After I won the Newbery Medal for 'From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler,' children all over the world let me know that they liked books that take them to unusual places where they meet unusual people.
Interpretation
Books can transport readers to unique worlds and introduce them to interesting characters.
E. L. Konigsburg emphasizes the power of literature to engage children's imaginations by taking them to extraordinary settings and allowing them to encounter fascinating characters. Winning the Newbery Medal reinforced her belief in the importance of storytelling that challenges the norms and intrigues young minds, showing that readers appreciate adventures in unexpected places with distinctive individuals.
In practice
This quote can inspire a reading program aimed at encouraging children to explore diverse literature.
The essential problems remain the same... The kids I write about are asking for the same things I wanted. They want two contradictory things. They want to be the same as everyone else, and they want to be different from everyone else. They want acceptance for both.
I'm not sure that love and like aren't like cats and dogs: One can't grow up to be the other, but they can be taught to live under the same roof.
I think most of us are outsiders. And I think that's good because it makes you question things.
Art comes from a visceral need and is usually generated by something I have seen; writing comes from something that happens in my head and my heart.
Every now and then, a person must do something simply because he wants to, because it seems to him worth doing. And that does not make it worthless or a waste of time.
Finish. The difference between being a writer and being a person of talent is the discipline it takes to apply the seat of your pants to the seat of your chair and finish. Don't talk about doing it. Do it. Finish.
Jane Austen's books, too, are absent from this library. Just that one omission alone would make a fairly good library out of a library that hadn't a book in it.
There is a great discovery still to be made in literature, that of paying literary men by the quantity they do not write.
When a novel has 200,000 words, then it is possible for the reader to experience 200,000 delights, and to turn back to the first page of the book and experience them all over again, perhaps more intensely.
The land of literature is a fairy land to those who view it at a distance, but, like all other landscapes, the charm fades on a nearer approach, and the thorns and briars become visible.
I have good reason to be content, for thank God I can read and perhaps understand Shakespeare to his depths.
So many Indian novels, quite unfairly, do not get the prominence they should because they have been written in a language other than English.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.