Quotes from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“You know the reason The Beatles made it so big?...'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' First single. Fucking brilliant. Perhaps the most fucking brilliant song ever written. Because they nailed it. That's what everyone wants. Not 24/7 hot wet sex. Not a marriage that lasts a hundred years. Not a Porsche...or a million-dollar crib. No. They wanna hold your hand. They have such a feeling that they can't hide. Every single successful song of the past fifty years can be traced back to 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' And every single successful love story has those unbearable and unbearably exciting moments of hand-holding.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I Wanna Hold Your Hand.’ First single. Fucking brilliant. Perhaps the most fucking brilliant song ever written. Because they nailed it. That’s what everyone wants. Not 24-7 hot wet sex. Not a marriage that lasts a hundred years. Not a Porsche or a blow job or a million-dollar crib. No. They wanna hold your hand. They have a feeling that they can’t hide.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“The way you're singing in your sleep
The way you look before you leap
The strange illusions that you keep
You don't know
But I'm noticing

The way your touch turns into arcs
The way you slide into the dark
The beating of my open heart
You don't know
But I'm noticing”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I'm thinking I would like to dance in the rain with this person. I would like to lie next to him in the dark and watch him breathe and watch him sleep and wonder what he's dreaming about and not get an inferiority complex if the dreams aren't about me.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“She's cinematic and I'm a fucking sitcom.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I mean, I don’t know how the world broke. And I don’t know if there’s a God who can help us fix it. But the fact that the world is broken - I absolutely believe that. Just look around us. Every minute - every single second - there are a million things you could be thinking about. A million things you could be worrying about. Our world - don’t you just feel we’re becoming more fragmented? I used to think that when I got older, the world would make so much more sense. But you know what? The older I get, the more confusing it is to me. The more complicated it is. Harder. You’d think we’d be getting better at it. But there’s just more and more chaos. The pieces - they’re everywhere. And nobody knows what to do about it. I find myself grasping, Nick. You know that feeling? That feeling when you just want the right thing to fall into the right place, not only because it’s right, but because it would mean that such a thing is still possible? I want to believe that.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Singing in the rain. I'm singing in the rain. And it's such a fucking glorious feeling. An unexpected downpour and I am just giving myself into it. Because what the fuck else can you do? Run for cover? Shriek and curse? No--when the rain falls you just let it fall and you grin like a madman and you dance with it because if you can make yourself happy in the rain, then you're doing pretty alright in life.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Fuck this.
Fuck this wondering. Fuck this trying and trying. Fuck this belief that two people can become one ideal. Fuck this helplessness. Fuck this waiting for something to happen that probably won't ever happen.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“There’s no such thing as ready,” she says. “There’s only willing.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I always think of each night as a song. Or each moment as a song. But now I'm seeing we don't live in a single song. We move from song to song, from lyric to lyric, from chord to chord. There is no ending here. It's an infinite playlist.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Singing in the rain. I'm singing in the rain. And it's such a fucking glorious feeling.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Because the song is us and the song is her and this time I’m going to use her name. Norah, Norah, Norah - no rhymes really. Just truth.

I shouldn’t want the song to end. I always think of each night as a song. Or each moment as a song. But now I’m seeing we don’t live in a single song. We move from song to song, from lyric to lyric, from chord to chord. There is no ending here. It’s an infinite playlist.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“We are the ones who take this thing called music and line it up with this thing called time. We are the ticking, we are the pulsing, we are underneath every part of this moment. And by making the moment our own, we are rendering it timeless. There is no audience. There are no instruments. There are only bodies and thoughts and murmurs and looks. It's the concert rush to end all concert rushes, because this is what matters. When the heart races, this is what it's racing towards.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“But I guess you don't see the planets when you're staring at the sun. You just get blinded.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Maybe that's it, [...] [w]ith what you were talking about before. The world being broken. Maybe it isn't that we're supposed to find the pieces and put them back together. Maybe we're the pieces." [...] "Maybe [...] what we're supposed to do is come together. That's how we stop the breaking.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Answer all the questions that I'm too afraid to ask”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Tikkun olam.”

Exactly. Basically, it says that the world has been broken into pieces. All this chaos, all this discord. And our job - everyone’s job - is to try to put the pieces back together. To make things whole again.”

And you believe that?”

I guess I do. I mean, I don’t know how the world broke. And I don’t know if there’s a God who can help us fix it. But the fact that the world is broken - I absolutely believe that. Just look around us. Every minute - every single second - there are a million things you could be thinking about. A million things you could be worrying about. Our world - don’t you feel we’re becoming more and more fragmented? I used to think that when I got older, the world would make so much more sense. But you know what? The older I get, the more confusing it is to me. The more complicated it is. Harder. You’d think we’d be getting better at it. But there’s just more and more chaos. The pieces - they’re everywhere. And nobody knows what to do about it. I find myself grasping, Nick. You know that feeling? That feeling when you just want the right thing to fall into the right place, not only because it’s right, but because it will mean that such a thing is still possible? I want to believe in that.”

