My good ideas are shy. But if they see that I treat the stupid ideas with respect, they come forward.
Gail Carson Levine
Managing to tell a story is very gratifying.
My interest in the theater led me to my first writing experience as an adult. My husband David wrote the music and lyrics and I wrote the book for a children's musical, 'Spacenapped' that was produced by a neighborhood theater in Brooklyn.
It feels presumptuous to think of writing for adults.
I have a very vivid memory of the way my parents spoke, and the 50's that I grew up in are closer to the 20's, I think, than today in many, many ways.
I make mistakes on a very grand scale.
I grew up in New York City. In elementary school, I was a charter member of the Scribble Scrabble Club, and in high school, my poems were published in an anthology of student poetry.
I had to write something and couldn't think of a plot, so I decided to write a Cinderella story because it already had a plot! Then, when I thought about Cinderella's character, I realized that she was too much of a goody-two-shoes for me, and I would hate her before I finished ten pages.
I wrote as a kid, but I never wanted to be a writer, particularly. I had been drawing and painting for years and loved that.
I didn't want to be a writer. First I wanted to act, and then I wanted to be a painter like my big sister.
Most of my job life has had to do with welfare, first helping people find work and then as an administrator. The earlier experience was more direct and satisfying, and I enjoy thinking that a bunch of people somewhere are doing better today than they might have done if not for me.
I found that I was much more interested in writing and that I didn't like the illustrating at all. I had always been the hardest on myself when I drew and painted. I am not hard on myself when I write. I like what I write, so it is a much happier process.
Contemporary fiction is the hardest for me because I am not really in the popular culture - I don't watch TV.
I loved fairy tales as a kid, so that's where my mind gravitates.
'EIla Enchanted' began in a marvelous writing course at New York City's The New School.
As a child, I loved fairy tales because the story, the what-comes-next, is paramount. As an adult, I'm fascinated by their logic and illogic.
Most of the authors I liked were dead, so it didn't seem like a safe occupation.
I was excited to make my own 'Neverland.'
Ideas sometimes come from nowhere, and sometimes they take lots of thinking.
If a big person invests time in reading, kids learn reading is important, the child is important, words are important, stories are important.
Encourage children to write their own stories, and then don't rain on their parade. Don't say, 'That's not true.' Applaud flights of fantasy. Help with spelling and grammar, but stand up and cheer the use of imagination.
Get to know your kids' minds and how they think.
Sometimes the kids come up with better endings than the real story.
