"Time weighs down on you like an old, ambiguous dream. You keep on moving, trying to slip through it. But even if you go to the ends of the earth, you won’t be able to escape it. Still, you have to go there—to the edge of the world. There’s something you can’t do unless you get there."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."
— Dr. Seuss

"Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."
— Dr. Seuss

"“I wanted to destroy everything beautiful I'd never have. Burn the Amazon rain forests. Pump chlorofluorocarbons straight up to gobble the ozone. Open the dump valves on supertankers and uncap offshore oil wells. I wanted to kill all the fish I couldn't afford to eat, and smother the French beaches I'd never see. I wanted the whole world to hit bottom.”"
— Chuck Palahnuik

"You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams."
— Dr. Seuss

"“The world of the grotesque is the darkness within us. Well before Freud and Jung shined a light on the workings of the subconscious, this correlation between darkness and our subconscious, these two forms of darkness, was obvious to people. It wasn’t a metaphor, even. If you trace it back further, it wasn’t even a correlation. Until Edison invented the electric light, most of the world was totally covered in darkness. The physical darkness outside and the inner darkness of the soul were mixed together, with no boundary separating the two. They were directly linked. Like this.” Oshima brings his two hands together tightly."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells."
— Dr. Seuss

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..."
— Dr. Seuss

"Better to be a first-class matchbox than a second-class match."
— Haruki Murakami

"A person's a person, no matter how small."
— Dr. Seuss

"I think of myself as more the non-turn-on type. so when I do get turned on, I don’t trust it, I have to investigate the source."
— Haruki Murakami

"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go."
— Dr. Seuss

"But no one was asking me. I was here to do a job, and gray steel lockers or pale peach jukebox was no business of mine."
— Haruki Murakami (Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World)

"Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You."
— Dr. Seuss (Happy Birthday to You!)

"“Well, think of what I’m doing to you right now. For me I’m the self, and you’re the object. For you, of course, it’s the exact opposite—you’re the self to you and I’m the object. And by exchanging self and object, we can project ourselves onto the other and gain self-consciousness. Volitionally.” “I still don’t get it, but it sure feels good.” “That’s the whole idea,” the girl said."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple."
— Dr. Seuss

"“The pure present is an ungraspable advance of the past devouring the future. In truth, all sensation is already memory.” Hoshino looked up, mouth half open, and gazed at her face. “What’s that?” “Henri Bergson,” she replied, licking the semen from the tip of his penis. [...] “I can’t think of anything special, but could you quote some more of that philosophy stuff? I don’t know why, but it might keep me from coming so quick. Otherwise I’ll lose it pretty fast.”"
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not."
— Dr. Seuss (The Lorax)

"Symbolism and meaning are two separate things. I think she found the right words by bypassing procedures like meaning and logic. She captured words in a dream, like delicately catching hold of a butterfly’s wings as it flutters around. Artists are those who can evade the verbose.”"
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Being crazy isn't enough."
— Dr. Seuss

"“The world of the grotesque is the darkness within us. Well before Freud and Jung shined a light on the workings of the subconscious, this correlation between darkness and our subconscious, these two forms of darkness, was obvious to people. It wasn’t a metaphor, even. If you trace it back further, it wasn’t even a correlation. Until Edison invented the electric light, most of the world was totally covered in darkness. The physical darkness outside and the inner darkness of the soul were mixed together, with no boundary separating the two. They were directly linked. Like this.” Oshima brings his two hands together tightly. "But today things are different. The darkness in the outside world has vanished, but the darkness in our hearts remains, virtually unchanged. Just like an iceberg, what we label the ego or consciousness is, for the most part, sunk in darkness. And that estrangement sometimes creates a deep contradiction or confusion within us.”"
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!"
— Dr. Seuss

"This is the extent of his knowledge of the sea: it was very big, it was salty, and fish lived there."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind. Some come from ahead and some come from behind. But I've bought a big bat. I'm all ready you see. Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!"
— Dr. Seuss

"The morning air of the pasture turned steadily cooler. Day by day, the bright golden leaves of the birches turned more spotted as the first winds of winter slipped between the withered branches and across the highlands toward the southeast. Stopping in the center of the pasture, I could hear the winds clearly. No turning back, they pronounced. The brief autumn was gone."
— Haruki Murakami (A Wild Sheep Chase)

"Someday you will murder your father and be with your mother, he said.” Once I’ve spoken this, put this thought into concrete words, a hollow feeling grabs hold of me. And inside that hollow, my heart pounds out a vacant, metallic rhythm. Expression unchanged, Oshima gazes at me for a long time. “So he said that someday you would kill your father with your own hands, that you would sleep with your mother.” I nod a few more times. “The same prophecy made about Oedipus. Though of course you knew that.” I nod. “But that’s not all. There’s an extra ingredient he threw into the mix. I have a sister six years older than me, and my father said I would sleep with her, too.” “Your father actually said this to you?” “Yeah. I was still in elementary school then, and didn’t know what he meant by ‘be with.’ It was only a few years later that I caught on.” Oshima doesn’t say anything. “My father told me there was nothing I could do to escape this fate. That prophecy is like a timing device buried inside my genes, and nothing can ever change it. I will kill my father and be with my mother and sister."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"If things start happening, don't worry, don't stew, just go right along and you'll start happening too."
— Dr. Seuss

"You'll get mixed up, of course, as you already know. You'll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go. So be sure when you step. Step with care and great tact and remember that Life's a Great Balancing Act. Just never forget to be dexterous and deft. And never mix up your right foot with your left."
— Dr. Seuss (Oh, the Places You'll Go!)

