Quotes from Breath

“It’s how I fill the time when nothing’s happening. Thinking too much, flirting with melancholy.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“It's funny, but you never really think much about breathing. Until it's all you ever think about.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I liked books - the respite and privacy of them - books about plants and the formation of ice and the business of world wars. Whenever I sank into them I felt free.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“We rise to a challenge and set a course. We take a decision. You put your mind to something. Just deciding to do it gets you halfway there. Daring to try. ”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“Being afreaid proves you're alive and awake.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“Wherever I went I felt like the last person awake in a room full of sleepers”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I came home at dusk with my ears ringing from the quiet.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I was in my thirties before I learnt that I too would prefer not to see what I could no longer have”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“Surviving is the strongest memory I have; the sense of having walked on water.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“Everyone will tell you your goal is impossible, pointless, stupid, wasteful. So you hang tough. You back yourslef and only yourself. ”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“Inside those waves our voices bounced back at us, deeper and larger for all the noise, like the voices of men. ”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“That was the simple objective, being airborne, up longer, up higher, more casually & with more fuck off elegance than anyone else in the world. I never understood the rules or the science of it but I recognized the single-mindedness it took to match risk with nerve come what may. Some endeavours require a kind of egotism, a near autistic narrowness. Everything conspires against you – the habits of physics, the impulse to flee - & you’re weighed down by every dollop of commonsense dished up. Everyone will tell you your goal is impossible, pointless, stupid, wasteful so you hang tough. You back yourself & only yourself. This idiot resolve is all you have.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“And somehow, somewhere along the track, I went numb. I couldn’t say what it was & didn’t dare try. How do you explain the sense of being made to feel improper ? I withdrew into a watchful rectitude, anxious to please, risking nothing. I followed the outline of my life, carefully rehearsing form without conviction, like a bishop who can’t see that his faith has become an act.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“That eye... was like a fuckin hole in the universe”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I still judge every joyous moment, every victory and revelation against those few seconds of living
”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I have never been a violent man. Just a little creepy, it seems.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“And though I've lived to be an old man with my very own share of happiness for all the mess I made, I still judge every joyous moment, every victory and revelation against those few seconds of living.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“It's how I fill the time when nothing's happening, thinking too much, flirting with melancholy”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“They probably don’t understand this, but it’s important for me to show them that their father is a man who dances – who saves lives and carries the wounded, yes, but who also does something completely pointless and beautiful, and in this at least he should need no explanation.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“...jedoch spürt man auf ziemlich perverse Art, dass man dem Leben an sich ausgeliefert ist, weil es einen zwingt, zu atmen und zu atmen und zu atmen in einer endlosen Kapitulation vor der biologischen Routine, und dass das menschliche Streben nach Kontrolle ebenso viel mit der Machtergreifung über den eigenen Körper zu tun hat wie mit der Ausübung von Macht über andere.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I will always remember my first wave this morning. The smells of paraffin wax and brine and peppy scrub. The way the swell rose beneath me like a body drawing to air. How the wave drew me forward and I sprang to my feet, skating with the wind of momentum in my ears. I leant across the wall of upstanding water and the board came with me as though it was part of my body and mind. The blur of spray. The billion shards of light. I remember the solitary watching figure on the beach and the flash of Loonies's smile as I flew by; I was intoxicated. And though I've lived to be an old man with my own share of happiness for all the mess I made, I still judge every joyous moment, every victory and revelation against those few seconds of living.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

“I couldn't take my eyes from those plumes of spray, the churning shards of light. Was this what the old man was afraid of? I tried to think of poor dead Snowy Muir but death was hard to imagine when you had these blokes dancing themselves across the bay with smiles on their faces and sun in their hair. I couldn't have put words to it as a boy, but later I understood what seized my imagination that day. How strange it was to see men do something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant, as though nobody saw or cared.”
― Tim Winton, quote from Breath

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“I will love you if I never see you again, and I will love you if I never see you again, and I will love you if I see you every Tuesday. I will love you as the starfish loves a coral reef and as kudzu loves trees, even if the oceans turn to sawdust and the trees fall in the forest without anyone around to hear them. I will love you as the pesto loves the fettuccini and ats the horseradish loves the miyagi, and the pepperoni loves the pizza. I will love you as the manatee loves the head of lettuce and as the dark spot loves the leopard, as the leech loves the ankle of a wader and as a corpse loves the beak of the vulture. I will love you as the doctor loves his sickest patient and a lake loves its thirstiest swimmer. I will love you as the beard loves the chin, and the crumbs love the beard, and the damp napkin loves the crumbs, and the precious document loves the dampness of the napkin, and the squinting eye of the reader loves the smudged document, and the tears of sadness love the squinting eye as it misreads what is written.

I will love you as the iceberg loves the ship, and the passengers love the lifeboat, and the lifeboat loves the teeth of the sperm whale, and the sperm whale loves the flavor of naval uniforms. I will love you as a drawer loves a secret compartment, and as a secret compartment loves a secret, and as a secret loves to make a person gasp... I will love you until all such compartments are discovered and opened, and all the secrets have gone gasping into the world. I will love you until all the codes and hearts have been broken and until every anagram and egg has been unscrambled. I will love you until every fire is extinguished and rebuilt from the handsomest and most susceptible of woods. I will love you until the bird hates a nest and the worm hates an apple. I will love you as we find ourselves farther and farther from one another, where once we were so close... I will love you until your face is fogged by distant memory. I will love you no matter where you go and who you see, I will love you if you don't marry me. I will love you if you marry someone else--and i will love you if you never marry at all, and spend your years wishing you had married me after all. That is how I will love you even as the world goes on its wicked way.”
― Lemony Snicket, quote from The Beatrice Letters

“In any case, perhaps the quest for data to support our actions gets overemphasized. After all, our emotions distinguish us. Art and poetry and music are from and to the human heart, as is, for many, our relationship with the land.' ~ Randy Morgenson”
― Eric Blehm, quote from The Last Season

“Oh, never and forever aren't for mortals, love. But we won't be parted till I know it's right that we part.”
― Ursula K. Le Guin, quote from Lavinia

“knows where he is now. Not here, that’s for sure. Hope the Krauts didn’t grab him. Buford…Dammit!”
― Jeff Shaara, quote from The Steel Wave

“The only tests worth passing are the ones we set ourselves.”
― Gemma Malley, quote from The Resistance

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About BookQuoters

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.