Beverly Cleary, beloved and prolific author of children’s books, dies at 104
By VALERIE J. NELSON
With witty yet economic prose and a gift for recalling the inner emotions of childhood, Beverly Cleary wove timeless tales that took young readers back to the Portland, Ore., of her youth.
Her stories served as a collective touchstone for the childhoods of many baby boomers, and succeeding generations, who saw themselves in the pages of her work.
Cleary died Thursday in Carmel, where she had lived since the 1960s. She was 104.
The grande dame of children’s literature, she wrote both humorously and realistically about the anxieties of childhood in such enduringly popular books as “Henry Huggins” and “Beezus and Ramona.”