I asked my mum, who's a very clever psychotherapist, and she says that kids love stories about death; they need it, they need to have stories that deal with death and explain it, as a place to put their fears.

I cannot for the life of me understand why small children take so long to grow up. I think they do it deliberately, just to annoy me.

Of course not. You can't have a family hanging over you like a bunch of old dead goats. No offense.

Had I not had children of my own, I would have never written books for children, nor would I have been capable of doing so.

It doesn't matter who you are or what you look like, so long as somebody loves you.

Of course they're real people. They're Oompa-Loompas...Imported direct from Loompaland...And oh what a terrible country it is! Nothing but thick jungles infested by the most dangerous beasts in the world - hornswogglers and snozzwangers and those terrible wicked whangdoodles. A whangdoodle would eat ten Oompa-Loompas for breakfast and come galloping back for a second helping.

When you're old enough to write a book for children, by then you'll have become a grown up and have lost all your jokeyness. Unless you're an undeveloped adult and still have an enormous amount of childishness in you.