Quotes from Ghost Story

Peter Straub ·  567 pages

Rating: (58.3K votes)


“... He was particularly disgruntled to see what he had taken for a bundle of old rags on the tracks outside was a human body. He did not say "Not again" (what he said was "Shit on this"), but "Not again" was what he meant.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“...nobody can protect anybody else from vileness. Or from pain. All you can do is not let it break you in half and keep on going until you get to the other side.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“The mind was a trap--it was a cage that slammed down over you.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“The day was a long bolt of gray cloth; endless.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“I do know that nobody can protect anybody else from vileness. Or from pain. All you can do is not let it break you in half and keep on going until you get to the other side.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story



“And I found a statement by Hawthorne which helped to explain his method: “I have sometimes produced a singular and not unpleasing effect, so far as my own mind was concerned, by imagining a train of incidents in which the spiritual mechanism of the faery legend should be combined with the characters and manners of everyday life.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“it didn’t have a real ending. It just slipped backward when other things happened.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“But you do not reject the supernatural out of hand,' Sears said. 'I don't know if I do or do not,' I said. 'Like most people.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“Students set up desks where you could sign petitions for legalizing marijuana or declare yourself in favor of homosexuality and the protection of whales; students thronged by.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story


“and rising extremely unlike Phoebus with the dawn to prepare the schoolhouse.”
― Peter Straub, quote from Ghost Story



About the author

Peter Straub
Born place: in Milwaukee Wisconsin, The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Stupid is terminal. There is no cure. I know those who've beaten cancer, but not a single individual who's ever been cured of stupid. Fortunately, nature has its own way of thinning the herd. The stupid ultimately don't survive. The antelope that doesn't recognize the lion as predator, winds up inside the lion.”
― Quentin R. Bufogle, quote from Horse Latitudes


“You want to know what I'm wearing?"
"Not unless you think it'll really get me excited."
"I'm afraid clothes have to have women in them for you to get excited."
"Maybe you could talk in a high voice."
"Cut through the shit, Hap.”
― Joe R. Lansdale, quote from Mucho Mojo


“Let's never stop asking questions. Questions give us a harbor to remember where we once lived mentally. They remind us of the possibilities that can be born out of thoughts and musings, and they link together pattern that define our lives.”
― quote from I Married Adventure


“For the concept of the supplement - which here determines that of the representative image - harbors within itself two significations whose cohabitation is as strange as it is necessary. The supplement adds itself, it is a surplus, a plenitude enriching another plenitude, the fullest measure of presence. But the supplement supplements. It adds only to replace. It intervenes or insinuates itself in-the-place-of; if it fills, it is as one fills a void. If it represents and makes an image, it is by the anterior default of a presence. The sign is always the supplement of the thing itself. The supplement will always be the moving of the tongue or acting through the hands of others. In it everything is brought together: Progress as the possibility of perversion, regression toward an evil that is not natural and that adheres to the power of substitution, that permits us to absent ourselves and act by proxy, through the hands of others. Through the written. This substitution always has the form of the sign. The scandal is that the sign, the image, or the representer, become forces and make "the world move". Blindness to the supplement is the law. We must begin wherever we are and the thought of the trace, which cannot take the scent into account, has already taught of the trace, which cannot not take the scent into account, has already taught us that it was impossible to justify a point of departure absolutely, Wherever we are: in a text where we already believe ourselves to be.”
― Jacques Derrida, quote from Of Grammatology


“Why will you not just accept what is? You have done as you will in my domain. I have exacted no price for actions that would be the death of any other."
"Why? I am your enemy here!”
― Michelle Sagara West, quote from Into the Dark Lands


Interesting books

Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ
(57.5K)
Emotional Intelligen...
by Daniel Goleman
The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion
(18.1K)
The Righteous Mind:...
by Jonathan Haidt
The Crossover
(27.7K)
The Crossover
by Kwame Alexander
The Lemonade Crime
(3K)
The Lemonade Crime
by Jacqueline Davies
Ariel: The Restored Edition
(3.9K)
Ariel: The Restored...
by Sylvia Plath
The Atlantis Gene
(44.6K)
The Atlantis Gene
by A.G. Riddle

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.