Beverly Cleary Quotes & Sayings

Amy thought a moment. How could they get rid of their mother? We could have her away taking care of a sick neighbor, and we are all alone in the house — 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 didn't even find out his name — Beverly Cleary

Novels by British writers are among my favorites because our family has enjoyed travel in England and because they are written with an economy of words as if they were written with a pen instead of a computer. Penelope Fitzgerald is a favorite. — Beverly Cleary

Girl Snouts." "We are not," contradicted Sarah. "We're Girl Scouts." "Hup, two, three, four. Hup, two, three, four," counted Mrs. Collins, who was the jolly type and did not understand how parents sometimes embarrass their children. Down the hill marched the class. Mitchell felt Bernadette's toe on his heel again and jumped in time. — Beverly Cleary

I know this is probably sort of sudden." The boy hesitated. "But I was wodnering if you would care to go to the movies with me tomorrow night. — Beverly Cleary

When I was in the first grade I was afraid of the teacher and had a miserable time in the reading circle, a difficulty that was overcome by the loving patience of my second grade teacher. Even though I could read, I refused to do so. — Beverly Cleary

I wanted to be a ballerina. I changed my mind. — Beverly Cleary

If you don't see the book you want on the shelves, write it. — Beverly Cleary

I grew up before there were strict leash laws. — Beverly Cleary

If they had been riding in a car, she would have waited for him to go around and open the door for her, but riding in a truck is different — 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

Once more Jane sat staring at the telephone. This time she was filled with a confidence that was new to her. Stan Crandall. Stanley Crandall. He liked her! He had seen her once, and even though had been rumpled and grass-stained and having a terrible time with Sandra, he liked her well enough to go to the trouble of finding out her name and calling to ask her to go to the movies. Jane smiled at the telephone and gave a sigh of happiness — Beverly Cleary

Problem solving, and I don't mean algebra, seems to be my life's work. Maybe it's everyone's life's work. — Beverly Cleary

Nothing in the whole world felt as good as being able to make something from a sudden idea. — Beverly Cleary

I don't think children themselves have changed that much. It's the world that has changed. — Beverly Cleary

And now I'm going to find out how to get a library started. — Beverly Cleary

I had a bad time in school in the first grade. Because I had been a rather lonely child on a farm, but I was free and wild and to be shut up in a classroom - there were 40 children on those days in the classroom, and it was quite a shock. — Beverly Cleary

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

I don't ever go on the Internet. I don't even know how it works. — Beverly Cleary

In 50 years, the world has changed, especially for kids, but kids' needs haven't changed. They still need to feel safe, be close to their families, like their teachers, and have friends to play with. — Beverly Cleary

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

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

And the muscles of his scrawny arms Are strong as rubber bands. — Beverly Cleary

I guess that's what growing up is. Saying good-by to a lot of things. Sometimes it is easy and sometimes it isn't. But it is all right. — 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 and remove it from his arm. Silently he fumbled with the bracelet and slipped it around her right wrist. with a tiny click he snapped the clasp shut. Jane gave a gasp of astonishment and turned questioning to Stan. She was wearing his identification bracelet! The silver links on her wrist were still warm from his arm — Beverly Cleary

Neither the mouse nor the boy was the least bit surprised that each could understand the other. Two creatures who shared a love for motorcycles naturally spoke the same language. — Beverly Cleary

I think the best teachers had a real interest in the subject they were teaching and a love for children. Some of the teachers were just doing their job, but others had that little extra. They really cared about children and they wore pretty dresses. — 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 in my imagination and work forward and backward from there. — Beverly Cleary

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

She means well, but she always manages to do the wrong thing. She has a real talent for it. — Beverly Cleary

I hope children will be happy with the books I've written, and go on to be readers all of their lives. — Beverly Cleary

most beautiful, magic time of the whole year. Her parents loved her, and she loved them, — Beverly Cleary

I just wrote about childhood as I had known it. — Beverly Cleary

Say, who is this Mr. King?" "What Mr. King?" asked Ramona, walking into his trap. "Nosmo King, — Beverly Cleary

Mother," said Ramona urgently. This time she stepped into the hall. "Unless we get a ladder (Go back to your room, Ramona) and break the window so we can unlock it," Mother continued, speaking with one sentence inside another, the way grown-ups so often did with Ramona around. "But Mother," insisted Ramona even more urgently. "I have to - " "Oh, dear, I might have known," sighed Mother. — Beverly Cleary

