Children of Eden is Stephen Schwartz's favorite of his own shows. He wrote, in answer to a question, "I think the work of which I am most proud is  Children of Eden, for several reasons. To begin with, I think it's my best score musically. It also contains the song that is maybe my personal favorite of my songs from a purely visceral point of view, "Stranger to the Rain", a song that embodies how I feel about parenting (which is very important to me), "The Hardest Part of Love", and above all, the song that most most espouses my philosophy of life and which, if I had one song to be remembered by, is the one I would choose: "In the Beginning". There are more of the themes that I return to over and over - personal responsibility, rebellion, intellectual independence, as well as overcoming family dysfunctions -- in this work than in any of my other shows. And I am proud of the fact that that it has become a viable and often performed piece that I know will live on after I'm gone."