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" Children have to be motivated to want to learn to read. Reading must not be taught simply as a school exercise. "

Michael Morpurgo

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" A notion for a story is for me a confluence of real events, historical perhaps, or from my own memory to create an exciting fusion. "

Michael Morpurgo

" The big relationships you make in your life are with those that you love and if things do go wrong then it's a source of great pain and that lasts. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Animals are sentient, intelligent, perceptive, funny and entertaining. We owe them a duty of care as we do to children. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Admitting failure is quite cleansing, but never - pleasurable. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Some writers - most, I suspect - write in isolation. I think I'd always found that quite difficult. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I was brought up, as a lot of kids are, on 'Aesop's Fables,' 'Brothers Grimm,' 'La Fontaine,' all those sorts of things. Hans Christian Andersen is a hero of mine. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Marry someone who flatters you. Because I've written 80 books since 'War Horse' but when my wife reads one, all she says is, 'It's quite good, but it's not as good as 'War Horse,' is it?' "

Michael Morpurgo

" Write because you love it and not because it is something that you think you should do. Always write about something or somebody you know about - something that you feel deeply and passionately about. Never try and force it. "

Michael Morpurgo

" If I'm serious, yes, I'd like to have done what Shakespeare did... to act and write. You learn so much from acting. One of our great writers, Alan Bennett, does both supremely well. When I write a story, I tend to speak it aloud as I'm writing it. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I got married young, far too young, but it is fine. We are still married 48 years later. I got married at 19. "

Michael Morpurgo

" You know, I really wish now I'd had the nerve to become an actor. Because I'd have been Robert Redford, no question. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Encouraging young people to believe in themselves and find their own voice whether it's through writing, drama or art is so important in giving young people a sense of self-worth. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I really can't write fantasy. I cannot invent a world which does not exist. And I can't read fantasy either. As soon as I realise I'm reading a book that hasn't got its roots in a reality I can comprehend, I switch off. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Read a lot - poems, prose, stories, newspapers, anything. Read books and poems that you think you will like and some that you think might not be for you. You might be surprised. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Everyone is interested in war, in that people don't want it to happen. I'm much more interested in peace than in war but it's important to understand why we fight. "

Michael Morpurgo

" There is the myth that writing books for children is easier than writing books for grownups, whereas we know that truly great books for children are works of genius, whether it's 'Alice in Wonderland' or the 'Gruffalo' or 'Northern Lights.' When it's a great book, it's a great book, whether it's for children or not. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I become my characters, and then try to allow events in the story to take their own course. I try not to play God, but to let them work out their own destiny. "

Michael Morpurgo

" When I sit down I write very fast... if I haven't finished a book in two or three months then I think it's not going well. "

Michael Morpurgo

" It's the teacher that makes the difference, not the classroom. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Only the best books are special. Why? Because they open our eyes, touch us, excite us, extend us. "

Michael Morpurgo

" To write something you have to feel it and know it, and that's not comfortable. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I was never a great reader, but there were two stories I loved best: Kipling's 'The Elephant's Child' and 'The Jungle Book.' Deep down, I've always wanted to write a book about a wild child and an elephant. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I was rather a poor student, too easily distracted - did a lot of gazing out of windows, fine for training to be a writer, but not a great way to achieve in the classroom. The truth is that I was happy to bumble along and do enough to avoid detention, but not much more. "

Michael Morpurgo

" A lot of children, like I did, move away from words because of the fear - which is something you have to take out of education: the fear of worrying about what marks you'll get, detention, worrying about letting people down, your parents, teachers. "

Michael Morpurgo

" When I write I try as far as possible to forget I'm writing it at all. I tell it down onto the page, as if I'm telling it to one person only, my best friend. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I'm still not sure I want to be a writer. I think of myself as a storyteller more. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Live an interesting life. Meet people. Read a lot and widely, learn from the great writers. "

Michael Morpurgo

" War continues to divide people, to change them forever, and I write about it both because I want people to understand the absolute futility of war, the 'pity of war' as Wilfred Owen called it. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Wherever my story takes me, however dark and difficult the theme, there is always some hope and redemption, not because readers like happy endings, but because I am an optimist at heart. I know the sun will rise in the morning, that there is a light at the end of every tunnel. "

Michael Morpurgo

" By the time I sit down and face the blank page I am raring to go. I tell it as if I'm talking to my best friend or one of my grandchildren. "

Michael Morpurgo