Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe Quotes

“Feeling sorry for myself was an art. I think a part of me liked doing that.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“If we studied birds, maybe we could learn to be free.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“I came to understand that my father was a careful man. To be careful with people and with words was a rare and beautiful thing.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Smiles are like that. They come and go.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“The Ari I used to be didn't exist anymore. And the Ari I was becoming? He didn't exist yet.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Those words tasted bitter.

But the worst part was that those words were living inside me. And they were leaking out of me. Words were not things you could control. Not always.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“I’m not into all this academic stuff. Too much analysis. What ever happened to reading a book because you liked it?”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“No wonder I stopped keeping a journal. It was like keeping a record of my own stupidity.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“The whole world seemed to be quiet and calm and I wanted to be the world and feel like that.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Ari?” My father’s voice was soft. “Ari, Ari, Ari. You’re fighting this war in the worst possible way.”

“I don’t know how to fight it, Dad.”

“You should ask for help,” he said.

“I don’t know how to do that, either.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“You belong everywhere you go. That’s just how you are.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Water was something he loved, something he respected. He understood its beauty and its dangers. He talked about swimming as if it were a way of life.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“I guess I was a mystery even to myself.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“The funny thing is, I sometimes think my mother loves my father more than he loves her. Does that make sense?"
"Yeah, I guess so. Maybe. Is love a contest?"
"What does that mean?"
"Maybe everyone loves differently. Maybe that's all that matters.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Man loneliness was much bigger than boy loneliness.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Maybe the problem between me and my father was that we were both the same.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“I was harder than Dante. I think I'd tried to hide that hardness from him because I'd wanted him to like me. But now he knew. That I was hard. And maybe that was okay. Maybe he could like the fact that I was hard just as I liked the fact that he wasn't hard.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“In order to be wildly popular you had to make people believe that you were fun and interesting I just wasn't that much of a con artist.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“I guess I did miss Dante-even though I tried hard to not think about him. The problem with trying hard not to think about something was that you thought about it even more.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Why did I have to be a good boy just because I had a bad-boy brother? I hated the way my mom and dad did family math.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Bullshit, Ari. You have the harder rule to follow? Buffalo shit. Coyote shit. All you have to do is be loyal to the most brilliant guy you've ever met—which is like walking barefoot through the park. I, on the other hand, have to refrain from kissing the greatest guy in the universe—which is like walking barefoot on hot coals.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Words were not things you could control. Not always.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“It was like she understood something about me that she'd never quite understood before. I always felt that when she looked at me, she was trying to find me, trying to find out who I was. But it seemed at that moment that she saw me, that she knew me. But that confused me.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“For a few minutes I wished that Dante and I lived in the universe of boys instead of the universe of almost-men.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“In your dream. You were looking for me."

"I'm always looking for you," I whispered.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Summer had come and gone. Summer had come and gone. And the world was ending.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Birds exist to teach us things about the sky.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“The worst part about going crazy is that when you're not crazy anymore, you just don't know what to think of yourself.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Yeah, I had all kinds of tragic reasons for feeling sorry for myself. Being fifteen didn't help. Sometimes I thought that being fifteen was the worst tragedy of all.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“There is a famous painting, Nighthawks, by Edward Hopper. I am in love with that painting. Sometimes, I think everyone is like the people in that painting, everyone lost in their own private universes of pain or sorrow or guilt, everyone remote and unknowable. The painting reminds me of you. It breaks my heart.”
― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe