Quotes from Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
"The idea of being a writer never entered my mind when I was growing up. An occupation, I knew, was something that took years of preparation and hard work and writing was simply too much fun. So I decided on becoming a teacher, an actress, an opera singer, a tap dancer, or a missionary."
-- from How I Came to Be a Writer
"Each day I would rush home from school to see if the wastebasket held any discarded paper that had one side blank. We were not allowed to use new sheets of paper for our writing or drawing, so books had to be done on used paper. I would staple these sheets together and sometimes paste a strip of colored paper over the staples to give it the appearance of a bound book. Then I would grandly begin my story, writing the words at the top of each page and drawing an accompanying picture on the bottom. Sometimes I typed the story before stapling the pages. And sometimes I even cut old envelopes in half and pasted them on the inside covers as pockets, slipping an index card in each one, like a library book, so I could check it out to friends and neighbors. I was the author, illustrator, printer, binder, and librarian, all in one."
-- Something About the Author, V.66
"I can never understand why people who have not seen me for a while ask if I am still writing. They might as well ask if I am still breathing. Writing is something I have been doing all my life. Even before I could put words down on paper, I was making up stories. There is no other job, I'm sure, that I would enjoy as much, for in my books I can be anyone I please--old or young, boy or girl. I can do wildly exciting things I would never dream of doing in real life, and can experience sorrows and terrors that I have always been curious about."
-- from Fifth Book of Junior Authors
"There are two sons and a husband in my own family, and they all enjoy reading and criticizing my books. They often crop up in my stories--a mannerism here, a problem there, the shape of a chin, perhaps. . . . Of course you would never recognize them, for all of my characters are made up of little bits and pieces of many different people."
-- ibid
"On my deathbed, I am sure, I will gasp, 'But I still have five more books to write!' . . . I will go on writing, because an idea in the head is like a rock in the shoe; I just can't wait to get it out."
-- How I Came to Be a Writer
