Joy > Joy's Quotes

“So many books, so little time.”
― Frank Zappa

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

“Sometimes I can hear my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I'm not living.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”
― Mae West

“When you're given an opportunity to change your life, be ready to do whatever it takes to make it happen. The world doesn't give things, you take things.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

“People aren't either wicked or noble. They're like chef's salads, with good things and bad things chopped and mixed together in a vinaigrette of confusion and conflict.”
― Lemony Snicket, The Grim Grotto

“Fate is like a strange, unpopular restaurant filled with odd little waiters who bring you things you never asked for and don't always like.”
― Lemony Snicket

“I don’t like knowing people in the context of things. "Oh, that’s the person I work out with. That’s the person I’m in a book club with. That’s the person I did that show with." Because once the context ends, so does the friendship”
― Jennette McCurdy, I'm Glad My Mom Died

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind.”
― Bernard M. Baruch

“Sometimes I think the difference between an actress and a star is that a star feels comfortable being the very thing the world wants her to be”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

“Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.”
― G. Michael Hopf, Those Who Remain

“You can only be jealous of someone who has something you think you ought to have yourself.”
― Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

“He tried. That's the big thing. He tried to do the best he could with what God gave him. He should get a nice raise for trying so hard.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Harrison Bergeron

“Things we lose have a way of coming back to us in the end, if not always in the way we expect.”
― JK Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

“All great literature is one of two stories; a man goes on a journey or a stranger comes to town.”
― Leo Tolstoy

“A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon. Breach man's mind. Who knows who might be the target of a well-read man?”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”
― James Clear, Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

“Don't try to make me grow up before my time…”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“Conceit spoils the finest genius.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“…because talent isn't genius, and no amount of energy can make it so. I want to be great, or nothing.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“Why is marijuana against the law? It grows naturally upon our planet. Doesn’t the idea of making nature against the law seem to you a bit . . . unnatural?”
― Bill Hicks

“When I read a book it feels like real life and when I put the book down it's like I go back into the dream.”
― Lisa Jewell, Then She Was Gone

“Why didn't I learn to treat everything like it was the last time. My greatest regret was how much I believed in the future.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

“I regret that it takes a life to learn how to live.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

“My life story is the story of everyone I've ever met.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

“Things usually work out in the end."
"What if they don't?"
"That just means you haven't come to the end yet.”
― Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle

“I suppose you wish you’d won the war.” I raised an eyebrow. “Oh, Mr. Darcy-Witt,” I said, as if I were explaining something obvious to a child. “No one wins a war.”
― John Boyne, All the Broken Places

“In my experience, those who have the greatest respect for the rules also take the most enjoyment in breaking them.”
― Lucy Foley, The Guest List

“He wanted to be free of so many obligations, and he’d gotten what he wanted. He was free. It was a terrible feeling.”
― Sarah Bruni, The Night Gwen Stacy Died: A Fiercely Smart Literary Coming of Age Drama for Women About First Love, Loss, and Identity