HATFIELD — Author Jane Yolen, known for her prolific literary career, died at her home in Hatfield on Thursday, June 11, at the age of 87.

At the time of her death, Yolen had published more than 450 books for children and adults, including novels, poetry books, graphic novels, short stories, anthologies, picture books, nonfiction books, cookbooks and music books. Some of her most famous works included “Owl Moon,” “The Devil’s Arithmetic,” “The Emperor and the Kite,” “Briar Rose,” and the “How Do Dinosaurs…?” series.

“Writing was her thing. She loved writing. She wrote with joy,” said Yolen’s daughter Heidi E. Y. Stemple. “People who would say, ‘Writing is easy. You just slice yourself open and bleed on the page.’ She always said, ‘That’s ridiculous. If you don’t love writing, if it doesn’t fill your soul, you don’t do it. Just write with joy.’”

“People talk about how prolific she was, and 450 books and counting — that’s incredible. But what we really should be talking about is the level of quality of those books,” said author and Northampton gallery owner Rich Michelson. “Usually, when somebody writes so much, they start phoning it in or copying themselves. She just kept doing different things, expanding herself, pushing.”

Over the course of her career, Yolen won numerous awards for her work, including the Caldecott Medal, the Massachusetts Book Award, the Christopher Medal, the Golden Kite Award, the Nebula Award, the World Fantasy Association Life Achievement Award, the Sophie Brody Award, the Association of Jewish Libraries Award, and the Catholic Libraries Medal. She also received honorary doctorates from six New England colleges, including Smith College and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Still, Stemple said, Yolen’s greatest honor was the countless lives she touched in her decades-long writing career.

“She got letters from adults saying, ‘I read your book as a child, and now I’m reading it to my grandchild,’” Stemple said.

Yolen was born in New York City in 1939. As a child, she lived in California, New York, Virginia and Connecticut, and she was “a gold-star kid,” as she put it, who was very active in academics and extracurriculars. She attended Smith College, where she won numerous awards for her writing, graduating in 1960.

Yolen returned to New York City after graduation, selling her first book, “Pirates in Petticoats,” on her 22nd birthday. In 1962, she married David Stemple, a computer science professor who later chaired the department at the University of Massachusetts. The couple was happily married for 44 years until Stemple died of cancer in 2006. They raised three children: Heidi Stemple, who is now an author herself; Jason Stemple, a nature photographer and TV producer; and Adam Stemple, a novelist and musician.

“Our family was really involved in the arts from the beginning. … It was important to [our parents] that the arts were validated as a career choice when all of our friends who wanted to play music or write were told that they needed to get a teaching job just to make sure that they had a ‘real’ job,” Heidi Stemple said.

The family moved to Hatfield when Heidi was very young. There, Yolen had a rule: if she was writing, the children weren’t allowed to bother her unless they’d stopped breathing or were “bleeding from an important orifice,” Stemple recalled.

Stemple also remembered her mom as someone who “was never quiet. She was not afraid of her opinion. She would get out there and she would talk about book banning. She would talk about censorship. She would talk about never talking down to children, so she was not afraid to take a stand. She didn’t care if it harmed her reputation. She didn’t care about any of that.”

Several local authors who spoke to the Gazette remembered Yolen for her generosity and passion for mentoring other writers.

“I loved her intensity,” said Patricia Lee Lewis, author of “Thorns of the Mesquite.” “When she would have a conversation, there was very little small talk. It really had to be about pushing you and your own work and what you expected to happen and where were your barriers, and just very solidly in favor of the creative process and the publication. … You would always feel better about having been in conversation with her.”

Jarrett J. Krosoczka, author of “Hey, Kiddo” and the “Lunch Lady” series, met Yolen virtually in a Yahoo group listserv for children’s book authors in 2003. At the time, he was living in Boston, but he would drive out to the then-new Eric Carle Museum to see exhibits. When he told the group he’d be visiting the area soon, “She invited me to her home for tea, which, as a 25-year-old who was new to the industry, was mind-boggling,” he said.

“As much as she will be remembered for having published 450 books, I think that her greater legacy is the thousands upon thousands of books by authors she influenced and encouraged along the way,” said Krosoczka, who now lives in Florence. Yolen “gave me a lot of positive reinforcement that taught me I had a place on the bookshelf.”

Grace Lin, author of “A Big Mooncake for Little Star,” also recalled having tea with Yolen early in her own career.

“She was so kind. But with her kindness, though, she was always honest. I think that was what was so wonderful about her. You never felt like she was just trying to encourage you because, ‘Oh, you’re a nice person, you’re a sweet thing.’ … She was looking at your [work] with an honest eye, she was looking at you with an honest eye, and she was going to encourage you in the way that she felt was true,” Lin said.

Several of Yolen’s colleagues also had fond recollections of her writing philosophy, “BIC,” which stood for “butt in chair.” In other words, the best way for a writer to get work done was just to sit down and do it, even if they didn’t feel inspired or in a writing mood at that moment.

Yolen served as president of the Science Fiction Writers of America from 1986 to 1988 and was a longtime member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) from its inception in 1971. In an online statement, the SCBWI said, “No matter the genre, Jane’s books were penned with the utmost concern for the child who might someday pick them up and devote their time to reading the words she wrote. This is something we might all aspire to do.”

The organization also referred to her as “the modern-day Hans Christian Andersen” — calling it “one accolade that does not carry with it a trophy, a certificate, or a medal. Instead, it is a simple celebration of her work, bestowed upon her by her many peers.”

She also had longstanding ties to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst and to Hatfield Elementary School. The latter has held a writing contest in her name for more than 40 years.

Though Yolen leaves a legacy of hundreds of books published and shared countless times across the world — including about a dozen under contract to be published, Stemple said, plus somewhere between 100 and 200 fully written manuscripts — she will also live on in the Valley in a unique way.

On the back of R. Michelson Galleries in Northampton, a massive mural scales the building. It features a beloved cast of children’s book characters — including Fancy Nancy, Elephant and Piggie, Arthur and Paddington Bear — exploring and playing on shelves of larger-than-life books.

At the top right, Mother Goose takes flight atop her goose companion. The image originates from Ruth Sanderson’s book “Mother Goose and Friends,” and the model for that illustration was none other than Yolen.

In fact, Sanderson said, Yolen was also “a modern-day Mother Goose.” Via email, Sanderson recalled several other illustrations Yolen happily posed for, including Mrs. Sowerby in “The Secret Garden” and a sleeping cook in “Sleeping Beauty.” She also remembered her as someone who loved lifting up-and-coming writers and illustrators by providing feedback and creating professional opportunities. In Sanderson’s case, by introducing her to her editor at Little, Brown and Company.

“Without Jane, this might never have happened,” Sanderson said. “She helped me fulfill my dream.”

Yolen leaves behind one brother; three children; two daughters-in-law; five grandchildren; one grandson-in-law; one “son-out-law,” according to her obituary; and her partner. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the Jane Yolen & Heidi E.Y. Stemple Scholarship at Boyds Mills, the SCBWI Jane Yolen Midlist Grant, and the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art.

For more information about Jane Yolen, visit janeyolen.com.