Beverly Cleary Quotes

Once more Jane sat staring at the telephone. This time she was filled with a confidence that was new to her. Stan Crandall. Stanley Crandall. He liked her! He had seen her once, and even though had been rumpled and grass-stained and having a terrible time with Sandra, he liked her well enough to go to the trouble of finding out her name and calling to ask her to go to the movies. Jane smiled at the telephone and gave a sigh of happiness ~ Beverly Cleary

After Father had served the chicken and mashed potatoes and peas and Mother had passed the hot rolls, Beezus decidedthe time had come to tell Aunt Beatrice about being Sacajawea. "Do you know what I did last week?" she began. "I want some jelly," said Ramona "You mean, 'Please pass the jelly,' "corrected Mother while Beezus waited patiently. 'No, what did you do last week?" asked Aunt Beatrice. "Well, last week I-" Beezus began again. " like purple jelly better then red jelly," said Ramona. ' Ramona , stop interrupting your sister," said Father. "Well, Ido like purple jelly better then red jelly," insisted Ramona."Never mind," said Mother. "Go no, Beezus." Last week-" said Beezus, looking at her aunt, who smiled as if she understood."Excuse me, Beezus," Mother cut in. "Ramona, we do not put jelly on our mashed potatoes." "I like jelly on my mashed potatoes."Ramona stirred potato and jelly aroud with her fork. "Ramona you heard what your mother said." Father looked stern. "If I can ut butter on my mashed potateos, why can't I put jelly? I put butter and jelly on toast," said Ramona. Father couldn't help laughing. "That's a hard question to answer." "But Mother-" Beezus began."I like jelly on my mashed potateos," interrupted Ramona, looking sulky. ~ Beverly Cleary

I think the best teachers had a real interest in the subject they were teaching and a love for children. Some of the teachers were just doing their job, but others had that little extra. They really cared about children and they wore pretty dresses. ~ Beverly Cleary

What interests me is what children go through while growing up. ~ Beverly Cleary

If she can't spell, why is she a librarian? Librarians should know how to spell. ~ Beverly Cleary

I don't think children themselves have changed that much. It's the world that has changed. ~ Beverly Cleary

If she can't spell, she shouldn't be a librarian. ~ Beverly Cleary

Words were so puzzling. Present should mean a present just as attack should mean to stick tacks in people. ~ Beverly Cleary

Tiddlywinks, tiddlywinks, I want to play tiddlywinks, chanted Ramona, shaking her head back and forth. ~ Beverly Cleary

My mother always kept library books in the house, and one rainy Sunday afternoon - this was before television, and we didn't even have a radio - I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered I was reading and enjoying what I read. ~ Beverly Cleary

She was surprised to feel his hand on her arm and still more surprised-almost unbelieving-to see his fingers unclasp his identification bracelet and remove it from his arm. Silently he fumbled with the bracelet and slipped it around her right wrist. with a tiny click he snapped the clasp shut. Jane gave a gasp of astonishment and turned questioning to Stan. She was wearing his identification bracelet! The silver links on her wrist were still warm from his arm ~ Beverly Cleary

Willa Jean, pleased to have her grandmother on her side, set a red checker on top of a black checker. "Your turn," she said to Ramona as if she were being generous. ~ Beverly Cleary

Bags and boxes across the hot parking lot to the van. On the way back to the mall, Willa Jean, who spotted the ice-cream store that sold fifty-two flavors, told her uncle she needed an ice-cream cone. Uncle Hobart agreed that ice-cream cones were needed by all. Inside the busy shop, customers had to take numbers and wait turns. Ramona, responsible for Willa Jean, who could not read, was faced with the embarrassing task of reading aloud the list of fifty-two flavors while all the customers listened. Strawberry, German chocolate, vanilla, ginger-peachy, red-white-and-blueberry, black walnut, Mississippi mud, green bubble gum, baseball nut. ~ Beverly Cleary

And the muscles of his scrawny arms Are strong as rubber bands. ~ Beverly Cleary

My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. She read mainly travel books. ~ Beverly Cleary

