Prelutsky Quotes & Sayings

We are well on our way to becoming a banana republic in every respect except, of course, that we don't grow bananas. — Burt Prelutsky

We Built a Castle Near the Rocks,
we built it out of sand.
Our fortress was an ice-cream box
with turret, tall and grand.
Our men were twigs, our gun were straws
from which we'd sipped at lunch.
We had the best of wars ...
till someone's foot
went
CRUNCH!
[Joan Walsh Anglund] — Jack Prelutsky

Poetry seems to sink into us the way prose doesn't. I can still quote verses I learned when I was very young, but I have trouble remembering one line of a novel I just finished reading. — Jack Prelutsky

The main problem with pacifism is that it doesn't work in all situations. The main problem with pacifists is that they're convinced it does. — Burt Prelutsky

Then I decided to draw from and on my own imagination, and everything came out perfect. — Jack Prelutsky

Where taxes are concerned, there are two clear-cut points of view. There are those who think they're too high and those who think they should be even higher because, after all, politicians spend our money far more wisely than we do. The obvious solution I'd propose is that the people in the first group would pay less and those in the second group would pay more. Lots more. — Burt Prelutsky

Children seem naturally drawn to poetry - it's some combination of the rhyme, rhythm, and the words themselves. — Jack Prelutsky

When I began writing, I didn't read any other children's poets ... I didn't want to be influenced until I'd found my own voice. Now I read them all. — Jack Prelutsky

Attempted murder should carry the same penalty as first-degree murder. Otherwise, you're simply rewarding incompetence. — Burt Prelutsky

I've been influenced by poets as diverse as Dylan Thomas, Lewis Carroll, and Edgar Allan Poe. — Jack Prelutsky

The sound of a word is at least as important as the meaning. — Jack Prelutsky

Frankly, writing poetry for children is plain old fun, and I consider myself blessed to have such a delightful career. — Jack Prelutsky

If you don't believe in dragons,
It is curiously true
That the dragons you disparage
Choose to not believe in you. — Jack Prelutsky

If liberals didn't have double standards, they wouldn't have any standards at all. — Burt Prelutsky

I invented animals and birds - I had about two dozen. After working on them for six months, I sat down and just for fun wrote two dozen poems to accompany the drawings. It was for no one to every see, but a friend sent me in to an editor. — Jack Prelutsky

I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat.
I don't don't know why know why,
I simply know that I I I
am am inclined to say to say
a lot a lot this way this way-
I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat.

I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat.
My mom my mom gets mad gets mad,
it irritates my dad my dad,
it drives them up a tree a tree,
that's what they tell they tell me me-
I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat.

I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat.
It gets me in a jam a jam,
but that's the way I am I am,
in fact I think it's neat it's neat
to to to to repeat repeat-
I often repeat repeat myself,
I often repeat repeat. — Jack Prelutsky

I write the poems first, with only a few exceptions for odd reasons, where I'm given the illustration first. — Jack Prelutsky

I always knew would be some sort of artist, but didn't know what. — Jack Prelutsky

Writing gives me the opportunity to explore ideas, play with language, solve problems, use my imagination, and draw on my own childhood. — Jack Prelutsky

His blood is black and boiling hot, he gurgles ghastly groans. He'll cook you in his dinner pot, your skin, your flesh, your bones. — Jack Prelutsky

Surely something must be terribly wrong with a man who seems to be far more concerned with Jews building houses in Israel than with Muslims building a nuclear bomb in Iran. — Burt Prelutsky

I'm never bored. — Jack Prelutsky

We all need ways to express ourselves, and poetry is one of mine. — Jack Prelutsky

A poet is not something you become; a poet is something you are. — Jack Prelutsky

Otherwise I don't read much adult poetry at all, because I'm not smart enough and mostly I don't get it. — Jack Prelutsky

I'm mostly influenced by life, what's around me, and my own childhood. — Jack Prelutsky

After I'd produced about two dozen pen and ink drawings, one evening I decided that they needed poems to accompany them. I still have no idea where that notion came from, but it took me about two hours to produce verses for these creatures. — Jack Prelutsky

I look for poetry in English because it's the only language I read. — Jack Prelutsky

My wife used to tell me one of my best qualities was that my feet don't smell, but I remember my brother's did when we were kids. — Jack Prelutsky

She comes by night, in fearsome flight, in garments black as pitch, the queen of doom upon her broom, the wild and wicked witch. — Jack Prelutsky

It seems to me that if you can't make a good solid case for your faith, you don't have a religion, you just have a habit. — Burt Prelutsky

In masks and gown we haunt the street
And knock on doors for trick or treat
Tonight we are the king and queen,
For oh tonight it's Halloween! — Jack Prelutsky

I'm working now on a collection of Shakespearean sonnets, about 100 of them, that I may publish if anyone's interested. My take on life is a little different from the bard's. — Jack Prelutsky

The best that can be said for those like Senators Nelson and Landrieu is that they held out until Obama and Reid met their price. By now, I can't even recall what it took to make Joe Lieberman say 'Uncle!' But it just goes to prove that when politicians like these three refer to themselves as moderate Democrats, we should recognize that it's similar to the distinction made in a related field when call girls insist they're not streetwalkers. It's the same profession; only the prices differ. — Burt Prelutsky

There's not too much difference between writing a picture book and writing a collection of a hundred poems or so, except that the bigger books take a lot longer to do. — Jack Prelutsky

These self-anointed intellectuals are people who think that those who believe in God and Jesus Christ, those who 'cling to their guns and their religion,' are a lower form of animal life, while they, themselves, have no problem whatever accepting Obama as a messiah and, in the past, deifying the likes of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Let's face it, when you kneel in a church, you're accepting that there is something greater and wiser than yourself in the universe. When, on the other hand, you kneel to a left-wing politician, you're merely emulating Monica Lewinsky. — Burt Prelutsky

In California, thieves have three choices: They can go to prison, Sacramento, or Washington D.C. — Burt Prelutsky

I would go to sketch groups and draw. I really enjoyed the subject matter, but I wasn't good at it. — Jack Prelutsky

You're nasty and you're loud,
you're mean enough for two,
If I could be a cloud,
I'd rain all day on you. — Jack Prelutsky

I'm usually working on eight or 10 things at once. — Jack Prelutsky

My reading is extremely eclectic. Lately I've been teaching myself computer graphics, so I'm reading a lot about that. I read books of trivia, of facts. — Jack Prelutsky

The BALLPOINT PENGUINS, black and white,
Do little else but write and write.
Although they've nothing much to say,
They write and write it anyway ... — Jack Prelutsky

I keep a guitar around while writing and will improvise music. I do this for several reasons, such as that it's fun, and sometimes it helps me with the meter. — Jack Prelutsky

I accept challenges, I have always done that in writing. — Jack Prelutsky

Finally, it occurs to me that the biggest problem with our elections is that however you vote, you wind up electing a politician. — Burt Prelutsky