Beverly Cleary

I particularly enjoy cello music because our daughter plays the cello. I have listened to her practice for so many hours that…

— Beverly Cleary

I don't necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that's most vivid…

— Beverly Cleary

I think adults sometimes don't think about how children are feeling about the adult problems.

— Beverly Cleary

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

— Beverly Cleary

I know that when I was a children's librarian, that was about 1940, boys particularly asked where were the books about kids…

— Beverly Cleary

I haven't been very enthusiastic about the commercialization of children's literature. Kids should borrow books from the library and not necessarily be…

— Beverly Cleary

“She was surprised to feel his hand on her arm and still more surprised-almost unbelieving-to see his fingers unclasp his identification bracelet…

— Beverly Cleary

“He seemed grown-up, compared to the boys at school, and although he was not handsome, or even particularly good-looking—there were still some…

— Beverly Cleary

The key to writing successful YA is to keep the adults out of the story as much as possible.

— Beverly Cleary

In my grammar school years back in the 1920s I used my ten-cents-a-week allowance for Saturday matinees of Douglas Fairbanks movies. All…

— Beverly Cleary

“Well, she thought, I'm certainly bright. She had wanted to meet a new boy and when she finally did meet one she…

— Beverly Cleary

I wrote books to entertain. I'm not trying to teach anything! If I suspected the author was trying to show me how…

— Beverly Cleary

I had a bad time in school in the first grade. Because I had been a rather lonely child on a farm,…

— Beverly Cleary

“If there's one thing I can't stand, its a cheeky mouse.”

— Beverly Cleary

I think the best teachers had a real interest in the subject they were teaching and a love for children. Some of…

— Beverly Cleary

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

— Beverly Cleary

“If you don't see the book you want on the shelf, write it.”

— Beverly Cleary

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

“He would be atleast sixteen-old enough to have a driver's licence- and he would have crinkles around his eyes that showed he…

— Beverly Cleary

One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered…

— Beverly Cleary

She was not a slowpoke grownup. She was a girl who could not wait. Life was so interesting she had to find…

— Beverly Cleary

Over the years, I have been approached about making Ramona into a cartoon or movie, but I was afraid that no one…

— Beverly Cleary

I was a librarian.

— Beverly Cleary

Ramona was originally an accidental character I added to the Henry Huggins books because I noticed that none of the characters had…

— Beverly Cleary

My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. She read mainly travel books.

— Beverly Cleary