28 Summers Quotes

“It is May of 2020, and I do not have a brain well suited for this.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Gatsby is a critique of the American Dream. The only people who end up rich or successful in the novel are the ones who start out that way. Almost everyone else ends up dead or destitute. And it’s a critique of the kind of vapid capitalism that can’t find anything more interesting to do with money than try to make more of it. The book lays bare the carelessness of the entitled rich—the kind of people who buy puppies but won’t take care of dogs, or who purchase vast libraries of books but never read any of them.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“In the Anthropocene there are no disinterested observers; there are only participants”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“We probably didn't know what we were doing thousands of years ago as we hunted some large mammals to extinction. But we know what we're doing now. We know how to tread more lightly upon the earth. We could choose to use less energy, eat less meat, clear fewer forests. And we chose not to. As a result, for many forms of life, humanity is the apocalypse.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“And the worst thing about being young is not being able to appreciate that you’re young because you aren’t old enough to know any better.”
― Elin Hilderbrand, 28 Summers

“I remember as a child hearing phrases like "Only the strong survive" and "survival of the fittest" and feeling terrified, because I knew I was neither strong nor fit. I didn't yet understand that when humanity protects the frail among us, and works to ensure their survival, the human project as a whole gets stronger.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“I am glad to be unalone in cramped circles of restless yearning.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“I can only know my pain, and you can only know yours.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“And so I try to turn toward that scattered light, belly out, and I tell myself; This doesn't look like a picture. And it doesn't look like a god. It is a sunset, and it is beautiful, and this whole thing you've been doing where nothing gets five stars because nothing is perfect? That's bullshit. So much is perfect. Starting with this. I give sunsets five stars.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“I was thinking about the people I used to be, and how they fought and scrapped and survived for moments like this one.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“The five-star scale doesn’t really exist for humans; it exists for data aggregation systems, which is why it did not become standard until the internet era. Making conclusions about a book’s quality from a 175-word review is hard work for artificial intelligences, whereas star ratings are ideal for them.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“All of life is dependent upon other life, and the closer we consider what constitutes living, the harder life becomes to define.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“They won’t be okay, of course, but they will go on, and the love you poured into them will go on.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed

“I miss the luxury of caring about stuff that doesn't matter.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Just be aware that what you achieve doesn’t matter as much as what kind of person you are,”
― Elin Hilderbrand, 28 Summers

“I cry a lot because I miss people. I cry a lot because they die, and I can’t stop them. They leave me, and I love them more.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Knowing the facts doesn't help me picture the truth.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Even the most extraordinary genius can accomplish very little alone.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“A species that has only ever found its way to more must now find its way to less.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“But knowing something abstractly is different than knowing it experientially.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“For me, reading and rereading are an everlasting apprenticeship.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“There was so much news. News that was forever breaking, that there was never time for context.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“I have a friend, Alex, who is one of those impossibly easygoing, imperturbable souls who can instantly recalibrate when faced with a shift in circumstance. But occasionally, when on a tight schedule, Alex will become visibly stressed and say things like, 'We've got to get a move on.' Alex's wife, Linda, calls this 'Airport Alex.' Much to my chagrin, I am always Airport Alex.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“A while back, my brain started playing a game similar to the why game. This one is called What's Even The Point.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“These days, after drinking from the internet's fire hose for thirty years, I've begun to feel more of those negative effects. I don't know if it's my age, or the fact that the internet is no longer plugged into the wall and now travels with me everywhere I go, but I find myself thinking of that Wordsworth poem that begins, "The world is too much with us; late and soon.”

What does it say that I can't imagine my life or my work without the internet? What does it mean to have my way of thinking, and my way of being, so profoundly shaped my machine logic? What does it mean that, having been part of the internet for so long, the internet is also part of me?

My friend Stan Muller tells me that when you're living in the middle of history, you never know what it means. I am living in the middle of the internet. I have no idea what it means.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“It’s no coincidence that the scientific revolution in Britain coincided with the rise of British participation in the Atlantic slave trade and the growing wealth being extracted from colonies and enslaved labor.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Kurt Vonnegut, wrote that one of the flaws in the human character “is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Art isn't optional for humans.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“Disease only treats humans equally when our social orders treat humans equally.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

“I must choose to believe, to care, to hold dear. I keep going. I go to therapy. I try a different medication. I meditate, even though I despise meditation. I exercise. I wait. I work to believe, to hold dear, to go on.”
― John Green, The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet