Top 120 Beverly Cleary Quotes (2024 Update)
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51. “The humiliation that Jane had felt turned to something else – grief perhaps, or regret. Regret that she had not known how to act with a boy, regret that she had not been wiser.”

— Beverly Cleary

52. “Children want to do what grownups do.”

— Beverly Cleary

53. “We didn’t have television in those days, and many people didn’t even have radios. My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening.”

— Beverly Cleary

54. “Writers are good at plucking out what they need here and there.”

— Beverly Cleary

55. “My mother would read aloud to my father and me in the evening. She read mainly travel books.”

— Beverly Cleary

56. “But maybe when he has worked at ShopRite longer, he will like it better. New jobs take getting used to.”

— Beverly Cleary

57. “Swell, just swell,” muttered Howie. “Twenty-nine kids laughing at me in girls’ socks carrying a stupid little pillow.”

— Beverly Cleary

58. “Girl Snouts.” “We are not,” contradicted Sarah. “We’re Girl Scouts.” “Hup, two, three, four. Hup, two, three, four,” counted Mrs. Collins, who was the jolly type and did not understand how parents sometimes embarrass their children. Down the hill marched the class. Mitchell felt Bernadette’s toe on his heel again and jumped in time.”

— Beverly Cleary

59. “And the muscles of his scrawny arms Are strong as rubber bands.”

— Beverly Cleary

60. “If there’s one thing I can’t stand, its a cheeky mouse.”

— Beverly Cleary

61. “Poor Miss Binney, dressed like Mother Goose, now had the responsibility of sixty-eight boys and girls.”

— Beverly Cleary

62. “Mother, what am I going to do?′ Beezus demanded. ‘It’s checked out on my card and I’m responsible. They won’t let me take any more books out of the library, and I won’t have anything to read, and it will all be Ramona’s fault. She’s always spoiling my fun and it isn’t fair!’ Beezus didn’t know what she would do without her library card. She couldn’t get along without library books. She just couldn’t, that was all.”

— Beverly Cleary

63. “Ramona grabbed the book. “It’s mine. I told you it was mine!” Then she turned to Beezus and said triumphantly, “You said people didn’t buy books at the library and now you just bought one!”

— Beverly Cleary

64. “Plainly something had to be done and it was up to Beezus to do it.”

— Beverly Cleary

65. “A happy ending for today,” corrected Ramona. Tomorrow they would begin all over again.”

— Beverly Cleary

66. “How can there be no such word as can’t? Ramona wondered. Mrs. Rudge had just said can’t. If there was so such word as can’t then Mrs. Rudge could not have said there was no such word as can’t. Therefore, what Mrs. Rudge said could not be true.”

— Beverly Cleary

67. “We have our ups and downs,” said Mrs. Quimby, “but we manage to get along, and we stick together.”

— Beverly Cleary

68. “Only grown-ups would say boots were for keeping feet dry. Anyone in kindergarten knew that a girl should wear shiny red or white boots on the first rainy day, not to keep her feet dry, but to show off. That’s what boots were for – showing off, wading, splashing, stamping.”

— Beverly Cleary

69. “And now I’m going to find out how to get a library started.”

— Beverly Cleary

70. “She would not have hurt the old man’s feelings for anything in the world.”

— Beverly Cleary

71. “Amy thought a moment. How could they get rid of their mother? “We could have her away taking care of a sick neighbor, and we are all alone in the house.”

— Beverly Cleary

72. “She was surprised to feel his hand on her arm and still more surprised-almost unbelieving-to see his fingers unclasp his identification bracelet and remove it from his arm. Silently he fumbled with the bracelet and slipped it around her right wrist. with a tiny click he snapped the clasp shut. Jane gave a gasp of astonishment and turned questioning to Stan. She was wearing his identification bracelet! The silver links on her wrist were still warm from his arm.”

— Beverly Cleary

73. “Now we lay Picky-picky down to sleep. We pray thee, Lord, his soul to keep. Thy love stay with him through the night and wake him with the morning light.”

— Beverly Cleary

74. “He would be atleast sixteen-old enough to have a driver’s licence- and he would have crinkles around his eyes that showed he had a sense of humor and he would be tall, the kind of boy all the other girls would like to date.”

