War continues to divide people, to change them forever, and I write about it both because I want people to understand the absolute futility of war, the pity of war as Wilfred Owen called it. – Michael Morpurgo
A lot of children, like I did, move away from words because of the fear – which is something you have to take out of education: the fear of worrying about what marks youll get, detention, worrying about letting people down, your parents, teachers. – Michael Morpurgo
Strange questions are the more interesting ones. Children by and large dont try to trip you up… they want to find out how you do this funny thing that you do… if theyve loved a story they love to know how it started. – Michael Morpurgo
When children are very young, you read them books that are positive to help them go to sleep. But there comes a moment when they begin to understand the difficulties of the world. They know there are problems and the books they read should reflect that, not gloss over them. – Michael Morpurgo
And I know Im supposed to feel guilty for wanting people to buy my books… and books in general? Novels and poetry, they belong to the realm of art. How dirty of us to try to hawk art! But, after a decade of hand-wringing and apologies, I cant quite muster the guilt anymore. – Julianna Baggott