Hugh Lofting Quotes

My name is Jarrett Krosoczka, and I write and illustrate books for children for a living. So I use my imagination as my full-time job.

I've never written a children's book, but when people meet me for the first time and I say I write books, they invariably reply, 'Children's books?' Maybe it's something about my face.

I started writing books for children because I could illustrate them myself and because, in my innocence, I thought they'd be easier.

I used to want to be a children's writer, because I would have all these great ideas when I was little, and I'd write them and draw them, and turn them into class.

People think writing a children's book is something you could do in an afternoon but it's actually really hard.

It was a combination of an intense interest in children's literature, which I've always had, and the feeling that I'd just have a go and see if I could do it.

Writing for children is an art in itself, and a most interesting one.

Writing children's books gives a writer a very strong sense of narrative drive.

I didn't start working on children's books until I got a job at a book warehouse on the children's floor. When I started reading some of the books, I was so impressed.

I don't call myself a writer.

Then one day I thought it would be wonderful to make a whole book, to make my text and my drawings together, and that's how I started doing children's books.

Anybody could write a bad script, and I'm one of them, you know?

We always wanted to do a children's book of some form or another.

I love picture books. I think some of the best people in children's books are the ones who create their own picture books. I wish I could say I'm one of them, but I'm not.

People think children's books are about teddy bears and little flowers. I realize people sometimes don't know what to do with my books because they say, 'Is it a children's book, and what age group?'

'War and Peas' by Michael Foreman, one of the great British children's illustrators. His watercolours are so lovely you could almost eat them, just as members of the target audience have been trying to do for decades.

But when I was a little kid, I was always writing stories and illustrating little books that I would create.

One of my main decisions when accepting the job of Children's Laureate was that I must continue working on picture books. If I don't write and illustrate for some time, then I begin to question who I am.

Maurice Sendak is the daddy of them all when it comes to picture books - the words, the rhythm, the psychology, the design.

I feel lucky that my career so far has included books for adults and books for kids. They're equally important to me, and I hope I get to continue writing both.

It is extremely important to me to write for children.

If I have any advantage, maybe, as a writer, it is that I don't think I'm very interesting. I mean, beginning a novel with the last sentence is a pretty plodding way to spend your life.

I wasn't that great a chef, and I don't think I'm that great a writer.

I was lucky enough to be a child during the renaissance of Australian children's literature, when people like Ivan Southall, Colin Thiele, Lilith Norman and Wrightson were pumping out hugely inspiring stuff.

Even including myself, my favorite author is Eileen Spinelli, who I happen to live with. She's a terrific writer and has written several of my all-time favorites.