WORLD Book Day marks the deaths of two towering pillars of literature, Shakespeare in England and Cervantes in Spain, but the date April 23 picked by Unesco to get children reading was moved to March in the UK so as not to clash with Easter holidays. Over

WORLD Book Day marks the deaths of two towering pillars of literature, Shakespeare in England and Cervantes in Spain, but the date April 23 picked by Unesco to get children reading was moved to March in the UK so as not to clash with Easter holidays.

Over the past week, Barking and Dagenham primaries have been allowing pupils to dress up as their favourite book and comic characters and handing out �1 book tokens inciting them to snap up novels from school fairs.

One of them was St Peter's School in Goresbrook Road, Dagenham, where 300 pupils temporarily impersonated literary stars such as Harry Potter.

Children from St Vincent's in Burnside Road, Dagenham, visited Newham Bookshop in Barking Road and named their ultimate villains, including Captain Hook and Harry Potter's arch nemesis, Lord Voldermort.

Rush Green Junior in Dagenham Road ran a poster competition and Marsh Green Primary in South Close, Dagenham, on Monday hosted children's author Jack Trelawny, behind the Kernowland stories set in an imaginary Cornwall.

Marsh Green admin manager Ann Savage said: "It is a wonderful opportunity for the children to get that love of books. A whole world opens to them.