“You don't write because someone sets assignments! You write because you need to write, or because you hope someone will listen or because writing will mend something broken inside you or bring something back to life.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“Some things can be both real and imaginary at the same time, . . . some lies can be true, . . . broken faith may be restored.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“The right circumstances sometimes happen of their own accord, slyly, without fanfare, without warning. Layman's alchemy. . . . The magic of everyday things.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“The process of writing is a little like madness, a kind of possession not altogether benign.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“A few hundred years ago there were no differences between magic and medicine.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“It isn't just a village. The houses aren't just places to live. Everything belongs to everybody. Everyone belongs to everyone else. Even a single person can make a difference.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“Their love was something which coloured the air between them like sunlight.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“So much of his life seemed to be like this now, a blur of days without anything to define them from each other, like episodes of a soap he watched out of habit, even though none of the characters interested him.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“The day stretched out in front of him like an empty road in the desert.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“He drank, for the same reason he wrote second-rate science fiction. Not to forget but to remember, to open the past and find himself there again. He opened each bottle, began each story with the secret conviction that here was the magic drought that would restore him. But magic, like wine, needs the right conditions in order to work.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“He was the cleanest-cut comic-book schoolboy hero imaginable.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“There was a quote he could not quite remember, something about the past being an island surrounded by time. He had missed the last boat to the island.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“You may be a foreigner, but you have the heart of a Frenchman.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“And yet I could still hear them. As if some part of their essence had evaporated into the air, become a part of this place, ingrained, like the scent of cigarettes and burning sugar, in the woodwork and plaster. Everything was buzzing with that vanished presence, buzzing and singing and laughing louder than ever before, stone and tile and polished wood, all whispering with agitation and excitement; never still, never silent.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“Too much balast slows you down.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“Виното говори. Всички го знаят. Огледайте се наоколо. Попитайте оракула на ъгъла на улицата; неканения гост на сватбеното тържество; блажения безумец. То говори. Говори като вентрилок. Има милион гласове. Развързва езика, извежда на бял свят тайни, които никога не сте искали да споделите, тайни, които дори не сте знаели. То крещи, декламира, шепне. Разказва за велики дела, блестящи планове, трагични любовни истории и ужасяващи предателства. Пищи от смях. Тихо се подсммихва под мустак. Плаче пред собственото си отражение. Връща ни към отдавна отминали лета и най-грижливо забравени спомени. Всяка бутилка носи полъха на други времена, други места, всяко едно - от най-простото "Либфраумилх" до високомерното "Вьов Клико" от 1945 година - малко чудо. Всекидневна магия, както го наричаше Джо. Трансформиране на основна материя в свят от мечти. Лаическа алхимия.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“All right, Monsieur Jay,' she said, smiling. 'I'll tell them you're OK.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“Вы пишете не потому, что кто-то даёт задания! Вы пишете потому, что не можете не писать, или потому, что надеетесь – вас кто-то услышит, или чтобы починить то, что внутри вас сломалось, или вернуть что-то к жизни...
Здесь люди держатся за обычаи. Церковь. Семья. Земля. Вот почему так много молодых уезжают. Им подавай то, о чём в журналах написано. Им подавай города, машины, клубы, магазины. Но всегда есть те, кто остаётся. И те, кто возвращается.”
― Joanne Harris, quote from Blackberry Wine
“I believe in evolution, scientific inquiry, and global warming; I believe in free speech, whether politically correct or politically incorrect, and I am suspicious of using government to impose anybody's religious beliefs -including my own- on nonbelievers.”
― Barack Obama, quote from The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
“He forgot about the woman. It was as if she didn't exist when he wasn't looking at her, and her voice and her attempt to cut herself free were the results of some absurd supernatural manifestation.
He opened the cottage door wide. You could see anything in the rain. The individual drops became streaks with the slowness of the eye; they merged and re-emerged as ciphers for the shapes you carried inside you; they lasted less than a heartbeat in your sight and they went on forever.
He saw a chair, and a ship that was not a ship; he saw a man with two shadows, and he saw that which cannot be seen - a concept; the adaptive, self-seeking urge to survive, to bend everything that can be reached to that end, and to remove and to add and to smash and to create so that one particular collection of cells can go on, can move onward and decide, and keeping moving and keeping deciding, knowing that - if nothing else - at least it lives.
And it had two shadows, it was two things: it was the need and it was the method. The need was obvious: to defeat what opposed its life. The method was that taking and bending of materials and people to one purpose, the outlook that everything could be used in the fight; that nothing could be excluded, that everything was a weapon, and the ability to handle those weapons, to find them and choose which one to aim and fire; that talent, that ability, that use of weapons.
A chair, and a ship that was not a ship, a man with two shadows, and...”
― Iain M. Banks, quote from Use of Weapons
“The more obscure our tastes, the greater the proof of our genius.”
― Jennifer Donnelly, quote from Revolution
“El gobernador era corpulento, macizo, bajo y de aspecto vulgar.”
― Isaac Asimov, quote from The Foundation Trilogy
“Dad was in the United Auto Workers at work so seniority was real important in our house.”
― Christopher Paul Curtis, quote from The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963
BookQuoters 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.