He seemed grown-up, compared to the boys at school, and although he was not handsome, or even particularly good-looking - there were still some scars on his face from the skin trouble he had when he was younger - his face was agreeable because it was so ... What was the word? Kind, perhaps. Or gentle. But strong, too. He was genuinely glad to see all of Sue's family, and when Sue entered the room and he helped her on with her coat, Jean thought he acted as if her sister was someone precious to him. ~ Beverly Cleary

We didn't have television in those days, and many people didn't even have radios. My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. ~ Beverly Cleary

I wanted to be a ballerina. I changed my mind. ~ Beverly Cleary

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. ~ Jeff Kinney

I had a very wise mother. She always kept books that were my grade level in our house. ~ Beverly Cleary

Emily was lucky in many ways. She was lucky in the house she lived in, a house with three balconies, a cupola, banisters just right for sliding down, and the second bathtub in Yamhill County. ~ Beverly Cleary

One rainy Sunday when I was in the third grade, I picked up a book to look at the pictures and discovered that even though I did not want to, I was reading. I have been a reader ever since. ~ Beverly Cleary

Halfway to the house Stan stopped and turned to Jane.
He put his hands on her shoulders and drew her toward him.
"I'm glad we're going steady," he whispered.
"So am I."
In spite of the reassuring weight of his bracelet on her wrist, Jane suddenly felt shy. It seemed strange to be so close to Stan, to feel his crisp clean shirt against her cheek. She could not look up at him. Gently Stan lifted her face to his. "You're my girl," he whispered.
-Fifteen ~ Beverly Cleary

I wrote books to entertain. I'm not trying to teach anything! If I suspected the author was trying to show me how to be a better behaved girl, I shut the book. ~ Beverly Cleary

I don't ever go on the Internet. I don't even know how it works. ~ Beverly Cleary

I guess that's what growing up is. Saying good-by to a lot of things. Sometimes it is easy and sometimes it isn't. But it is all right. ~ Beverly Cleary

most beautiful, magic time of the whole year. Her parents loved her, and she loved them, ~ Beverly Cleary

Well, she thought, I'm certainly bright. She had wanted to meet a new boy and when she finally did meet one she didn't even find out his name ~ Beverly Cleary

I feel sometimes that in children's books there are more and more grim problems, but I don't know that I want to burden third- and fourth-graders with them. ~ Beverly Cleary

I am sort of medium ... I guess you could call me the mediumest boy in the class. -Leigh Botts ~ Beverly Cleary

With gray thread Beezus carefully outlined the steam coming from the teakettle's spout and thought about her pretty young aunt, who was always so gay and so understanding. No wonder she was Mother's favorite sister. Beezus hoped to be exactly like Aunt Beatrice when she grew up. She wanted to be a fourth-grade teacher and drive a yellow convertible and live in an apartment house with an elevator and a buzzer that opened the front door. Because she was named after Aunt Beatrice, Beezus felt she might be like her in other ways, too. ~ Beverly Cleary

Ramona grabbed the book. "It's mine. I told you it was mine!" Then she turned to Beezus and said triumphantly, "You said people didn't buy books at the library and now you just bought one! ~ Beverly Cleary

Daisy picked up the large, limp cat that was almost too heavy for her. "This is Clawed," she said. "C-l-a-w-e-d," she spelled. "Not like a man's name. My brother named him Clawed because he had been clawed by another cat when he found him hiding in a gutter. Daddy says he hopes Jeremy never finds a wounded skunk. ~ Beverly Cleary

I was an only child; I didn't have a sister, or sisters. ~ Beverly Cleary

Ralph really felt sorry for the boy, hampered as he was by his youth and his mother. ~ Beverly Cleary

I don't think children's inner feelings have changed. They still want a mother and father in the very same house; they want places to play. ~ Beverly Cleary

