“Perhaps that's what life is about--the search for such a connection. The search for magic. The search for the inexplicable. Not in order to explain it, or contain it. Simply in order to feel it. Because in that recognition of the sublime, we see for a moment the entire universe in the palm of our hand. And in that moment, we touch the face of God.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“One’s nature comes from within, not from without. The abomination occurs in subverting one’s instinct in favor of a rigid code written by others. Trying to force yourself into a role that confounds your spirit will always break you.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“If you feel you don’t have enough, you hold on to things,” he said. “But if you feel you have enough, you let go of things.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“With a book—presuming it’s a good book—you can depend upon an outcome that adheres to the necessities of drama. The question will be answered. It has to be. The answer may not be happy; we can’t guarantee a comedy. Sometimes tragedy strikes. But there will be a conclusion. Of that we can be sure. That’s the whole point of a book. But in real life, there is no guarantee that any question will ever be answered. Real life is messy because we don’t know where it’s going to go.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“No, you don’t remember, and sometimes it’s best that way. Sometimes it’s best to start fresh. Every day, fresh. Living always in the present, unburdened by the pain of the past. Most of us drag around our misdeeds like giant dead birds tied to our necks; we condemn ourselves to telling every stranger we meet the story of our anguish and inadequacies, hoping that one day we will be forgiven, hoping that we will find a person who will look at us and pretend to ignore the ridiculous dead birds hanging from our sunburned and weather-beaten necks. And if we find that person, and if we don’t hate him for not hating us, if we don’t hold him in contempt for not treating us contemptuously, as we expect to be treated—nay, as we demand to be treated—well, that person will be something of a soul mate, I imagine.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“Perhaps that’s what life is about—the search for such a connection. The search for magic. The search for the inexplicable. Not in order to explain it, or contain it. Simply in order to feel it. Because in that recognition of the sublime, we see for a moment the entire universe in the palm of our hand. And in that moment, we touch the face of God.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“I have made mistakes and I have hurt people, I do not deny that fact. But I have corrected those mistakes vigorously once I understood the error of my ways.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“With a book—presuming it’s a good book—you can depend upon an outcome that adheres to the necessities of drama. The question will be answered. It has to be. The answer may not be happy; we can’t guarantee a comedy. Sometimes tragedy strikes. But there will be a conclusion. Of that we can be sure. That’s the whole point of a book.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“I hear hundreds of years of life. I hear wind and rain and fire and beetles. I hear the seasons changing and birds and squirrels. I hear the life of the trees this wood came from.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“Stories continue in all directions to include even the retelling of the stories themselves, as legend is informed by interpretation, and interpretation is informed by time.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“You know,” he said, “at some point you’re going to realize that being a smart-ass isn’t as much about being smart as it is about being an ass.” “That’s good,” I said. “Did you read that in a fortune cookie?”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“I hoped...something...words, maybe; stories -- something I could touch, and when I touched it, it was different than when other people touched it. I wanted very badly to have an affinity for something that would become transcendent when I held it in my hands... Perhaps that's what life is all about -- the search for such a connection. The search for magic. The search for the inexplicable. Not in order to explain it, or contain it. Simply in order to feel it. Because in that recognition of the sublime, we see for a moment the entire universe in the palm of our hand. And in that moment, we touch the face of God.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“(C)hoice without alternative is only a sleight of hand; it is a magician's force-play, during which you believe you have free well, but your fate has already been decided: the magician knows which card you will pick!”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“Oh, my faith has flagged at times. It's easy to fall back into the same routines and paint over the sublime with coat after coat of indifference... I promise you something: when you have touched the face of God, you can never unlearn what you have learned. You can never unsee what you have seen.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“the result is what people live with, not the cause.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“With a book—presuming it’s a good book—you can depend upon an outcome that adheres to the necessities of drama.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“You know, he said, at some point you're going to realize that being a smart-ass isn't about being smart as it is about being an ass.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“You know,” he said, “at some point you’re going to realize that being a smart-ass isn’t as much about being smart as it is about being an ass.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“What did we do before Google? Before Wi-Fi? Before cable modems? Before cell phone towers on every building? Before that? We did what we had to do because we were resourceful. We had initiative. And we understood that the process is fundamental to the result: a poor process produces a poor product. And now? Now we let someone else worry about the messy details. We delegate that responsibility. And so we delegate our privacy. And so we delegate our liberty. And so we forsake the control of our own destinies.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“More wine helps; it takes the edge off the despair.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“You know what your potential was when you were young: you could have done anything! But instead of doing anything, you did nothing.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“I realized, then, that being an adult was just about bullshitting everyone around you. Just do things until someone stops you from doing those things, and then say, “Oh, that isn’t allowed?”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“Truth, honesty, integrity, he said. "And loyalty. Above truth, honesty, and integrity, I would demand loyalty. Loyalty above all. You have to swear an oath."
"I can never put loyalty above truth honesty and integrity. . . don't demand loyalty over truth. Don't ever do that.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“The rain has been incessant. It feeds my soul. I feel that it washes over my body, and a part of me drips into the soil with the rain, and a part of me becomes the soil and is drank into the roots of these trees and I have become one with them.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“Because the earth calls. The soil, the rocks, the clay. It calls to us to remind us, to make sure we remember. The earth will ultimately win. It always does. We will, all of us, end our lives here. Even the birds.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“if money affects who you love, then it isn’t really love.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“I wanted very badly to have an affinity for something that would become transcendent when I held it in my hands. I don’t know that I’ve ever found that thing; sometimes I suspect I have, but then I doubt myself. Perhaps I’m looking for it still. Perhaps that’s what life is about—the search for such a connection. The search for magic. The search for the inexplicable. Not in order to explain it, or contain it. Simply in order to feel it. Because in that recognition of the sublime, we see for a moment the entire universe in the palm of our hand.”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“We are all connected. The living to the non-living, as the non-living to the living. All things in all directions in all times. It is only in the physical dimension that we have limitations. (The membrane between us is thinner than you think.)”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
“One’s nature comes from within, not from without. The abomination occurs in subverting one’s instinct in favor of a rigid code written by others. Trying to force yourself into a role that confounds your spirit will always break you.” I”
― Garth Stein, quote from A Sudden Light
Garth Stein
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“There is light in the world, and it is us!”
― Eliezer Yudkowsky, quote from Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality
“The dark organ music filled the Department of Post-Mortem Communications. Moist assumed it was all part of the ambience, although the mood would have been more precisely obtained if the tune it was playing did not appear to be Cantate and Fugue for someone Who Has Trouble with the Pedals.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Making Money
“For the more a man restricts himself the closer he is, conversely, to infinity.”
― Stefan Zweig, quote from Chess Story
“He’d heard every person gets one impossible wish—just one—if the person wants something more than anything, and they can find a bit of magic to help them along.”
― Stephanie Garber, quote from Caraval
“love, as their parents knew, was not enough. Hunger and poverty could never be reduced by love alone.”
― Paul Scott, quote from The Jewel in the Crown
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A Walk in the WoodsBookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
