Jeff Kinney Quotes

I'm keeping my day job, because Poptropica is something that really energizes me. I'd love to create a TV series or write a film that's not in the 'Wimpy' universe, but I know it will be difficult to create something from scratch. But I love creating good comedy for kids, so I hope to have another successful venture in the future!

He got the crib, so for the first few months of my life I had to sleep in the top dresser drawer, which I'm pretty sure isn't even legal.

i'm just glad i'm not in the swim team this summer

There are two ways to look at my publishing career. One is that I'm a novelist churning out books, who is eight into a series; the other way is that I'm a cartoonist, just starting out. Most cartoonists have long careers: Charles Schulz drew Peanuts for 50 years.

I think humor is key [to a successful middle-grade novel]. Kids like to read for entertainment, and the best way to entertain kids is to make them laugh.

It seems that when anything aimed at kids catches on, it causes the collective antennae of the older set to go up.

Looking back, I realize my favorite stories weren't in books, they were in comics. On top of being a history enthusiast, my father was also a comics fan, and he kept his stash in the top drawer of his dresser, in easy reach of a kid making a beeline to the bathroom.

Now there's a black market for toys at our school. Christopher Stangel brought in a bunch of Legos from home yesterday, and I hear a single brick will set you back fifty cents.

There was this book Dad used to read to me every night called "The Giving Tree." It was a really good book, but the back of it had a picture of the author, this guy named Shel Silverstein.
But Shel Silverstein looks more like a burglar or a pirate than a guy who should be writing books for kids.
Dad must have known that picture kind of freaked me out, because one night after I got out of bed, Dad said: "IF YOU GET OUT OF BED AGAIN TONIGHT, YOU'LL PROBABLY RUN INTO SHEL SILVERSTEIN IN THE HALLWAY."
That really did the trick, Ever since then, I STILL don't get out of bed at night, even if I really need to use the bathroom.

On our swim team, they had something called the 'developmental meet.' I didn't know it was a meet only for the worst kids so that they could get a ribbon, and I'd show up with my friend who was also a terrible swimmer, and we would be amazed that the best kids hadn't bothered to show up. I didn't get it until after college.

Youre gonna grow up and marry some ice cream! Haha!

I think Diary of a Wimpy kidis sooooo good!!!!!!!

When I was on the swim team as a kid, I used to hide out from my coach by going into the bathroom and hiding out in one of the stalls. And I would literally wrap myself in toilet paper so as not to get hypothermia.

don't expect me to be all dear diary this and dear diary that

So if you want to find somebody to blame for the way i am, I guess you'd have to start with the public education system.

The only reason I get out of bed at all on weekends is because eventually I can't stand the taste of my own breath any more.

You and your group of nerds fall into a pit and it's full of dynamite and you blow up. The End.

That made Dad pretty mad, so he said
"NO SON OF MINE IS A QUITTER!"
Which isn't really true at all. I'm a HUGE quitter, and so is Rodrick. And I think Manny is on his third of fourth preschool by now.

hope your birthday is hot hot hot

Hay he's a great writer and i like him a lot

Kids can sniff out when they are being preached to, and they don't like it. So while my books aren't amoral, they are not infused with morals or a message, either, and kids like that.

I can't divorce myself from my childhood. I try to write as much fiction as I possibly can, but there are so many things that are touchstones of my childhood like being on the swim team and playing soccer and the particularities of sports season and environments that make their way into my books.

I'm probably something like 95% chicken nugget

'Diary of a Wimpy Kid' is my first book, and it's the fulfillment of a life-long dream. I had always wanted to be a cartoonist, but I found that it was very tough to break into the world of newspaper syndication. So I started playing with a style that mixed cartoons and 'traditional' writing, and that's how 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid' was born.

I draft on the computer. I have a really giant screen that attaches to my laptop, and then I have a humongous digital drawing tablet called a Cintiq. It sits at all different angles, and it's so big that it would take two people to move it.

I'm not even the most influential person in my own house.

We're incredibly excited to welcome the 500 millionth Poptropican into our virtual world. When we started in 2007, we never could have imagined that we'd see a day when half a billion avatars inhabited Poptropica.

I just hope someone doesn't start the Cheese Touch up again, because I don't need that kind of stress in my life any more.

First of all, let me get this straight: This is a JOURNAL, not a diary. I know what it says on the cover, but when Mom went out to buy this thing I SPECIFICALLY told her to get one that didn't say 'diary' on it.

