Jeff Kinney
Jeff Kinney
American author and cartoonist who created the Diary of a Wimpy Kid children's book series. He is also known for establishing the popular children's website, Poptropica.
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionChildren's Author
Date of Birth19 February 1971
CityFort Washington, MD
CountryUnited States of America
books difference keen kids legitimate loved push
Kids and adults have a difference of opinion when it comes to what constitutes legitimate reading. Adults often push books that they loved as children, which, ironically, were often books that their parents weren't particularly keen on.
kids preached sniff
Kids can sniff out when they are being preached to, and they don't like it. So while my books aren't amoral, they are not infused with morals or a message, either, and kids like that.
adult age agenda early impress kids lesson literary message moral obvious run sniff
If there is any message in the 'Wimpy Kid' books, it is that reading can be and should be fun. As an adult reader, when I see an obvious moral lesson to be taught, I run in the other direction... Kids can sniff out an adult agenda from an early age. I'm writing for entertainment, not to impress literary judges.
characters excited felt form held kids life wonderful
I'm very excited to see the wonderful 2-D characters in Poptropica come to life in the form of 3-D toys. When I first held the characters in my hands, it felt like magic. I'm excited for kids to have the same feeling!
amazed best bothered friend kids meet swim terrible until worst
On our swim team, they had something called the 'developmental meet.' I didn't know it was a meet only for the worst kids so that they could get a ribbon, and I'd show up with my friend who was also a terrible swimmer, and we would be amazed that the best kids hadn't bothered to show up. I didn't get it until after college.
collective kids
It seems that when anything aimed at kids catches on, it causes the collective antennae of the older set to go up.
bad hours kids line
I'm not very charismatic or telegenic. I feel bad for the kids waiting three hours in line for their book to be signed.
blast family growing happened kids phone stories younger
I write for kids because I think the most interesting (and most humorous) stories come from people's childhoods. When I was writing 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid,' I had a blast talking on the phone to my younger brother, Patrick, remembering all of the things that happened to our family when we were growing up.
bought dishes house kids letters next places smaller stored thousands work
I work in the house next to where I live. We bought a smaller house that I use as my office and the place where my two employees work... We've got tens of thousands of letters from kids stored all over the house in places you would usually put dishes and other things like that.
hand heavy kids sniff
Kids can sniff out a moral. They can feel the heavy hand of an adult.
above collector comics gems head impeccable included luckily shoulders stood works
Luckily for me, my father had impeccable taste. No contemporary collector was he. His treasure trove of comics included gems such as 'Little Lulu,' 'Frontline Combat' and 'Classics Illustrated.' But the works that stood head and shoulders above the rest were Carl Barks's 'Donald Duck' and 'Uncle Scrooge' comics from the 1940s through the 1960s.
dead dog fighting george home keeps life lunch remember separate
I remember once I had lunch with George W Bush, his father, and Condoleezza Rice. Then I went home to find my dog and my neighbour's dog fighting over a dead rabbit, and I had to separate them. I like that my home life keeps things real.
locked wrote
I do all my speeches in pictures. If I wrote words, I'd get locked in on them.
cartooning middle pencil sketches until
In middle school, I started to draw, and my pencil sketches were huge. They were these 4ft by 3ft drawings, and I got a lot of attention for that, so that was very validating. But I didn't start cartooning until I was in college.