All knowledge is valuable to a librarian. ~ Beverly Cleary

I was a librarian. ~ Beverly Cleary

Girl Snouts." "We are not," contradicted Sarah. "We're Girl Scouts." "Hup, two, three, four. Hup, two, three, four," counted Mrs. Collins, who was the jolly type and did not understand how parents sometimes embarrass their children. Down the hill marched the class. Mitchell felt Bernadette's toe on his heel again and jumped in time. ~ Beverly Cleary

Today I discovered two kinds of people who go to high school: those who wear new clothes to show off on the first day, and those who wear their oldest clothes to show they think school is unimportant. ~ Beverly Cleary

I don't necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that's most vivid in my imagination and work forward and backward from there. ~ Beverly Cleary

She was not a slowpoke grownup. She was a girl who could not wait. Life was so interesting she had to find out what happened next. ~ Beverly Cleary

I was a great reader of fairy tales. I tried to read the entire fairy tale section of the library. ~ Beverly Cleary

With twins, reading aloud to them was the only chance I could get to sit down. I read them picture books until they were reading on their own. ~ Beverly Cleary

I'm just lucky. I do have very clear memories of childhood. I find that many people don't, but I'm just very fortunate that I have that kind of memory. ~ Beverly Cleary

As a child, I disliked books in which children learned to be 'better' children. ~ Beverly Cleary

If you don't see the book you want on the shelves, write it. ~ Beverly Cleary

I enjoy writing for third and fourth graders most of all. ~ Beverly Cleary

I had a bad time in school in the first grade. Because I had been a rather lonely child on a farm, but I was free and wild and to be shut up in a classroom - there were 40 children on those days in the classroom, and it was quite a shock. ~ Beverly Cleary

Quite often somebody will say, 'What year do your books take place?' and the only answer I can give is, in childhood. ~ Beverly Cleary

I am not a pest, Ramona Quimby told her big sister Beezus. ~ Beverly Cleary

I was a very observant child. The boys in my books are based on boys in my neighborhood growing up. ~ Beverly Cleary

He would be atleast sixteen-old enough to have a driver's licence- and he would have crinkles around his eyes that showed he had a sense of humor and he would be tall, the kind of boy all the other girls would like to date ~ Beverly Cleary

I hope children will be happy with the books I've written, and go on to be readers all of their lives. ~ Beverly Cleary

Oh well, thought Jane, that's how men are. He's probably taking it for granted. She found it very pleasant to be taken for granted by Stan ~ Beverly Cleary

Dear Emily, This week I went to the library. I got Black Beauty. It is about a horse. It is the best book I ever read. I read it three times. I have to go now. Write soon. Yours truly, Muriel. P.S. Mama sends her love. ~ Beverly Cleary

People are inclined to say that I am Ramona. I'm not sure that's true, but I did share some experiences with her. ~ Beverly Cleary

Problem solving, and I don't mean algebra, seems to be my life's work. Maybe it's everyone's life's work. ~ Beverly Cleary

Ramona could not understand why grown-ups always talked about how quickly children grew up. Ramona thought growing up was the slowest thing there was, slower even than waiting for Christmas to come.
She had been waiting years just to get to kindergarten, and the last half hour was the slowest part of all. ~ Beverly Cleary

In my grammar school years back in the 1920s I used my ten-cents-a-week allowance for Saturday matinees of Douglas Fairbanks movies. All that swashbuckling and leaping about in the midst of the sails of ships! ~ Beverly Cleary

I particularly enjoy cello music because our daughter plays the cello. I have listened to her practice for so many hours that I am familiar with the music written for that instrument. I am also fond of the popular music of the 1930s because my future husband and I danced to it so many Saturday nights when we were in college. ~ Beverly Cleary

This morning the sun was shining, so Barry and I mailed my letter to Mr. Henshaw and then walked over to see if there were still any butterflies in the grove. We only saw three or four, so I guess most of them have gone north for the summer. Then we walked down to the little park at Lovers Point and sat on a rock watching sailboats on the bay for a while. When clouds began to blow in we walked back to my house. ~ Beverly Cleary

Poor Miss Binney, dressed like Mother Goose, now had the responsibility of sixty-eight boys and girls. ~ Beverly Cleary

