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We need to tell kids flat out: reading is not optional.

Walter Dean Myers

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Walter Dean Myers
Age: 76 †
Born: 1937
Born: August 12
Died: 2014
Died: July 1
Novelist
Writer
Martinsburg
West Virginia
Walter Milton Myers
Optional
Flat
Flats
Reading
Tell
Kids
Need
Needs

More quotes by Walter Dean Myers

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As a young man, I saw families prosper without reading because there were always sufficient opportunities for willing workers who could follow simple instructions. This is no longer the case. Children who don't read are, in the main, destined for lesser lives. I feel a deep sense of responsibility to change this.
Walter Dean Myers
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Wherever your heart rests There I will live and be blessed I've tried to line up the things I Needed to say but now my feelings just Tumble from me. I am half foolish, Half drunk with wanting you With wanting to take your hand And leap into the darkness of whatever Life will bring. Love makes me Brave and without love I'm made Nothing.
Walter Dean Myers
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To fight for one's country, to offer one's very life to promote the well being of the United States, is truly a noble undertaking. But so is the vigilance of the citizen who carefully examines our leaders to see if political problems are being solved by wars simply because this seems to be the easiest solution.
Walter Dean Myers
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Cutting people out of your life is easy, keeping them in is hard.
Walter Dean Myers
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Children have adopted a consumerist attitude - I dare you to entertain me.
Walter Dean Myers
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My life is not packaged, Not tidy. There are leftover strands and jagged Edges that cut even my friends.
Walter Dean Myers
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As a kid I didn't see black cowboys on the screen. What that said to me was that there were things I couldn't do or be because of my color. What we see others like us do gives us permission to expand our own horizons.
Walter Dean Myers
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That's what's wrong with women. They want you to wait for them until they get ready and then they don't even tell you how they feel.
Walter Dean Myers
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I read a lot of comic books and any kind of thing I could find. One day, a teacher found me. She grabbed my comic book and tore it up. I was really upset, but then she brought in a pile of books from her own library. That was the best thing that ever happened to me.
Walter Dean Myers
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I couldn't speak well. I went to speech therapy for 10 years. And I was sort of frustrated in that sense.
Walter Dean Myers
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What some people wanted was sometimes too hard to get, and the stress of trying was sometimes too hard to deal with... Maybe doing well in life was just too hard for some people.
Walter Dean Myers
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Reading is not optional.
Walter Dean Myers
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the beast is the monster that destroys your dream
Walter Dean Myers
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We all think we're different, but when it comes around, we end up needing the same things. Somebody to love us. Somebody to respect us.
Walter Dean Myers
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And what I was feeling was the wonder Of being more than me, of being more Than mere here and now allowed I had become a shining star, a burning nova Exploded with love Flying through an endlessly Expanding universe Away from the me that was Toward a me that is beyond Understanding.
Walter Dean Myers
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Forever in your arms Is where I want to be Holding you close Within the space That once held only me... Forever in your warmth The place for me and you I feel the sun Our life's just begun I know you feel it too
Walter Dean Myers
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As a child I wanted to be a professional athlete or lawyer.
Walter Dean Myers
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Think about all the tomorrows of your life.
Walter Dean Myers
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I talk to myself out loud at times, and feel embarrassed when people overhear me.
Walter Dean Myers
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And I see the - you know, when I go to the juvenile detention centers and prisons, I see people who can't read now. And I know that when they leave those prisons and those detention centers, they're not going to be able to make it in our society.
Walter Dean Myers