I feel sometimes that in children’s books there are more and more grim problems, but I don’t know that I want to burden third- and fourth-graders with them.
BEVERLY CLEARYThe key to writing successful YA is to keep the adults out of the story as much as possible.
More Beverly Cleary Quotes
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I was a great reader of fairy tales. I tried to read the entire fairy tale section of the library.
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I had a very wise mother. She always kept books that were my grade level in our house.
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Children should learn that reading is pleasure, not just something that teachers make you do in school.
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Quite often somebody will say, What year do your books take place? and the only answer I can give is, In childhood.
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As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be ‘better’ children.
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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.
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Children want to do what grownups do.
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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.
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If we finished our work, the teacher would say, ‘Now don’t read ahead.’ But sometimes I hid the book I was reading behind my geography book and did read ahead. You can hide a lot behind a geography book.
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People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don’t really read children’s books.
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I read my books aloud before they were published.
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She means well, but she always manages to do the wrong thing. She has a real talent for it.
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I wanted to be a ballerina. I changed my mind.
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I just wrote about childhood as I had known it.
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What interests me is what children go through while growing up.
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