black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

I don’t think children’s inner feelings have changed. They still want a mother and father in the very same house; they want places to play.

Beverly Cleary

What interests me is what children go through while growing up.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Children Growing Interest
I was an only child; I didn’t have a sister, or sisters.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Children Only Child Sister
Otis was inspired by a boy who sat across the aisle from me in sixth grade. He was a lively person. My best friend appears in assorted books in various disguises.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Boys Friendship
As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be ‘better’ children.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Child Children
Nothing in the whole world felt as good as being able to make something from a sudden idea.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Able Ideas World
The key to writing successful YA is to keep the adults out of the story as much as possible.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Keys Successful Writing
He was dressed as if everything he wore had come from different stores or from a rummage sale, except that the crease in his trousers was sharp and his shoes were shined.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Different Rummage Sales Shoes
I have lovely memories of Los Angeles in the 1930s. I came down to live with my mother’s cousin and they invited me to come and go to junior college for a year.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Cousin Memories Mother
Quite often somebody will say, What year do your books take place? and the only answer I can give is, In childhood.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Giving Years
Don’t stop now. Go ahead! Be readers all of your lives. And don’t forget, librarians and teachers can help you find the right books to read.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Helping Teacher
I don’t necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that’s most vivid in my imagination and work forward and backward from there.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Imagination Stories
She means well, but she always manages to do the wrong thing. She has a real talent for it.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Mean Real Talent
In seventh grade…I found a place on the [library]shelf where my book would be if I ever wrote a book, which I doubted.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Library Seventh
The humiliation that Jane had felt turned to something else–grief perhaps, or regret. Regret that she had not known how to act with a boy, regret that she had not been wiser.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Boys Grief Humilation Perhaps Regret Turned
With twins, reading aloud to them was the only chance I could get to sit down. I read them picture books until they were reading on their own.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Chance Reading
My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. She read mainly travel books.
BEVERLY CLEARY

Book Father Mother

I don’t think children’s inner feelings have changed. They still want a mother and father in the very same house; they want places to play.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

I don’t think children’s inner feelings have changed. They still want a mother and father in the very same house; they want places to play.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Beverly Cleary Quotes