"If there is a hard, high wall and an egg that breaks against it, no matter how right the wall or how wrong the egg, I will stand on the side of the egg. Why? Because each of us is an egg, a unique soul enclosed in a fragile egg. Each of us is confronting a high wall. The high wall is the system which forces us to do the things we would not ordinarily see fit to do as individuals . . . We are all human beings, individuals, fragile eggs. We have no hope against the wall: it's too high, too dark, too cold. To fight the wall, we must join our souls together for warmth, strength. We must not let the system control us -- create who we are. It is we who created the system. (Jerusalem Prize acceptance speech, JERUSALEM POST, Feb. 15, 2009)"
— Haruki Murakami

"Just tell yourself, Duckie, your real quite lucky."
— Dr. Seuss

"you got to know your limits. once is enough, but you got to learn. a little caution never hurt anyone. a good woodsman has only one scar on him. no more, no less."
— Haruki Murakami (Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World)

"I thought about the screws and their happiness. Maybe they were glad to be free of the eggbeater, to be independent screws, to luxuriate on white trays. It did feel good to see them happy."
— Haruki Murakami

"You're off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting,
So... get on your way!"
— Dr. Seuss

"I have only one thing I hope to convey to you today. We are all human beings, individuals transcending nationality and race and religion, fragile eggs faced with a solid wall called The System. To all appearances, we have no hope of winning. The wall is too high, too strong - and too cold. If we have any hope of victory at all, it will have to come from our believing in the utter uniqueness and irreplaceability of our own and others' souls and from the warmth we gain by joining souls together.

Take a moment to think about this. Each of us possesses a tangible, living soul. The System has no such thing. We must not allow The System to exploit us. We must not allow The System to take on a life of its own. The System did not make us: We made The System."
— Haruki Murakami

""If you want to catch beasts you don't see every day,
You have to go places quite out of the way,
You have to go places no others can get to.
You have to get cold and you have too get wet, too."
— Theodor Seuss Geisel, Dr. Seuss

"I tell lies sometimes.
The last time I lied was a year ago.
I absolutely detest lying. You could say that lying and silence are the two greatest sins of present day society. Actually, I lie a lot, and I'm always clamming up."
— Haruki Murakami

"All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring."
— Chuck Palahniuk

"Listen, Kafka. What you’re experiencing now is the motif of many Greek tragedies. Man doesn’t choose fate. Fate chooses man. That’s the basic worldview of Greek drama. And the sense of tragedy—according to Aristotle—comes, ironically enough, not from the protagonist’s weak points but from his good qualities. Do you know what I’m getting at? People are drawn deeper into tragedy not by their defects but by their virtues. Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex being a great example. Oedipus is drawn into tragedy not because of laziness or stupidity, but because of his courage and honesty. So an inevitable irony results."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"So be sure when you step, Step with care and great tact. And remember that life's A Great Balancing Act. And will you succeed? Yes! You will, indeed! (98 and ¾ percent guaranteed) Kid, you'll move mountains."
— Dr. Seuss (Oh, the Places You'll Go!)

"'These days I just can't seem to say what I mean,' she said. 'I just can't. Every time I try to say something, it misses the point. Either that or I end up saying the opposite of what I mean. The more I try to get it right the more mixed up it gets. Sometimes I can't even remember what I was trying to say in the first place. It's like my body's split in two and one of me is chasing the other me around a big pillar. We're running circles around it. The other me has the right words, but I can never catch her...Do you know what I'm trying to say?' 'Everybody has that kind of feeling sometimes,' I said. 'You can't express yourself the way you want to, and it annoys you.' Obviously this wasn't what she wanted to hear."
— Haruki Murakami (Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman)

"The one you love and the one who loves you are never, ever the same person."
— Chuck Palahniuk (Invisible Monsters)

""When I was little, I had this science book. There was a section on 'What would happen to the world if there was no friction?' Answer: 'Everything on earth would fly into space from the centrifugal force of revolution.' That was my mood." "
— Haruki Murakami

"It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything. "
— Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club)

"I’m free, I think. I shut my eyes and think hard and deep about how free I am, but I can’t really understand what it means. All I know is I’m totally alone. All alone in an unfamiliar place, like some solitary explorer who’s lost his compass and his map. Is this what it means to be free? I don’t know, and I give up thinking about it."
— Haruki Murakami (Kafka on the Shore)

"Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope."
— Dr. Seuss

"Curiosity can bring guts out of hiding at times, maybe even get them going. But curiosity usually evaporates. Gust have to go for the long haul. Curiosity's like a fun friend you can't really trust. It turns you on and then it leaves you to make it on your own - with whatever guts you can muster"
— Haruki Murakami

"We all die. The goal isn't to live forever, the goal is to create something that will."
— Chuck Palahniuk

"Tell me, Doctor, are you afraid of death?"
"I guess it depends on how you die."
— Haruki Murakami (The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle)

"It's so hard to forget pain, but it's even harder to remember sweetness.
We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace."
— Chuck Palahniuk (Diary)

"The most important thing we learn at school is the fact that the most important things can't be learned at school."
— Haruki Murakami (What I Talk About When I Talk About Running)