“We give all we have, lives, property, safety, skill...we fight, we die, for a simple thing. Only that a man can stand up.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“How old are you Johnny" she asked.
Sixteen."
And what's that-a boy or a man?"
He laughed. "A boy in time of peace and a man in time of war.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“If you can't do, you'd best shut up about it.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“If you can't do, you had best shut up. He started to slam the door, thought better of it. If you can't do, you'd best not slam doors.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“Just like the sun coming up yonder out of the sea, pushing rays of light ahead of it.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“After that Johnny began to watch himself. For the first time he learned to think before he spoke.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“saying. ‘I want it as a birthday present to my venerable”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“It was sink or swim for him—and happens he’s swimming.”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“down Cambridge road through the bushes on Charlestown Common a scurry of red ants. Had he really seen them or imagined them? But all about him people were exclaiming, ‘Look, there they are!’ Those red ants were British soldiers. To his left the last moment of sunset light was dying. The day had been amazingly warm, but with night a fresh breeze came up off the ocean. Lights began to glimmer in Charlestown and on warships. Seemingly there was nothing more to be seen from Beacon Hill. Silently people turned to go to their houses. ‘Look!’ Johnny cried. You could see the flash of musket fire, too far away to be heard. Fireflies swarming, hardly more than that. –4– Getting”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“The first of the tea ships, the Dartmouth,”
― Esther Forbes, quote from Johnny Tremain
“Relationships were for that reason utterly mysterious, they took place between two subconscious minds, and whatever the surface trickle thought was going on could not be trusted to be right.”
― Kim Stanley Robinson, quote from Red Mars
“If the meaning of life has become doubtful, if one's relations to others and to oneself do not offer security, then fame is one means to silence one's doubts. It has a function to be compared with that of the Egyptian pyramids or the Christian faith in immortality: it elevates one's individual life from its limitations and instability to the plane of indestructability; if one's name is known to one's contemporaries and if one can hope that it will last for centuries, then one's life has meaning and significance by this very reflection of it in the judgments of others.”
― Erich Fromm, quote from Escape from Freedom
“ I'm the reason she's going to have to make a choice, one I"m not even sure I want her to make any more.”
― K. Bromberg, quote from Crashed
“Father of all--God!--what we have here is of thee; take our thanks and bless us, that we may continue to do thy will.”
― Lew Wallace, quote from Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ
“There's a woman in the bakery who smiles at me as if everyone I've ever known has just died.”
― Scarlett Thomas, quote from The End of Mr. Y
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.