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I Don't Change The Language For Children Books. I Don't Make The Language Simpler. I Use Words That They Might Have To Look Up In The Dictionary. The Books Are Shorter, But There's Just Not That Much Difference Other Than That To Be Honest. And The Funny Thing Is, I Have Adult Writer Friends [to Whom I Would Say], "would You Think Of Writing A Children's Book?" And They Go, "no, God, I Wouldn't Know How." They're Quite Intimidated By The Concept Of It. And When I Say To Children's Books Writers, Would They Write An Adult Book, They Say No Because They Think They're Too Good For It.

-John Boyne

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I Don't Change The

John Boyne

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I Don't Change The Language For Children Books. I Don't Make The Language Simpler. I Use Words That They Might Have To Look Up In The Dictionary. The Books Are Shorter, But There's Just Not That Much Difference Other Than That To Be Honest. And The Funny Thing Is, I Have Adult Writer Friends [to Whom I Would Say], "would You Think Of Writing A Children's Book?" And They Go, "no, God, I Wouldn't Know How." They're Quite Intimidated By The Concept Of It. And When I Say To Children's Books Writers, Would They Write An Adult Book, They Say No Because They Think They're Too Good For It.

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I Was A Very Quiet Child, Quite Introverted, Really. Independent, Yes; I Didn't Need A Lot Of Supervision. Less So Than I Did When I Got Older, Maybe. But I Was A Bookish Child, Not Surprisingly. I Could Sit Quite Happily In A Corner For Hours And Entertain Myself With Books.

There Is Cruelty In The World Eliza, You Can See That, Can't You? It Surrounds Us. It Breathes On Us. We Spend Our Life Trying To Escape It.

He Looked Down And Did Something Quite Out Of Character For Him: He Took Hold Of Shmuel's Tiny Hand In His And Squeezed It Tightly. "you're My Best Friend, Shmuel," He Said. "my Best Friend For Life.

Do You See The Irony At All, Tristan?’ I Stare At Him And Shake My Head. He Seems Determined Not To Speak Again Until I Do. ‘what Irony?’ I Ask Eventually, The Words Tumbling Out In A Hurried Heap. ‘that I Am To Be Shot As A Coward While You Get To Live As One.

I Like Reading Books About Kids Where There Weren't Really Many Adults, Where They Didn't Need An Adult To Come And Solve The Problems For Them. They Could Use Their Own Ingenuity, Use Their Own Talents To Solve Whatever The Issue Was. And I Like That Still. I Think That Children Want To Read About Heroic Children. They Don't Want To Read About Children That Have To Be Saved All The Time.

Just Because A Man Glances Up At The Sky At Night Does Not Make Him An Astronomer, You Know.

The People I See From My Window. In The Huts, In The Distance. They're All Dressed The Same.' 'ah, Those People,' Said Father, Nodding His Head And Smiling Slightly. 'those People...well, They're Not People At All, Bruno.' Bruno Frowned. 'they're Not?' He Asked, Unsure What Father Meant By That.

It Reminds Me Of How Grandmother Always Had The Right Costume For Me To Wear. You Wear The Right Outfit And You Feel Like The Person You're Pretending To Be.

I Am Frustrated By Celebrities Who Decide To Write Children's Books Because They Think It's Easy. That Drives Me Crazy. It's Frustrating Because It's Unfair To Children. Because They'll Get A Lot Of Attention, They'll Get A Lot Of Marketing Budget And So On Just Because They're A Celebrity - The Madonnas, The Ricky Gervaises, The Russell Brands.

It Is Possible, You Know, To Drift Off To An Unknown World And Find Happiness There. Maybe Even More Happiness Than You've Ever Known Before.

Finding Happiness

I Like The Idea Of Standalone Novels. I Always Found With Series Of Books, It's Something That Publishers Love Obviously Because They Can Make A Lot Of Money And They Build An Audience From Book To Book, But I Don't Like That As A Writer. I Prefer The Idea Of Just Telling A Story, Completing It Within Your Book, And Moving On And Not Forcing A Child To Read Eight Of Them.

He Suddenly Became Convinced That If He Didn’t Do Something Sensible, Something To Put His Mind To Some Use, Then Before He Knew It He Would Be Wondering Round The Streets Having Fights With Himself And Inviting Domestic Animals To Social Occasions Too.