I write in reverse: Rather than come up with a narrative and write jokes for that narrative, I write jokes independently of the narrative, then I try to fit them in.

When kids get stuck on one of our quests, we now have an app for that. It is so cool to know that now kids can use mobile technology to learn more about Poptropica's great adventures and solve its challenging quests.

Sometimes friends get on each other's nerves.

I've never run into a person who yearns for their middle school days.

Luckily for me, my father had impeccable taste. No contemporary collector was he. His treasure trove of comics included gems such as 'Little Lulu,' 'Frontline Combat' and 'Classics Illustrated.' But the works that stood head and shoulders above the rest were Carl Barks's 'Donald Duck' and 'Uncle Scrooge' comics from the 1940s through the 1960s.

You can't expect everyone to have the same dedication as you.

that if you don't read nobody does

To come out and meet kids who have my books in their hands is kind of amazing.

I'm very excited to see the wonderful 2-D characters in Poptropica come to life in the form of 3-D toys. When I first held the characters in my hands, it felt like magic. I'm excited for kids to have the same feeling!

With the recent addition of a full soundtrack and the players map, millions of Poptropicans around the globe are now fully immersed in a multimedia gaming experience when they embark on our high quality adventures.

I don't know if this makes me a bad person or whatever, but it's hard for me to get interested in other people's vacations.

Hey guys i would like you to try this book you will love it!

I do all my speeches in pictures. If I wrote words, I'd get locked in on them.

I write for kids because I think the most interesting (and most humorous) stories come from people's childhoods. When I was writing 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid,' I had a blast talking on the phone to my younger brother, Patrick, remembering all of the things that happened to our family when we were growing up.

I was an average kid who had his wimpy moments.

Merit badges are these little patches you get for learning how to do all sorts of manly stuff.

On the first day of school, you got to be real careful where you sit. You walk into the classroom and just plunk your stuff down on any old desk, and the next thing you know the teacher is saying, 'I hope you all like where you're sitting, because these are your permanent seats.'

I think the most satisfying part about filmmaking is seeing a production in full bloom. When I write, I write in isolation.

Well, for starters, Abraham Lincoln didn't write 'To Kill a Mockingbird.

I didn't really know what to expect from detention but when I waked into the room, the first thought I had was, I don't belong in here with these future criminals.

I really wanted to be a newspaper cartoonist, but nobody liked my work. I didn't have the control or flair that was necessary to create something that didn't look childish.

In middle school, I started to draw, and my pencil sketches were huge. They were these 4ft by 3ft drawings, and I got a lot of attention for that, so that was very validating. But I didn't start cartooning until I was in college.

I'm not good at narrative; I'm really a gag writer, and that comes from being in the newspaper comic strip world for a while in college. What I do is I just write tons of jokes, then I sort them out in terms of quality and then pick the best of the jokes and then try to form them into a plot. If I get a good theme going, I feel lucky.

I realised all the good ideas were taken before I was even born.

Mom is always saying I'm a smart kid, but that I just don't apply myself.

I'm not really sure what makes a book a 'classic' to begin with, but I think it has to be at least fifty years old and some person or animal has to die at the end.

...the brain is like a muscle, and if you don't exercise it by reading and doing creative stuff, it'll get weak and mushy.

When you're used to having electricity and then all of a sudden it's taken away, you're basically just one step from being a wild animal.

I don't know what a guy needs to do to impress a girl these days.

I read the 'Harry Potter' books as I was writing my own books, and I love them, but I don't think Harry was very much like I was as a kid. He's always brave, and he's perfect in a lot of ways.

No matter how nice you are to some people, they'll turn their back on you the second they get the chance.

See, that's the problem with putting too much stock in the old days. You remember all the GOOD stuff, but you forget about the time you got spanked by your best friend's mom.

See, when you're a little kid, nobody ever warns you that you've got an expiration date. One day you're hot stuff and the next day you're a dirt sandwich.

So I've started wearing sweatpants to bed because I really don't need Santa seeing me in my underwear.

it turns the shower scene was a lot harder to film than i expected

I'll be famous one day, but for now I'm stuck in middle school with a bunch of morons. - Greg Heffley,

Dear Aunt Loretta,
Thank you so much for the awesome pants!
How did you know I wanted that for Christmas?
I love the way the pants look on my legs!
All my friends will be so jealous that I have my very own pants.
Thank you for making this the best Christmas ever!
Sincerely, Greg

Hot pink looks cute on only janet which is MEEEEEEE!!!

