovely."

Does it mean that she has to shelve her book writing while on tour. Does one get in the way of the other? "Oh no. I find that being away can be as creative as staying at home. I've done my third Ladybirds book and and another Animal Actions while on tour so it can lead to writing. So being away and performing can lead to more writing.

Is that something she can ever turn off then, this need to get children involved through words? "I do feel obliged to write," the former Children's Laureate admits. "To some extent its my job. And I have illustrators that I work with so I need to keep up, there are mouths to feed, so I do always need to produce new text. So when I’ve delivered something I m off the hook for a bit and I’m in that position now which is nice, but it’s been a busy year because so many lovely opportunities come my way."

As for future projects, Julia continues to look at new and novel ways of commanding children and young adults' attention.

"I'm writing a new musical for older children," she announces, "in theory anyway," she laughs, "so at the moment I'm just trying to decide on the story-line, whether to start it from scratch or adapt an existing story. But I'm not totally inexperienced at this sort of thing so I'm looking forward to that challenge."

The 68 year-old, who received an MBE in 2011 for services to Literature, is showing no signs of slowing down then. "I can't see that stopping until I become infirm," she adds gleefully.

As long as the children are still enthralled? "And the adults. I think the parents enjoy the show as much as the children."

Gruffalos, Ladybirds and Other Beasts comes to Oxford Playhouse from Monday May 30-Wednesday June 1.

01865 3056305. www.oxfordplayhouse.com