« How wonderful it must be to write stories, say the friends of the storyteller, and there are both admiration and envy in their tone. As for the admiration, the storyteller knows he does not deserve it: he knows perhaps he turns to woo the lady make-believe because he was too unpractical to manage a business, lacked the courage to become a doctor, was too weak a character to impose discipline on classes of unruly children; the admiring friends can do these things but he, faced with the problem of earning a living, could do nothing but step backward into the past and recover its memories for their entertainment. » (Elizabeth Goudge)