What is the point of it all? Not leaving legacies. But being ripe. Being ripe.

Illustrations have as much to say as the text. The trick is to say the same thing, but in a different way. It's no good being an illustrator who is saying a lot that is on his or her mind, if it has nothing to do with the text. . . the artist must override the story, but he must also override his own ego for the sake of the story.

Kids don't know about best sellers. They go for what they enjoy. They aren't star chasers and they don't suck up. It's why I like them.

I mean, being a child was being a child, was being a creature without power, without pocket money, without escape routes of any kind. So I didn't want to be a child.

I had been reading a fabulous book [The Man Verdi, by Frank Walker] about [Giuseppe] Verdi, whom I adore.

Parents shouldn't assume children are made out of sugar candy and will break and collapse instantly. Kids don't. We do.

Girls are infinitely more complicated than boys, and women more than men.