Nina Bawden Quotes
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I hope in my books I help children to see their strengths, and show them I have some idea of what they may occasionally be going through. Especially at tricky moments when it is easier to go back and evade things rather than go forwards and confront them.
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I like stirring the pot - I think it's part of my duty, to shake people up a bit - make them look at things in a different way.
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I like writing for children. It seems to me that most people underestimate their understanding and the strength of their feelings and in my books for them I try to put this right.
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People who don't read seem to me mysterious. I don't know how they think or learn about other people. Novels are a very important part of our education.
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One good reason for writing novels based on your life is that you have something to read in old age when you've forgotten what happened.
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A writer's work may be a coded autobiography, but only a very close friend could decipher it.
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Children often have a much stronger concept of morality than adults.
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All writers are liars. They twist events to suit themselves. They make use of their own tragedies to make a better story... They are terrible people.
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Life isn't so complicated for children. They have more time to think about the really important things. That's why I occasionally moralise in my children's books in a way I wouldn't dare when writing for adults.
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All writers are thieves; theft is a necessary tool of the trade.