I don't think of cartoons or comics as being for kids.

Once people know you're a CHEATER it follows you wherever you go.

You know, back in the old days adults were respected because of how wise they were, and people went to them to help settle disputes. Nowadays it's a whole different world, and half the time I wonder if grown-ups should really be in charge.

If I were put into a college lecture hall right now and told to pay attention for 45 minutes, it would be physically impossible for me to do. I'm one of those people who believe that ADD is a gift. It's tough to manage, but if you can harness it you can do great things.

I've seen a lot of movies where a kid my age finds out he's got magical powers and then gets invited to go away to some special school. Well, if I've got an invitation coming, now would be the perfect time to get it

I work in the house next to where I live. We bought a smaller house that I use as my office and the place where my two employees work ... We've got tens of thousands of letters from kids stored all over the house in places you would usually put dishes and other things like that.

I feel lucky I didn't become that newspaper cartoonist I wanted to be because in the U.S. so many newspapers have suffered circulation declines, and some have folded. What's fun about being an author is I reach a much bigger audience, and there is something special about launching a book you've penned.

Holly is the fourth-prettiest girl in the class, but the top 3 all have boyfriends. So a lot of guys like me are doing everything they can to get in good with her.

Chirag: Rowley, do you think I exist?
Rowley: Nope! I can't even hear you or see you!

If there's one thing I learned from Rodrick, it's to set people's expectations real low so you end up surprising them by practically doing nothing at all.

I gravitated to Judy Blume early on. 'Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing' was my favorite, with a realistic and relatable protagonist in Peter Hatcher. When I reached the fourth grade, I made the leap to science fiction and never looked back.

Many of Judy Blume's books - which I devoured when I was growing up and where I found characters that were believable because they were a lot like me - caused considerable consternation when they were first published, but now they're widely accepted as an essential part of the children's literary canon.

My advice to authors would be to try to do something original rather than to try to anticipate what the market is looking for.

When I was growing up, my house was filled with books. My mother was an educator, and my father was a history buff, so our home was a virtual library, covering every author from Beverly Cleary to James Michener.

It's not easy to writing thank-you notes for the stuff you didn't want in the first place.

I'm basically one of the best people I know.

I've learned to accept that I'm a children's writer, even if it's not what I set out to become. It's what I should have been all along, and I'll stay in this role as long as I'm a writer.

I never thought I was writing for kids at all. It really shocked and unsettled me to hear kids were buying the books. If I'd known I was writing for kids, I might actually have spelt things out a bit more, and that would probably have killed the appeal.

When I first learned about Abrams and saw the types of books they were making, I knew I wanted my books to be published by them. Abrams books are special-when you hold one in your hands, you have the feeling that this book needed to be made. I once heard an artist say that books are fetish objects-I think Abrams gets that, because their books demand to be treasured. So who better to give comics art its proper due? I feel privileged to have found a home with Abrams.

The best person I know is Myself.

When I started writing 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid,' I was trying to write the type of book you might enjoy, put back on your shelf, and rediscover a few years later. I hope that the book finds its way into the bathroom of every kid in America.

step step step no no no plop plop plop in i go

And if you don't spend every second outdoors, people think there's someting wrong with you.

Manny has it made in church

fish and visitors stink in 3 days.

Kids can sniff out a moral. They can feel the heavy hand of an adult.

This morning he told everyone that he's a "big boy" and he's giving up his pacifier for good. Then he threw his favorite binkie in the trash. Clap clap Clap clap Well, that New Year's resolution didn't even last a full minute. suck suck suck The only person in my family who didn't come up with a resolution is my older brother, Rodrick, and that's a pity because his list should be about a mile and a half long.

If there is any message in the 'Wimpy Kid' books, it is that reading can be and should be fun. As an adult reader, when I see an obvious moral lesson to be taught, I run in the other direction ... Kids can sniff out an adult agenda from an early age. I'm writing for entertainment, not to impress literary judges.

Seriously, though, in this day and age I don't know why we're still cutting open frogs to see what's inside them.
If somebody tells me there's a heart and intestines inside a grog, I'm willing to take their word for it.

And at least 95% of it was was totally outdated.