Celebrated American author Beverly Cleary passes away at 104

Celebrated children's writer of America Beverly Cleary, creator of exemplary characters like Ramona Quimby and Henry Huggins has passed away, she was 104.

Her publisher HarperCollins announced Beverly’s demise on Friday that the author passed away on Thursday in Carmel Valley, California.

Librarian turned writer, Beverly Cleary published Henry Huggins in 1950. Children worldwide love the adventures of Huggins and neighbors Ellen Tebbits, Otis Spofford, Beatrice “Beezus” Quimby and her younger sister, Ramona.

Henry Huggins, her first book, about a third-grader who adopts a skinny stray dog named Ribsy, was an immediate hit. From there, she wrote more books about Henry and his friends on Klickitat Street in Portland, Oregon.

Cleary was inspired to start writing when "a little boy faced me rather ferociously across the circulation desk and said: 'Where are the books about kids like us?'" her publisher quoted her as saying.

"I wanted to read about the sort of boys and girls that I knew in my neighborhood and in my school," she told NPR in 1999.

The renowned writer published more than 40 books, with more than 85 million copies sold. They were translated into 29 languages.

Beverly Cleary was named a "Living Legend" by the US Library of Congress in 2000, and awarded the National Medal of Art from the National Endowment for the Arts in 2003.

Cleary was not writing for quite long because she said she felt “it's important for writers to know when to quit.” “I even got rid of my typewriter. It was a nice one but I hate to type. When I started writing I found that I was thinking more about my typing than what I was going to say, so I wrote it long hand,” she said in March 2016.

Even though she quit writing, Cleary re-released three of her most cherished books with three famous fans writing forewords for the new editions.

Beverly’s disheartened fans expressed their love and farewell on social media.
Here are some of the tweets: