Nina Bawden Writing Quotations

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.

A writer's work may be a coded autobiography, but only a very close friend could decipher it.

The kind of response I hope for when I write my novels for children: to give them a chance to recognize something of their own feelings -- about themselves, their parents, their friends -- and their own situation as a kind of subject race, always at the mercy of the adults who mostly run their lives for them.

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.

All writers are thieves; theft is a necessary tool of the trade.

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.