Quotes from City of Saints and Madmen

Jeff VanderMeer ·  704 pages

Rating: (4.4K votes)


“Ten years ago, we would have been writing perfect stories, but people's attention spans have become more limited in these, the last days of literacy.”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen


“Perhaps [he had] persevered for too long, in the face of too many obstacles, his hair proof of his tenacity - the stark black streaked with white or, in certain light, stark white shot through with black, each strand of white attributable to the jungle fever (so cold it burned, his skin glacial), each strand of black a testament to being alive afterwards.”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen


“If people were not by nature insane and resistant to self-improvement or therapy,”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen


“No doubt the detour to deliver Lake had made the sheep late for an appointment.”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen


“Take two pictures representing the same subject; one may be dismissed as illustration if it is dominated by the subject and has no other justification but the subject, the other may be called painting if the subject is completely absorbed in the style, which is its own justification, whatever the subject, and has an intrinsic value.”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen



“When Dradin stopped running he found himself on the fringe of the religious quarter, next to an emaciated macadamia salesman who cracked jokes like nuts.”
― Jeff VanderMeer, quote from City of Saints and Madmen


About the author

Jeff VanderMeer
Born place: in The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Change is hard. It’s hard for you, it’s hard for me, it’s murder on your sister.” His voice breaks.”
― Gennifer Choldenko, quote from Al Capone Does My Shirts


“Only surprise delayed Regis’s immediate squeals of joy when Bruenor opened his gray eyes and winked.”
― R.A. Salvatore, quote from Streams of Silver


“president's brilliant theory of vending his wares direct to the people—was perhaps the only one who had suspicions. He had once written a brilliant criticism to some inquirer, in which he had said that no enterprise of such magnitude as the Northern Pacific had ever before been entirely dependent upon one house, or rather upon one man, and that he did not like it. "I am not sure that the lands through which the road runs are so unparalleled in climate, soil, timber, minerals, etc., as Mr. Cooke and his friends would have us believe. Neither do I think that the road”
― Theodore Dreiser, quote from The Financier


“Now as I began to sort through his “effects” it occurred to me how little I had really known him … I had forced upon my father the character that fitted most easily with my image of myself; to have had to admit to any complexity in him would have compromised my own.”
― David Malouf, quote from Johnno


“Well, it doesn't sound particularly noble and knightly to say you've rescued the Chief Cook and Librarian, does it? And it has cut down on the number of interruptions. I used to get two or three knights a day, and now there's only about one a week. And the ones who do come are at least smart enough to figure out that I'm still a princess even if the dragons call me Chief Cook”
― Patricia C. Wrede, quote from Searching for Dragons


Interesting books

Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture
(9.4K)
Highly Illogical Behavior
(10.2K)
Highly Illogical Beh...
by John Corey Whaley
The Girl in 6E
(13.7K)
The Girl in 6E
by A.R. Torre
War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning
(4.4K)
War Is a Force That...
by Chris Hedges
Origins: Fourteen Billion Years of Cosmic Evolution
(5.9K)
Origins: Fourteen Bi...
by Neil deGrasse Tyson
Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition
(70.9K)
Leaves of Grass: The...
by Walt Whitman

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.