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Charles Bukowski
“what matters most is how well you walk through the fire”
Charles Bukowski
William Faulkner
“Read, read, read. Read everything -- trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it.
Then write. If it's good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out of the window.”
William Faulkner
Robert Frost
“Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life; define yourself.”
Robert Frost
Jane Austen
“I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.”
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Oscar Wilde
“Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power.”
Oscar Wilde
“Love is always patient and kind. It is never jealous. Love is never boastful or conceited. It is never rude or selfish. It does not take offense and is not resentful. Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins, but delights in the truth. It is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes.”
Anonymous, Holy Bible: New International Version
Pablo Neruda
“Love is so short, forgetting is so long.”
Pablo Neruda, Love: Ten Poems
Maya Angelou
“I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.

(Popular misquote of "You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.")”
Maya Angelou, Letter to My Daughter
Roy T. Bennett
“Respect other people's feelings. It might mean nothing to you, but it could mean everything to them.”
Roy T. Bennett
Sarah Dessen
“No relationship is perfect, ever. There are always some ways you have to bend, to compromise, to give something up in order to gain something greater...The love we have for each other is bigger than these small differences. And that's the key. It's like a big pie chart, and the love in a relationship has to be the biggest piece. Love can make up for a lot.”
Sarah Dessen, This Lullaby
Oscar Wilde
“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.”
Oscar Wilde
Albert Camus
“Should I kill myself, or have a cup of coffee?”
Albert Camus
Martin Luther King Jr.
“If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”
Martin Luther King Jr.
Albert Einstein
“Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.”
Albert Einstein
Ned Vizzini
“I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare.”
Ned Vizzini, It's Kind of a Funny Story
Nicholas Sparks
“They didn’t agree on much. In fact, they didn’t agree on anything. They fought all the time and challenged each other ever day. But despite their differences, they had one important thing in common. They were crazy about each other.”
Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook
Neil Gaiman
“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.”
Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones
Cassandra Clare
“Not everything is about you," Clary said furiously.
"Possibly," Jace said, "but you do have to admit that the majority of things are.”
Cassandra Clare, City of Glass
Roy T. Bennett
“We are all different. Don’t judge, understand instead.”
Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Mae West
“I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it.”
Mae West
William Shakespeare
“It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.”
William Shakespeare
Daniel Pennac
“Reader's Bill of Rights

1. The right to not read

2. The right to skip pages

3. The right to not finish

4. The right to reread

5. The right to read anything

6. The right to escapism

7. The right to read anywhere

8. The right to browse

9. The right to read out loud

10. The right to not defend your tastes”
Daniel Pennac
Cassandra Clare
“I am a man" he told her, "and men do not consume pink beverages. Get thee gone woman, and bring me something brown.”
Cassandra Clare, City of Glass
Roy T. Bennett
“Believe in yourself. You are braver than you think, more talented than you know, and capable of more than you imagine.”
Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Stephen  King
“Good books don't give up all their secrets at once.”
Stephen King
“I think if I've learned anything about friendship, it's to hang in, stay connected, fight for them, and let them fight for you. Don't walk away, don't be distracted, don't be too busy or tired, don't take them for granted. Friends are part of the glue that holds life and faith together. Powerful stuff.”
Jon Katz
Saul Bellow
“You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write.”
Saul Bellow
John Green
“What the hell is that?" I laughed.
"It's my fox hat."
"Your fox hat?"
"Yeah, Pudge. My fox hat."
"Why are you wearing your fox hat?" I asked.
"Because no one can catch the motherfucking fox.”
John Green, Looking for Alaska
J.R.R. Tolkien
“Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.”
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
Mark Twain
“Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.”
Mark Twain