If we finished our work, the teacher would say, 'Now don't read ahead.' But sometimes I hid the book I was reading behind my geography book and did read ahead. You can hide a lot behind a geography book. ~ Beverly Cleary

Didn't the people who made those license plates care about little girls named Ramona? ~ Beverly Cleary

Ellen might have known her best friend would think of something like that. ~ Beverly Cleary

Neither the mouse nor the boy was the least bit surprised that each could understand the other. Two creatures who shared a love for motorcycles naturally spoke the same language. ~ Beverly Cleary

I grew up before there were strict leash laws. ~ Beverly Cleary

Otis was inspired by a boy who sat across the aisle from me in sixth grade. He was a lively person. My best friend appears in assorted books in various disguises. ~ Beverly Cleary

I didn't start out writing to give children hope, but I'm glad some of them found it. ~ Beverly Cleary

I think adults sometimes don't think about how children are feeling about the adult problems. ~ Beverly Cleary

When I was in the first grade I was afraid of the teacher and had a miserable time in the reading circle, a difficulty that was overcome by the loving patience of my second grade teacher. Even though I could read, I refused to do so. ~ Beverly Cleary

In 50 years, the world has changed, especially for kids, but kids' needs haven't changed. They still need to feel safe, be close to their families, like their teachers, and have friends to play with. ~ Beverly Cleary

The humiliation that Jane had felt turned to something else
grief perhaps, or regret. Regret that she had not known how to act with a boy, regret that she had not been wiser. ~ Beverly Cleary

Children want to do what grownups do. ~ Beverly Cleary

Mother," said Ramona urgently. This time she stepped into the hall. "Unless we get a ladder (Go back to your room, Ramona) and break the window so we can unlock it," Mother continued, speaking with one sentence inside another, the way grown-ups so often did with Ramona around. "But Mother," insisted Ramona even more urgently. "I have to - " "Oh, dear, I might have known," sighed Mother. ~ Beverly Cleary

Say, who is this Mr. King?" "What Mr. King?" asked Ramona, walking into his trap. "Nosmo King, ~ Beverly Cleary

The key to writing successful YA is to keep the adults out of the story as much as possible. ~ Beverly Cleary

Writers are good at plucking out what they need here and there. ~ Beverly Cleary

Novels by British writers are among my favorites because our family has enjoyed travel in England and because they are written with an economy of words as if they were written with a pen instead of a computer. Penelope Fitzgerald is a favorite. ~ Beverly Cleary

People are usually surprised to hear this, but I don't really read children's books. ~ Beverly Cleary

These people all thought they knew him. They believed he was a whore, and sometimes he thought he was too. But he really wasn't. Every partner he'd ever had broken it off with him when they couldn't handle him at his worst points. A lot of partners won't stick around when they hear the phrase "I have bipolar disorder" come out of someone's mouth, so he didn't tell them, just telling them he was moody. Of course, they all liked him when he was happy. It was when he wasn't that things went bad. ~ Beverly L. Anderson

Survivors who don't stand up for themselves often develop physical and emotional illnesses. Many become depressed because they feel so hopeless and helpless about being able to change their lives. They turn their anger inward and become prone to headaches, muscle tension, nervous conditions and insomnia. ~ Beverly Engel

He couldn't believe how badly he wanted to spank that sexy little ass in her faded blue jeans. Squeeze it and spank it and rub it. And bang it.

He wanted to bang Beverly Anderson.

