Life & Wisdom Quote by Margaret Mahy

Mahy is quietly puncturing the fantasy of the author as an all-powerful puppet master. The line starts with a polite, almost academic hedge ("It can certainly happen"), then swerves into a candid admission: not only is this possible, it happens to her. That shift matters. It turns a craft observation into a statement of artistic humility, and it reframes "sophisticated stories" as less about literary status and more about living complexity - narratives that resist being reduced to a message.

The intent is both practical and philosophical. Practically, Mahy is describing the moment every serious writer recognizes: you outline a plot, then a character's internal logic starts vetoing your plans. Philosophically, she's defending the kind of children's and YA fiction she helped legitimize - work often dismissed as didactic or preprogrammed. When characters "take over", the story stops functioning like a lecture and starts behaving like a world. It implies moral and psychological realism: people surprise you, including the people you invent.

The subtext is a gentle warning against authorial control masquerading as wisdom. If the writer forces an "original idea" to win at all costs, characters become mouthpieces; the narrative feels rigged. Mahy's phrasing also carries an ethics of attention: the writer's job isn't to dominate but to listen, to follow the consequences of temperament, fear, desire.

Contextually, coming from a major New Zealand children's author, it reads like a defense of imagination as serious labor. The best stories don't obey; they argue back.