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" It's good to focus on the universal suffering that goes on in any war. Whatever the right and wrongs of the war, there is always universal suffering. "

Michael Morpurgo

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" The most important thing is to live an interesting life. Keep your eyes, ears and heart open. Talk to people and visit interesting places, and don't forget to ask questions. To be a writer you need to drink in the world around you so it's always there in your head. "

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

" Much that is great in literature is an acquired taste, and you have to acquire it in the first place. Our job as parents is essentially to pass on the enthusiasm we had for the things we loved. That's how we'll get them to fall in love with reading in the first place and, hopefully, to stay in love with it. "

Michael Morpurgo

" As a young child my attention span was, as I remember it, rather short. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Always write your ideas down however silly or trivial they might seem. Keep a notebook with you at all times. "

Michael Morpurgo

" With all editing, no matter how sensitive - and I've been very lucky here - I react sulkily at first, but then I settle down and get on with it, and a year later I have my book in my hand. "

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

" 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 fill up the well of stories in my head - without ever knowing I'm doing it. "

Michael Morpurgo

" 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

" 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

" 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

" 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

" Characters are the key to a good book. It took me several novels to comprehend that. "

Michael Morpurgo

" I was an overly young father, is the most polite way of putting it. I think I was rather immature and all I can say is that I think I've made a much better grandfather... I don't think I was ready to be a father to be honest. "

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

" 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 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

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

Michael Morpurgo

" Don't worry about writing a book or getting famous or making money. Just lead an interesting life. "

Michael Morpurgo

" You get to about 65 or 70 and you lose friends and the world does seem to be an endlessly difficult place and tragic place, so it's more and more difficult for me to find the bright lights. "

Michael Morpurgo

" It is the child's understanding that teaches the adults the way of the future. They're still doing it today with modern technology. "

Michael Morpurgo

" Remember to write for yourself, not for a market and give yourself time to develop your own style, your own voice. It takes a lifetime. Enjoy it! "

Michael Morpurgo

" Perhaps it is partly that we need to love books ourselves as parents, grandparents and teachers in order to pass on that passion for stories to our children. It's not about testing and reading schemes, but about loving stories and passing on that passion to our children. "

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

" I think there's something about studying a book which will kill it if you're not careful. "

Michael Morpurgo

" One of the great failings of our education system is that we tend to focus on those who are succeeding in exams, and there are plenty of them. But what we should also be looking at, and a lot more urgently, is those who fail. "

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

" Anything that gets children reading is fine. "

Michael Morpurgo