Chris Van Allsburg

Peter Rabbit's not a rabbit. Peter Rabbit is a proxy for the child who reads the book, and they imagine themselves in the rabbit's position.

The idea of the extraordinary happening in the context of the ordinary is what's fascinating to me.

I write for what's left of the eight-year-old still rattling around inside my head.

I am happy to the spokeswoman for this French youth that tomorrow will be spearhead new hope in the shape of the National Front.

Another thing that freaks me out is time. Time is like a book. You have a beginning, a middle and an end. It's just a cycle.

I was feeling a strong need to change, grow, and break with particular things that were going on in my life and my history, and the material was the perfect answer for that.