Line #30 Creator/BeverlyCleary


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/beverly_cleary_2006.jpeg]]
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3	->''"Children should learn that reading is pleasure, not just something that teachers make you do in school."''
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5	Beverly Atlee Cleary (April 12, 1916 – March 25, 2021) was an American children's author.
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7	Her largest and best-known collection of books (too loose-knit to be really a "series", although there is a chronological order) involves a group of children in Portland, Oregon (where Cleary herself grew up), including Literature/HenryHuggins and his dog Ribsy, Henry's friend Beatrice "Beezus" Quimby and her little sister Ramona, and Ramona's friend Howie Kemp. [[Literature/RamonaQuimby Ramona]] is the break-out star character of the series. They were adapted into a TV series in the [=1980s=] (called ''Ramona''), and a movie (called ''Ramona and Beezus'') was released in 2010.
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9	Another well-known series by Beverly Cleary begins with ''[[Literature/RalphSMouse The Mouse and the Motorcycle]]'', about a mouse who befriends a lonely boy and discovers a useful but never-quite-explained ability to [[SurprisinglyFunctionalToys drive toy vehicles as if they were real]].
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11	Part of what makes the books work so well is the portrayal of various events that are a huge deal to a child. Cleary's insight into the minds of children also creates a large cast of very realistic characters easy for both children and adults to relate to.
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13	Her birthday, April 12th, is designated as "Drop Everything and Read Day" ([[FunWithAcronyms DEAR]], as introduced in ''Ramona Quimby, Age 8'') in American elementary schools, in which lessons stop and the students simply read whatever they want silently.
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15	Cleary lived to be 104 years old. When asked, on her 100th birthday, if she had any tips for such longevity, she simply said, "I didn't do it on purpose."
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17	!!Works by Beverly Cleary with their own trope pages include:
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19	* ''Literature/HenryHuggins'' series
20	* ''Literature/RamonaQuimby'' series
21	* ''Literature/EllenAndOtis'' series
22	* ''Literature/RalphSMouse'' series
23	* ''Literature/DearMrHenshaw'' (her only book to win the MediaNotes/NewberyMedal) and ''Strider''
24	* ''Literature/EmilysRunawayImagination''
25	* ''Literature/MitchAndAmy''
26	* ''{{Literature/Socks}}''
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28	!!Beverly Cleary's other works provide examples of:
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30	* {{Novelization}}: Cleary wrote three soft-cover novels based on ''Series/LeaveItToBeaver'' in the early '60s.
31	* RadishCure: Cleary included a story in her autobiography of some boys who chewed garlic in class. The principal finally bought a dollar's worth of garlic[[note]]this was in the 1930s, so a dollar bought a ''lot'' of garlic[[/note]] and had them chew it all. Although Otis chews garlic himself in his self-titled book (as a way to get rid of the taste in his mouth after the "spitball incident"), he does not get punished for it. He does, however, get a Radish Cure for making spitballs.
32	* SeriousBusiness: The main characters tend to take a lot of things very seriously, even though their problems would seem very minor from an adult's point of view. Justified since the books are told from a child's perspective, in which things like paper routes and school art projects really ''are'' serious business.
33	* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism: While her books portray the ups and downs of life, her books usually have a much lighter spirit, making it more on the idealistic end of the scale.

Context Creator / BeverlyCleary