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Writing for young children I find I often use particular jokes with words and exaggerated, funny events, but some of these haunt the more complex stories for older children too.

Margaret Mahy

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Margaret Mahy
Age: 76 †
Born: 1936
Born: March 21
Died: 2012
Died: July 23
Author
Librarian
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Whakatane
Mahy
Margaret May
Children
Particular
Writing
Funny
Haunt
Words
Exaggerated
Use
Complexes
Often
Complex
Stories
Jokes
Young
Older
Find
Events

More quotes by Margaret Mahy

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When I was a child I had a best friend who lived across the road from me. When her mother died unexpectedly it was like losing a member of my own family. I think I am still affected by the memory of that loss.
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I had to wait for a long time before I could support myself with writing. However, being a writer is what I have most wanted to be, from the time I was a child.
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People can say what they like about the eternal verities, love and truth and so on, but nothing's as eternal as the dishes.
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When you are writing, of course, you have to do all that writing and correcting for yourself. When I was a librarian it was expected that I would know about a wide range of books.
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Time was too much a part of love, for even in fairytales the proof of love was not its first moment, but its latest ones - that people lived happily ever after. Love at first sight was nothing but infatuation until proved by time.
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New Zealand is the only country I know well enough to write about. It can sometimes lead to complications.
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Anyone interested in the world generally can't help being interested in young adult culture - in the music, the bands, the books, the fashions, and the way in which the young adult community develops its own language.
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If a job's worth doing, it's worth doing twice.
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I don't think I prefer writing for one age group above another. I am just as pleased with a story which I feel works well for very small children as I do with a story for young adults.
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At the same time, I think books create a sort of network in the reader's mind, with one book reinforcing another. Some books form relationships. Other books stand in opposition. No two writers or readers have the same pattern of interaction.
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You can't say you want things to be simple and then in the next breath ask me to be honest.
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It is a good idea to know which publishers publish which stories. For example, there is no sense in sending a picture book text to a publisher who does not publish picture books.
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Canadians are Americans with no Disneyland.
Margaret Mahy
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At this stage I am not involved with young adults as closely as many other writers. My children are grown up and my grandchildren are still quite young.
Margaret Mahy
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I think I am too interested in my own ideas to copy anyone else's, but I find that other people's imagery, the flow of language in the outside world, games with words, and ideas about relationships are all most important to me.
Margaret Mahy
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There are certainly times when my own everyday life seems to retreat so the life of the story can take me over. That is why a writer often needs space and time, so that he or she can abandon ordinary life and live with the characters.
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When you are reading, someone has done a lot of work on your behalf, someone has had ideas and has then written and corrected and improved them so that they can be shared.
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In a way, the characters often do take over.
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Try not to become disappointed if someone doesn't like a story you've written. Stick up for your ideas, but listen to what other people say, too. They might have good advice.
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I am really chained to my computer these days so I work in my bedroom, which is a room I have worked in for years and years. It is just as much an office as a bedroom, and during the day, my bed is rather like an extension of my desk.
Margaret Mahy