Brian Selznick Quotations

What interests me about clocks is that everything is hand-made, and yet to the person looking at the clock, something magical is happening that cannot be explained unless you are the clockmaker.

I think everything belongs in a certain place, for kids who feel they don't belong anywhere. A museum is an institution like a library where everything has a place, everything belongs.

I've always loved the wild rumpus in 'Where the Wild Things Are' by Maurice Sendak, because the words disappear, the pictures take up the whole page, and we move forward in the story by turning the pages.

But I'm a fairly mechanical worker - I tend not to think about themes so much as plot. I want to get the feeling right. If it's moving through tunnels, I ask myself, what is it like to move through tunnels?

I can draw pencil lines to show something is moving, but if I'm writing, I struggle with how to write it. The boy ran down the hallway? The boy ran quickly down the hallway? The boy ran down the marble hallway? I agonize over the words. So my editor works very hard. I'm lucky to have her.

I think the most important thing you can do is to keep drawing no matter what. And to not be afraid of drawing whatever interests you. If there is something that you want to draw, to make, then I think you should pursue it and not let anybody tell you that you cant do it.

I love being an illustrator because I get to read really great stories, work with amazing people, travel and see places I never would've seen. And I get to draw all the time.

I think from an early age I was aware of how a camera can tell a story, how a movie camera can affect how the narrative is told.

I think I always knew that I would do something with art because it was the one thing that I knew I was really good at.

I think when I'm drawing, I'm seeing what's happening on the page almost as if it were unfolding like a movie in my head.

I've been taking art lessons since I was little, and I've always drawn. I think in pictures.

Well, everything surprises me about the writing process because illustrating comes much more naturally to me than writing does.

I definitely think my work comes from things that I liked as a kid, and things I still like now. Monsters and magic and museums and movies, a lot of things that start with 'M' for some reason.

I love illustrating for other writers because I am given stories I never would have thought of, and my work as an illustrator is always in support of the story.

I majored in illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design, although I never had any intention of being an illustrator and didn't take any classes in illustration there. It was just that the illustration degree had no requirements.

The orphan in children's literature allows the child protagonist to move the story forward themselves. I think that, however happy a family, every intelligent child thinks: 'How did I come to be born to these parents?' - it is about finding your place in the world.

Once I'm given an idea for a story I have a million ideas on how it should be illustrated, but I don't have a big shoebox full of unfinished ideas.

A lot of people who don't write for kids think it's easy, because they think kids aren't as smart as they are, or that you have to dumb down what you would normally write for kids. But I think you have to work harder when you write for kids, to make sure every word is right, that it's there for the right reason.

For most of my career I illustrated books for other people.

It's fun to see how other artists adapt my work.

Since I spend such a long time making each book, I only choose books that I'm really interested in and that I really love.

A friend suggested that I get a job at a children's book store so I could meet kids and read books, and that turned out to be the single best bit of advice I've ever gotten.

A lot of times, people complain about how books and stories change when they're translated to the screen. But I think sometimes people forget that a lot of changes have to be made because we're not in a book when we're watching a movie.

I guess I see a part of myself in everyone I write about. I tend to write about kids who are obsessed with something, and even though I have never been good with machines the way Hugo is, I did love miniature things when I was a kid.

Sometimes, I have themes that interest me or that touch on larger issues but, really, I'm just trying to figure out the plot, or how the characters work. I'm trying to make the best story I possibly can.

If you lose your purpose ... it's like you're broken.

As I look out at all of you gathered here, I want to say that I don't see a room full of Parisians in top hats and diamonds and silk dresses. I don't see bankers and housewives and store clerks. No. I address you all tonight as you truly are: wizards, mermaids, travelers, adventurers, and magicians. You are the true dreamers.

Like a mermaid rising from an ocean of paper, the girl emerged across the room.

Maybe that's why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn't able to do what it was meant to do...Maybe it's the same with people," Hugo continued. "If you lose your purpose...it's like your broken.

Even if all the clocks in the station break down, thought Hugo, time won't stop. Not even if you really want it to. Like now.

In that moment, the machinery of the world lined up. Somewhere a clock struck midnight, and Hugo's future seemed to fall perfectly into place.

My house had suddenly turned into a hospital ward.

If you've ever wondered where your dreams come from when you go to sleep at night, just look around. This is where they are made.

I hope the snow covers everything so all the footsteps are silenced, and the whole city can be at peace.

Time can play all sorts of tricks on you. In the blink of an eye, babies appear in carriages, coffins disappear into the ground, wars are won and lost, and children transform, like butterflies, into adults.

Fairy tales only happen in movies." -George Melies from The Invention of Hugo Cabret

The idea of going to the movies made Hugo remember something Father had once told him about going to the movies when he was just a boy, when the movies were new. Hugo's father had stepped into a dark room, and on a white screen he had seen a rocket fly right into the eye of the man in the moon. Father said he had never experienced anything like it. It had been like seeing his dreams in the middle of the day.

I've always loved children's books - it's not that I didn't like them, I just didn't think I wanted to do that. But then I suddenly realized I did...

I address you all tonight for who you truly are: wizards, mermaids, travelers, adventurers, and magicians. You are the true dreamers.

Maybe we're all cabinets of wonders.

Having an eye patch actually makes it easier to look through a camera - I don't have to close one eye like everyone else.

Ben remembered reading about curators in "Wonderstruck", and thought about what id meant to curate your own life, as his dad had done here. What would it be like to pick and choose the objects and stories that would go in your own cabinet? How would Ben curate his own life? And then, thinking about his museum box, and his house, and his books, and the secret room, he realized he'd already begun doing it. Maybe, thought Ben, we are all cabinets of wonders.

She walked to the rear door and took out a bobby pin from her pocket. Hugo watched as she fiddled with the pin inside the lock until it clicked and the door opened. "How did you learn to do that?" asked Hugo. "Books," answered Isabelle.

He wished he was with his mom in her library, where everything was safe and numbered and organized by the Dewey decimal system. Ben wished the world was organized by the Dewey decimal system. That way you'd be able to find whatever you were looking for, like the meaning of your dream, or your dad.

Ben wished the world was organized by the Dewey decimal system. That way you'd be able to find whatever you were looking for.

You can make up your own story when you look at a photo.

I like to imagine that the world is one big machine. You know, machines never have any extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too.

Maybe we are all cabinets of wonders.