— Beverly Cleary

75. “Ramona required accuracy from books as well as people.”

— Beverly Cleary

76. “No,” said Ramona. “He’s the kind of grown-up who teases children and thinks he’s funny.”

— Beverly Cleary

77. “She told us we must always rotate our crops and never, never perjure ourselves.”

— Beverly Cleary

78. “Nobody understood. She wanted to behave herself. Except when banging her heels on the bedroom wall, she had always wanted to behave herself. Why couldn’t people understand how she felt?”

— Beverly Cleary

79. “A shivery feeling ran down Ramona’s backbone, as if magic were taking place.”

— Beverly Cleary

80. “I remember when Ramona named one of her dolls Chevrolet after the car.” Everyone laughed.”

— Beverly Cleary

81. “Ralph really felt sorry for the boy, hampered as he was by his youth and his mother.”

— Beverly Cleary

82. “Besides, why wasn’t the top of the bottle screwed on tight? Because some grown-up had not screwed it on, that’s why. Children weren’t the only people who did things wrong.”

— Beverly Cleary

83. “I know,” answered Yard Ape, “but we just keep him for a pet.”

— Beverly Cleary

84. “Didn’t grown-ups think children worried about anything but jack-o’-lanterns? Didn’t they know children worried about grown-ups?”

— Beverly Cleary

85. “Nothing infuriated Ramona more than having a grown-up say, as if she could not hear, that she was worn out.”

— Beverly Cleary

86. “Daisy picked up the large, limp cat that was almost too heavy for her. “This is Clawed,” she said. “C-l-a-w-e-d,” she spelled. “Not like a man’s name. My brother named him Clawed because he had been clawed by another cat when he found him hiding in a gutter. Daddy says he hopes Jeremy never finds a wounded skunk.”

— Beverly Cleary

87. “Emily was lucky in many ways. She was lucky in the house she lived in, a house with three balconies, a cupola, banisters just right for sliding down, and the second bathtub in Yamhill County.”

— Beverly Cleary

88. “That’s my brother Germy,” said Daisy. “He thinks he’s a genius because he’s in high school.” “Jeremy,” corrected the brother to Ramona and added, “Tinsel Teeth,” to his sister.”

— Beverly Cleary

89. “But also, as you go through life, you pick up shreds of things, and eventually you are able to fit them together.”

— Beverly Cleary

90. “Miss Binney was not like most grown-ups. Miss Binney understood.”

— Beverly Cleary

91. “Ramona was filled with the glory of losing her first tooth and love for her teacher. Miss Binney had said she was brave! This day was the most wonderful day in the world! The sun shone, the sky was blue, and Miss Binney loved her.”

— Beverly Cleary

92. “Dad quietly observed Mother’s relentless control over me, and my growing desperation. When escape was unexpectedly offered, he saw it as an opportunity, not only for a year of college, but as a way of ending my relationship with Gerhart. As I look back, I can see that my father, even though I did not ask, always understood what I wanted – roller skates, a hard sponge-rubber ball, a hemp jump rope, a bicycle, and now, freedom. I was leaving.”

— Beverly Cleary

93. “Ramona, are you having problems with your income tax?” Mrs. Quimby asked, behaving as if she were serious even though she was joking.”

— Beverly Cleary

94. “She’s playing she’s waiting for a bus,” explained Beezus. Henry groaned. It was the dumbest game he had ever heard of.”

— Beverly Cleary

95. “Ramona considered all these worries ridiculous, so she ignored them.”

— Beverly Cleary

96. “Ramona wished she could run, run, run out of that classroom as she had the day before and never come back.”

— Beverly Cleary

97. “As a child I very much objected to books that tried to teach me something. I just wanted to read for pleasure, and I did.”

— Beverly Cleary

98. “She tried to make up for speaking so disagreeably by stroking him, but Clawed merely turned his head long enough to give her a look that said, You are not my friend.”

— Beverly Cleary

99. “Being kissed by Gerhart was disappointing. I had expected a kiss to feel more like the time in Yamhill when I stuck my finger in the electric socket, only nice.”

— Beverly Cleary

100. “Willa Jean, pleased to have her grandmother on her side, set a red checker on top of a black checker. “Your turn,” she said to Ramona as if she were being generous.”

— Beverly Cleary