Quotes from Headhunters

“When I propose a candidate for a job I don't do it because the person in question is the best but because he is the one the client will employ. I provide them with a head that is good enough, placed on a body they want. [...] The world is full of people who pay serious money for bad pictures by good artists. And mediocre heads on tall bodies.”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

“An artist who maintains that he has been misunderstood is almost always a bad artist who, I’m afraid to say, has been understood.”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

“They had studied law, information technology and art history as part of their beauty treatment, they had let Norwegian taxpayers finance years at university just so that they could end up as overqualified, stay-at-home playthings and sit here exchanging confidences about how to keep their sugar daddies suitably happy, suitably jealous and suitably on their toes.”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

“most likely because the majority of the receptionists have gone home, to a sick partner according to statistics, in the country with the shortest working hours in the world, the biggest health budget and the highest proportion of sick leave.”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

“that it was impossible to get rid of it without”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

“We all drink according to how thirsty we are’.”
― Jo Nesbø, quote from Headhunters

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Popular quotes

“They were complicated years. The order of the world in which we had grown up was dissolving. The old skills resulting from long study and knowledge of the correct political line suddenly seemed senseless. Anarchist, Marxist, Gramscian, Communist, Leninist, Trotskyite, Maoist, worker were quickly becoming obsolete labels or, worse, a mark of brutality. The exploitation of man by man and the logic of maximum profit, which before had been considered an abomination, had returned to become the linchpins of freedom and democracy everywhere. Meanwhile, by means legal and illegal, all the accounts that remained open in the state and in the revolutionary organizations were being closed with a heavy hand. One might easily end up murdered or in jail, and among the common people a stampede had begun.”
― quote from The Story of the Lost Child

“Kada dodje, imaće lice tudjina da bi se sakrio od mene.”
― Herbjørg Wassmo, quote from Dina's Book

“I began to think of myself as a perennial tourist. There was something agreeable about this. To be a tourist is to escape accountability. Errors and failings don't cling to you the way they do back home. You're able to drift across continents and languages, suspending the operation of sound thought. Tourism is the march of stupidity. You're expected to be stupid. The entire mechanism of the host country is geared to travelers acting stupidly. You walk around dazed, squinting into fold-out maps. You don't know how to talk to people, how to get anywhere, what the money means, what time it is, what to eat or how to eat it. Being stupid is the pattern, the level and the norm. You can exist on this level for weeks and months without reprimand or dire consequence. Together with thousands, you are granted immunities and broad freedoms. You are an army of fools, wearing bright polyesters, riding camels, taking pictures of each other, haggard, dysenteric, thirsty. There is nothing to think about but the next shapeless event.”
― Don DeLillo, quote from The Names

“What a glorious boy
he had meant to be to her. Ah, Peter, we who have made the great
mistake, how differently we should all act at the second chance. But
Solomon was right; there is no second chance, not for most of us.
When we reach the window it is Lock-out Time. The iron bars are up
for life.”
― J.M. Barrie, quote from Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens / Peter and Wendy

“Dreams are imperfections of sleep; even so is consciousness the imperfection of waking.
Dreams are impurities in the circulation of the blood; even so it's consciousness a disorder of life.
Dreams are without proportion, without good sense, without truth; so also is consciousness.
Awake from dream, the truth is known: awake from waking. The truth is: The Unknown”
― Aleister Crowley, quote from The Book of Lies

Interesting books

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.