Anthony Browne

“Pictures are as evocative to me as smells.”

“Stories come to me and I don't know where they come from, but afterwards I can look back and say, 'Oh yes, that's got a little bit of me, or a little bit of my own son in it'. That's where ideas come from.”

“My dad never decided what he wanted to do; at times he fought in the army, was a teacher, a boxer, a light engineer, and a then a publican. My mum was a traditional housewife and mother. They showed my brother and I unconditional love.”

“Never forget that children are at the heart of everything we do. Respect them, listen to them, talk to them as equals, and care about them.”

“The first things I remember drawing were battles - big sheets of paper covered in terrible scenes of carnage - though when you looked closely, there were little jokes and speech bubbles and odd things going on in the background.”

“One day, I found my dad's dressing-gown in an old suitcase, and it transported me back to when I was five and thought he was a god or a superhero who could do anything. After that, I wrote my first positive book about fathers, about my dad.”

“Although I have two good Anglepoise lights, I much prefer to work by daylight.”

“I use a little brush only for really small details. Over the years, I've started to use a much larger brush.”

“Force me to choose my best book, and I always come back to 'Gorilla.' It was the first time I felt I understood what picture books could do.”

“One of my main decisions when accepting the job of Children's Laureate was that I must continue working on picture books. If I don't write and illustrate for some time, then I begin to question who I am.”

“When I was a boy, I was a worrier, and so was my son, Joe. I used to tell him that worrying meant he had an imagination and that one day he'd be pleased.”

“Children will come out and listen to a writer whose books they like. They don't need a government agency or a medal that says 'laureate' to continue that.”

“Most of the day I work standing up, as I once read somewhere that it's the best position for the back.”

“Picture books are for everybody at any age, not books to be left behind as we grow older. The best ones leave a tantalising gap between the pictures and the words, a gap that is filled by the reader's imagination, adding so much to the excitement of reading a book.”

“Having a memoir and a retrospective of your work running almost simultaneously when you're still alive does feel a bit posthumous.”

“Picture books are being marginalised. I get the feeling children are being pushed away from picture books earlier and earlier and being told to look at 'proper' books, which means books without pictures.”

“Stories come to me in mysterious ways, more like dreams than reasoned creations.”

“I don't like narrowing my readers down - there's not a particular age or gender or nationality. I suppose I'm aiming at the child I was.”

“Inspiring passion in children for books, and the world of imagination and creativity fuelled by them, is a fundamental reason for why the Children's Laureate post exists.”

“Most people lose their natural creativity at about five or six - but not me.”