They quoted part of his acceptance speech ~1998? of some Lifetime Achievement award... re his 5 decades in the field -

~"I've tried to make it OK for children to talk about their thoughts and their feelings, inluding on subjects which are difficult even for adults [my paraphrases here] - like divorce.. (And he relates a brief exchange with a child undergoing that). Because they Do have thoughts and feelings on these subjects and often no way to express them ... ..."

He never condescended, and he treated all children as deserving of respect -not as cute little animals-, but just as adults.. tried to show conflict resolution in his stories without violence. He seemed to me to be at times, the sole purveyor of the Virtue of gentleness and calmness, within a culture permeated by violent imagery and which spawns billionaires who sell that theme in games, publications, media. Because they can.

I'll miss his presence the most, post-Iraq - there will only be lesser people to try to explain to kids the results we will begin to experience during, after and for a long long time. A genius in his 'field'.



Ashton