In plain terms, a child is a complicated creature who can drive you crazy. There's a cruelty to childhood, there's an anger.

To get a child's trust - you may know or not - is a very hard thing to do. They're so used to not believing adults - because adults tell tales and lies all the time.

I have a good life.

When I did 'Bumble-ardy,' I was so intensely aware of death. Eugene, my friend and partner, was dying here in the house when I did 'Bumble-ardy'. I did 'Bumble-ardy' to save myself. I did not want to die with him. I wanted to live, as any human being does.

I did not know how to paint a mural. I did not know how to prepare the surface. There was nobody from the Renaissance around who could advise me, and I did the best I could.

Finding out that I was gay when I was older was a shock and a disappointment.

You cannot write for children They're much too complicated. You can only write books that are of interest to them.

'Hansel and Gretel' is one of the scariest stories ever written! Psychotic mother; stupid, inane father.

I'm an illustrator. I have to accept my role.

I have to accept my role. I will never kill myself like Vincent Van Gogh. Nor will I paint beautiful water lilies like Monet. I can't do that. I'm in the idiot role of being a kiddie book person.

That always seemed to be the most critical test that a child was confronted with - loss of parents, loss of direction, loss of love. Can you live without a mother and a father?

My life in Brooklyn was in constant danger because of my bad health.

As a kid, all I thought about was death. But you can't tell your parents that.

I'm a lucky buck.

I have this idiot name tag which says 'controversial.'

Childhood is a tricky business. Usually, something goes wrong.

I became a set designer for opera.

There's something in this country that is so opposed to understanding the complexity of children.

I don't have kids at all and I thank God that I never did.

I hate people.

I only have one subject. The question I am obsessed with is: How do children survive?

Oh, I adored Mickey Mouse when I was a child. He was the emblem of happiness and funniness. You went to the movies then, you saw two movies and a short. When Mickey Mouse came on the screen and there was his big head, my sister said she had to hold onto me. I went berserk.

I want to be alone and work until the day my heads hits the drawing table and I'm dead. Kaput. I feel very much like I want to be with my brother and sister again. They're nowhere. I know they're nowhere and they don't exist, but if nowhere means that's where they are, that's where I want to be.

I'm not Hans Christian Anderson. Nobody's gonna make a statue in the park with a lot of scrambling kids climbing up me. I won't have it, okay?

My father could be very witty, even if the humor was always on the darker side of irony.

I've always loved pigs: the shape of them, the look of them, and the fact that they are so intelligent.

If life is so critical, if Anne Frank could die, if my friend could die, children were as vulnerable as adults, and that gave me a secret purpose to my work, to make them live. Because I wanted to live. I wanted to grow up.

I'm not obsessed with angels but I do adore angels.

I remember how much - when I was a small boy I was taken to see a version of 'Peter Pan.' I detested it. I mean, the sentimental idea that anybody would want to remain a boy.

The world is twice as crazy as it's ever been.

I do not remember any proper children's books in my childhood. I was not exposed to them.