Ramona could not understand why grown-ups always talked about how quickly children grew up. Ramona thought growing up was the slowest thing there was, slower even than waiting for Christmas to come.
She had been waiting years just to get to kindergarten, and the last half hour was the slowest part of all. — 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 that swashbuckling and leaping about in the midst of the sails of ships! — Beverly Cleary

I am sort of medium ... I guess you could call me the mediumest boy in the class. -Leigh Botts — Beverly Cleary

Dear Emily, This week I went to the library. I got Black Beauty. It is about a horse. It is the best book I ever read. I read it three times. I have to go now. Write soon. Yours truly, Muriel. P.S. Mama sends her love. — Beverly Cleary

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

I'm just lucky. I do have very clear memories of childhood. I find that many people don't, but I'm just very fortunate that I have that kind of memory. — Beverly Cleary

I was an only child; I didn't have a sister, or sisters. — Beverly Cleary

I was a librarian. — Beverly Cleary

Halfway to the house Stan stopped and turned to Jane.
He put his hands on her shoulders and drew her toward him.
"I'm glad we're going steady," he whispered.
"So am I."
In spite of the reassuring weight of his bracelet on her wrist, Jane suddenly felt shy. It seemed strange to be so close to Stan, to feel his crisp clean shirt against her cheek. She could not look up at him. Gently Stan lifted her face to his. "You're my girl," he whispered.
-Fifteen — Beverly Cleary

Ramona grabbed the book. "It's mine. I told you it was mine!" Then she turned to Beezus and said triumphantly, "You said people didn't buy books at the library and now you just bought one! — Beverly Cleary

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

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

My favorite books are a constantly changing list, but one favorite has remained constant: the dictionary. Is the word I want to use spelled practice or practise? The dictionary knows. The dictionary also slows down my writing because it is such interesting reading that I am distracted. — Beverly Cleary

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

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

I read my books aloud before they were published. — Beverly Cleary

This morning the sun was shining, so Barry and I mailed my letter to Mr. Henshaw and then walked over to see if there were still any butterflies in the grove. We only saw three or four, so I guess most of them have gone north for the summer. Then we walked down to the little park at Lovers Point and sat on a rock watching sailboats on the bay for a while. When clouds began to blow in we walked back to my house. — Beverly Cleary

Oh well, thought Jane, that's how men are. He's probably taking it for granted. She found it very pleasant to be taken for granted by Stan — Beverly Cleary

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

Writers are good at plucking out what they need here and there. — Beverly Cleary

Daisy picked up the large, limp cat that was almost too heavy for her. "This is Clawed," she said. "C-l-a-w-e-d," she spelled. "Not like a man's name. My brother named him Clawed because he had been clawed by another cat when he found him hiding in a gutter. Daddy says he hopes Jeremy never finds a wounded skunk. — 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 had a sense of humor and he would be tall, the kind of boy all the other girls would like to date — 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 to be a better behaved girl, I shut the book. — Beverly Cleary

As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be 'better' children. — Beverly Cleary

I longed for funny stories about the sort of children who lived in my neighborhood. — Beverly Cleary

Ramona stepped back into her closet, slid the door shut, pressed an imaginary button, and when her imaginary elevator had made its imaginary descent, stepped out onto the real first floor and raced a real problem. Her mother and father were leaving for Parents' Night. — Beverly Cleary

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

They wiped his paws on a good bath towel whenever he came in with wet feet, because they had not been married long enough to have an old bath towel, — Beverly Cleary

If she can't spell, why is she a librarian? Librarians should know how to spell. — Beverly Cleary

I like to read, walk, cook, and travel to cities. We live in the country, so we miss museums and the bustle of city life. — Beverly Cleary

Willa Jean, pleased to have her grandmother on her side, set a red checker on top of a black checker. "Your turn," she said to Ramona as if she were being generous. — Beverly Cleary

Uncle Avery, who was not only postmaster but mayor of Pitchfork as well. — Beverly Cleary

Today I discovered two kinds of people who go to high school: those who wear new clothes to show off on the first day, and those who wear their oldest clothes to show they think school is unimportant. — Beverly Cleary