Children's Book Writers Tend To Feel Quite Superior, And Adult Writers Tend To Feel They Wouldn't Know How To Write A Children's Book - Which Might Surprise You Because I Think A Lot Of People Think It's The Other Way Around.

We All Are [normal]. Their Idea Of Normal Just Happens To Be Different To Some Other People's Idea Of Normal. But This Is The World We Live In. Some People Simply Cannot Accept Something That Is Outside Of Their Experience.

He Looked The Boy Up And Down As If He Had Never Seen A Child Before And Wasn't Quite Sure What He Was Supposed To Do With One: Eat It, Ignore It Or Kick It Down The Stairs.

Today People Can See And Protest All The Different Interests That Want War To Happen, The People It Financially Benefits. The First World War Wasn't Fought For That Reason. The Second World War Wasn't Fought For That Reason. Your Entire Country And Way Of Life Could Be Overtaken.

There Will Be Outrage And Disgust And People Will Turn On Me At The Last, They Will Hate Me, My Reputation Will Forever Be Destroyed, My Punishment Earned, Self-inflicted Like This Gunshot Wound, And The World Will Finally Know That I Was The Greatest Feather Man Of Them All.

Their Lost Voices Must Continue To Be Heard.

Unless You're Very Boring, I Think Most People Who've Lived Long Enough Have Something In Their Past Which Will Never Go Away. As A Writer, My Interest Has Become In Writing About Much More Emotional, Personal Topics. I'm Trying To Reach Into Subjects I Have Never Written About Before.

Bruno: "why Do You Wear Pajamas All Day?" Shmuel: "the Soldiers. They Took All Our Clothes Away." Bruno: "my Dad's A Soldier, But Not The Sort That Takes People's Clothes Away."

I Enjoy The Research Element. There Are So Many Stories From The Past That Interest Me, That I Want To Learn More About, Just As An Interested Person. And If I'm Going To Learn, If I'm Going To Research, It's Probably Going To Lead Me To Writing A Novel.

I Can't Bear To Be On A Train Without A Book", She Announced. " It's A Form Of Self-defence In A Way" .

...despite The Mayhem That Followed, Bruno Found That He Was Still Holding Shmuel's Hand In His Own And Nothing In The World Would Have Persuaded Him To Let Go.

What Exactly Was The Difference? He Wondered To Himself. And Who Decided Which People Wore The Striped Pajamas And Which People Wore The Uniforms?

(j)ust Because Your Version Of Normal Isn't The Same As Someone Else's Version Doesn't Mean That There's Anything Wrong With You.

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The First Thing He Noticed Was How Quiet It Was. This Was Nothing Like The Kind Of Quiet He Heard When He Woke Up In The Middle Of The Night After A Bad Dream. When That Happened, There Were Always Strange, Unidentifiable Sounds Seeping Into His Room From The Tiny Gaps Where The Windowpanes Weren't Sealed Together Correctly. At Those Moments He Could Always Tell There Was Life Outside, Even If All That Life Was Fast Asleep. It Was A Silence That Wasn't Silence At All.

I Think That Books For Young People Should Have Serious And Important Themes, They Shouldn't Be Trivial. So The Books I Write, They Would Be The Kind Of Stories You Would Write In An Adult Novel Only They Just Happen To Feature A Child At The Center Of Them.

But Still There Are Moments When A Brother And Sister Can Lay Down Their Instruments Of Torture For A Moment And Speak As Civilized Human Beings And Bruno Decided To Make This One Of Those Moments.

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. . .only The Victims And Survivors Can Truly Comprehend The Awfulness Of That Time And Place; The Rest Of Us Live On The Other Side Of The Fence, Staring Through From Our Own Comfortable Place, Trying In Our Own Clumsy Ways To Make Sense Of It All.

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The Dot That Became A Speck That Became A Blob That Became A Figure That Became A Boy

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War Today Is Such A More Visible Thing. We See It On Television, On Cnn. In 1914, War Was A Concept. There Was A Naivety And Stupidity That War Would Be A Great Lark. It's Not That Different From Gone With The Wind, Where All The Young Men Can't Wait To Go Off To Fight And Then Two Hours Later In The Movie, We See How The Reality Of That Has Come Home To Them.

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