Jesus H. Christ. ~ Penny Watson

One choice changes everything. The right choice changes your world ~ Beverly S. Harless

Opera is music AND drama. I'm prepared to sacrifice the beautiful note for the meaningful sound any time ... I can make a pretty tone as well as anyone, but there are times when the drama of a scene demands the opposite of a pretty sound. ~ Beverly Sills

Homosexuals want their depraved 'values' to become our children's values. Homosexuals expect society to embrace their immoral way of life. Worse yet, they are looking for new recruits! ~ Beverly LaHaye

Thankfully, Plott hadn't taken them very far inside. ~ Beverly Barton

Beverly once read a science magazine article about bioluminescence, the natural glow emitted by organisms like fireflies and jellyfish, but she knows the dead also give off a strange illumination, a phosphor that can permanently damage the eyes of the living. Necroluminescence - the light of the vanished. A hindsight produced by the departed body. Your failings backlit by the death of your loved ones. ~ Karen Russell

Plott's every touch, whether he was beating her or caressing her, was a form of brutalizing manipulation. ~ Beverly Barton

I could lay here and stare at him forever. I don't want to let go. Ever. ~ K.A. Tucker

It's strange to own anything, Beverly thinks, even your flesh, that nobody outside yourself ever touches or sees. ~ Karen Russell

Life in Beverly Hills is a game, and I make the rules. ~ Lisa Vanderpump

Edward gets funky in Beverly Mitchell's (and Jessica Biel's) garage rec room by painting the walls gray, building room screens that are painted gray and chartreuse, upholstering thrift store and existing furniture...
Hildi brings a little refinement to George and Jeff Stolt'z bachelor pad living room...
(Season 3, Episode 52) ~ Amy Tincher-Durik

In L.A., I love the L'Ermitage in Beverly Hills. Also, the Beverly Wilshire, where they make great huevos rancheros. I also love Shutters on the Beach, where I walk around everywhere in a bathrobe. ~ Adam Richman

Emotional abuse poisons a relationship and infuses it it with hostility, contempt, and hatred. No matter how much a couple once loved each other, once emotional abuse becomes a consistent aspect of the relationship, that love is overshadowed by fear, anger, guilt, and shame. Whether it is one or both partners who are being emotionally abusive, the relationship becomes increasingly more toxic as time goes by. In this polluted environment it is difficult for love not only to grow but to survive.

At the very least, emotional abuse causes both the abuser and the victim to lose sight of any redeeming qualitites his or her partner once had. The more a partner is allowed to degrade, criticize, or dominate her partner, the less she will respect her partner. And the more a partner is emotionally abused, the more he will slowly build up an intense hatred towards his abuser. The disrespect and hatred each partner begins to feel leads to more and more emotional abuse and to each partner justifying inappropriate, even destructive, behavior. Over time, anger can build up on the part of both abuser and victim, and emotional abuse can turn to physical violence. ~ Beverly Engel The Emotionally Abusive Relationship How To Stop Being Abused And How To Stop Abusing

Careers are developed one conversation at a time - over time. ~ Beverly Kaye Julie Winkle Giulioni

When they feel invisible, it's easy for them to leave. ~ Beverly L. Kaye

Remind yourself where you come from.

I spent the majority of my life running away from Utah, from the life I led there, from the memories I associated with those early years. It felt very someone-else-ago to me. London changed me profoundly.
When we were dancing on DWTS together, Jennifer Grey called me one night. She was having trouble with her back and wanted to see a physiotherapist. "Can you come with me?" she asked. She drove us through a residential section of Beverly Hills. We pulled into a house with a shed out back. Oddly, it didn't look like a doctor's office. There was a couch and incense burning. An Australian guy with a white beard came in : "Hey, mates." I looked at Jen and she winked at me. This was no physical therapy. She'd signed us up for some bizarre couples therapy!
The guy spoke to us for a while, then he asked Jennifer if she wouldn't mind leaving us to chat. I thought the whole thing was pretty out there, but I didn't think I could make a run for it.
"So, Derek," he said. "Tell me about your childhood." I laid it all out for him--I talked for almost two hours--and he nodded. "You can go pick him up now."
I raised an eyebrow. "Pick who up?"
The therapist smiled. "That younger boy, that self you left in Utah. You left him there while you've been on a mission moving forward so vigorously. Now you can go get him back."
I sat there, utterly stunned and speechless. It was beyond powerful and enlightening. Had I really ~ Derek Hough

No matter how much (or how little) help someone provides, always say thanks. Thank yous are simple but important. ~ Beverly K. Bachel