Some of you may remember reading The Bridge to Terabithia as a child. I remember reading it and loving it. Not growing up in a Christian family, I was not encouraged to notice, nor did I notice on my own, that the book does contain Christian overtones. In this interview the author, Katherine Paterson, discusses her view of writing as a Christian, including the fact that she had no intention of The Bridge to Terabithia being a Christian tract. Nonetheless, she explains how Christianity informed her writing:

I think C. S. Lewis said that a book cannot be what a writer is not. Who you are informs what you write on a very deep level. You reveal yourself whether you intend to or not. So you don’t signal that you’re a Christian; you write the story as well and as truthfully as you can because that’s how you glorify God, and you have to be true to the characters and who they are and how they talk. If it comes from a person who has a Christian hope and a Christian knowledge of grace, then I think hope and grace are going to infuse my work—not that I put them in, but because I can’t help having them there.

Reading this interview makes me want to go back and read the book. I admit, I’m a little disappointed it is being turned into a movie. As captivating as the big screen is, it is not the same as being lost in a book. Of course, I don’t need to go see the movie, but still . . ..

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