Children are game for anything. I throw them hard words, and they backhand them over the net. They love words that give them a hard time, provided they are in a context that absorbs their attention.

E. B. White (1899–1985) American author, critic, humorist [Elwyn Brooks "Andy" White]

Interview (1969-09) by George Plimpton and Frank Crowther, “The Art of the Essay No. 1,” The Paris Review, No. 48 (Fall 1969)
    (Source)

Collected in George Plimpton, ed., Writers at Work Vol. 8, ch. 1 (1988).