With gray thread Beezus carefully outlined the steam coming from the teakettle's spout and thought about her pretty young aunt, who was always so gay and so understanding. No wonder she was Mother's favorite sister. Beezus hoped to be exactly like Aunt Beatrice when she grew up. She wanted to be a fourth-grade teacher and drive a yellow convertible and live in an apartment house with an elevator and a buzzer that opened the front door. Because she was named after Aunt Beatrice, Beezus felt she might be like her in other ways, too. — 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 like us, and there weren't any at that time. — Beverly Cleary

'Dear Mr. Henshaw' came about because two different boys from different parts of the country asked me to write a book about a boy whose parents were divorced, and so I wrote 'Dear Mr. Henshaw,' and it won the Newbery, and I was - it's been very popular. — Beverly Cleary

I am not a pest, Ramona Quimby told her big sister Beezus. — Beverly Cleary

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

I particularly enjoy cello music because our daughter plays the cello. I have listened to her practice for so many hours that I am familiar with the music written for that instrument. I am also fond of the popular music of the 1930s because my future husband and I danced to it so many Saturday nights when we were in college. — Beverly Cleary

My mother always kept library books in the house, and one rainy Sunday afternoon - this was before television, and we didn't even have a radio - I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered I was reading and enjoying what I read. — Beverly Cleary

Tiddlywinks, tiddlywinks, I want to play tiddlywinks, chanted Ramona, shaking her head back and forth. — Beverly Cleary

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

Over the years, I have been approached about making Ramona into a cartoon or movie, but I was afraid that no one could really capture the spunky character of Ramona. — Beverly Cleary

Ramona was originally an accidental character I added to the Henry Huggins books because I noticed that none of the characters had siblings. I added Ramona as Beazus' pestering little sister. — Beverly Cleary

People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don't really read children's books. — Beverly Cleary

Ralph really felt sorry for the boy, hampered as he was by his youth and his mother. — Beverly Cleary

All knowledge is valuable to a librarian. — Beverly Cleary

Children want to do what grownups do. — Beverly Cleary

She would not have hurt the old man's feelings for anything in the world. — Beverly Cleary

If she can't spell, she shouldn't be a librarian. — Beverly Cleary

Ellen might have known her best friend would think of something like that. — Beverly Cleary

The rainy winter days passed quickly. Thanksgiving came and not long afterward Christmas vacation. Ramona missed Daisy, who went with her family to visit her grandparents. When she returned, the girls spent an afternoon dressing up Roberta in the clothes she had received for Christmas. Roberta was agreeable to having a dress pulled over her head, her arms stuffed into a sweater, her head shoved into caps. She enjoyed the girls' admiration. She was not so happy about a pair of crocheted slippers with ears and tails that looked like rabbits, a gift from Howie's grandmother, who enjoyed crocheting. Roberta did not care for the slippers. — Beverly Cleary

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

All her life she had wanted to squeeze the toothpaste really squeeze it,not just one little squirt ... The paste coiled and swirled and mounded in the washbasin. Ramona decorated the mound with toothpaste roses as if it was a toothpaste birthday cake — Beverly Cleary

Poor Miss Binney, dressed like Mother Goose, now had the responsibility of sixty-eight boys and girls. — Beverly Cleary

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

Didn't the people who made those license plates care about little girls named Ramona? — Beverly Cleary

She was not a slowpoke grownup. She was a girl who could not wait. Life was so interesting she had to find out what happened next. — Beverly Cleary

I didn't start out writing to give children hope, but I'm glad some of them found it. — Beverly Cleary

Words were so puzzling. Present should mean a present just as attack should mean to stick tacks in people. — Beverly Cleary

That was the trouble with this house. A girl couldn't even carry on a telephone conversation with any privacy — Beverly Cleary

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

Emily was lucky in many ways. She was lucky in the house she lived in, a house with three balconies, a cupola, banisters just right for sliding down, and the second bathtub in Yamhill County. — Beverly Cleary

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

Bags and boxes across the hot parking lot to the van. On the way back to the mall, Willa Jean, who spotted the ice-cream store that sold fifty-two flavors, told her uncle she needed an ice-cream cone. Uncle Hobart agreed that ice-cream cones were needed by all. Inside the busy shop, customers had to take numbers and wait turns. Ramona, responsible for Willa Jean, who could not read, was faced with the embarrassing task of reading aloud the list of fifty-two flavors while all the customers listened. Strawberry, German chocolate, vanilla, ginger-peachy, red-white-and-blueberry, black walnut, Mississippi mud, green bubble gum, baseball nut. — Beverly Cleary