Beverly Cleary Quotes

• Children want to do what grownups do.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Children

• I enjoy writing for third and fourth graders most of all.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Enjoy, Writing

• Children should learn that reading is pleasure, not just something that teachers make you do in school.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Children

  Tags in Pleasure

• 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

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Necessarily, Beginning

• 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 Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Feel, Books

• I read my books aloud before they were published.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Published, Read

• I had a very wise mother. She always kept books that were my grade level in our house.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Mother

  Tags in Books

• I was a great reader of fairy tales. I tried to read the entire fairy tale section of the library.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Fairy, Tried

• I was an only child; I didn’t have a sister, or sisters.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Child, Sister

• I grew up before there were strict leash laws.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Grew, Laws

• I wanted to be a ballerina. I changed my mind.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Mind, Changed

• I was a very observant child. The boys in my books are based on boys in my neighborhood growing up.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Observe

• One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered that even though I did not want to, I was reading. I have been a reader ever since.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Grade

• People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don’t really read children’s books.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in People, Surprised

• We didn’t have television in those days, and many people didn’t even have radios. My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in People, Television

• 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

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Reading, Chance

• Writers are good at plucking out what they need here and there.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Good, Writers

• 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

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Inspired

• People are inclined to say that I am Ramona. I’m not sure that’s true, but I did share some experiences with her.

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in People

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

  Beverly Cleary

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Books

Beverly Cleary (23)

Birth:	12th April, 1916
Nationality:	American
Profession:	Author, Librarian

About

Beverly Cleary is an American author of more than 30 books for young adults and children. One of America's most successful writers of children's literature, she has sold 91 million copies of her books worldwide. Some of her best-known characters are Henry Huggins, Ribsy, Beatrice Quimby, her sister Ramona Quimby, and Ralph S. Mouse. She won the 1981 National Book Award for Ramona and Her Mother and the 1984 Newbery Medal for Dear Mr. Henshaw.

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Today's Anniversary - 24th April

Births

• 1930 - Richard Donner
• 1904 - Willem de Kooning
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• 1889 - Stafford Cripps

Deaths

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• 1986 - Wallis Simpson
• 1993 - Oliver Tambo
• 1980 - Alejo Carpentier
• 1942 - Lucy Maud Montgomery