Do you really think it’s getting worse? I mean, aren’t we better off than we were twenty years ago? Or a hundred?”

We’re better off. But I don’t know if the world’s better off. I don’t know if the two are the same thing.”

You’re right.”

Excuse me?”

I said, ‘You’re right.’”

But nobody ever says, ‘You’re right.’ Just like that.”

Really?”

Really.”

…Then it hits me.

Maybe we’re the pieces,”

What?”

Maybe that’s it. With what you were talking about before. The world being broken. Maybe it isn’t that we’re supposed to find the pieces and put them back together. Maybe we’re the pieces. Maybe, what we’re supposed to do is come together. That’s how we stop the breaking.”

Tikkun olam.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“And I find myself saying, “It wasn’t really about her.” And finding it’s true.

What do you mean?” Norah asks.

It was about the feeling, you know? She caused it in me, but it wasn’t about her. It was about my reaction, what I wanted to feel and then convinced myself that I felt, because I wanted it that bad. That illusion. It was love because I created it as love.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I want to kiss her without counting the seconds. I want to hold her so long that I get to know her skin. I want, I want, I want.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I mean, I think I am basically a cool girl, but I am also a pain in the ass.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“When is a night over? Is it the start of sunrise or the end of it? Is it when you finally go to sleep or simply realize that you have to? When the club closes or when you everyone leaves?
"It's over when you decide it's over," she says. "When you call it a night. The rest is just a matter of where the sun is in the sky.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I've given him more mixed signals than a dyslexic Morse code operator.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“...because if you can make yourself happy in the rain then you're doing pretty alright in life.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Why do we even bother? Why do we make ourselves so open to such easy damage? Is it all loneliness? Is it all fear? Or is it just to experience those narcotic moments of belonging with someone else?”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I didn't let her go. She went. It's not my fault.
She did it.
She could undo it.
This is feeling so fucking famliar.
Why do we even bother? Why do we make ourselves so open to such easy damage? Is it all loneliness? Is it all fear? Of is it just to experience those narcotic moments of belonging with someone else?”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Wold domination is exhausting and cliche. People ought to just focus on being individual responsible citizens of the earth instead of assholes.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“When is the night over? Is it the start of sunrise or the end of it? Is it when you finally go to sleep or simply when you realize that you have to?”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Because when a guy's a jerk or an asshole, it's easier because you know exactly where you stand.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“Let me give you some free advice. She's a runner for sure- she'll run away every time without saying a word. But here's the thing- you are not a runner. And deep down, I don't think Norah wants to run, either. She's just feels like she has to. Partly because she's a tiresome spoiled-brat smartass with no fashion sense. And partly because she's a fucking human being.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“I move my feet, turn away from her, try to pretend she's not there, which is the biggest fucking joke I've ever not laughed at.”
― Rachel Cohn, quote from Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

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Popular quotes

“Just as when we step into a mosque and its high open dome leads our minds up , up , to greater things , so a great carpet seeks to do the same under the feet .Such a carpet directs us to the magnificence of the infinite , veiled , yet never near , closer than the pulse of jugular , the sunburst that explodes at the center of a carpet signals this boundless radiance . Flowers and trees evoke the pleasures of paradise, and there is always a spot at the center of the carpet that brings calm to the heart. A single white lotus flower floats in a turquoise pool , and in this tiniest of details, there it is : a call to the best within , summoning us to the joy of union .in carpets , I now saw not just intricacies of nature and color , not just mastery of space , but a sign of the infinite design . In each pattern lay the work of a weaver of the world, complete and whole ; and in each knot of daily existence lay mine .”
― Anita Amirrezvani, quote from The Blood of Flowers

“Yo te he nombrado reina.
Hay más altas que tú, más altas.
Hay más puras que tú, más puras.
Hay más bellas que tú, hay más bellas.

Pero tú eres la reina.

Cuando vas por las calles
nadie te reconoce.
Nadie ve tú corona de cristal, nadie mira
la alfombra de oro rojo
que pisas cuando pasas,
la alfombra que no existe.

Y cuando asomas
suenan todos los ríos
en mi cuerpo, sacuden
el cielo las campanas,
y un himno llena el mundo

Sóló tú y yo,
sóló tú y yo, amor mío,
lo escuchamos.”
― Pablo Neruda, quote from The Captain's Verses

“And to think I survived this deadly workload, only to be murdered by the sight of my parents' bare asses, a tragedy that gives a whole new meaning to the word assassination.”
― Megan McCafferty, quote from Charmed Thirds

“He was an old Drag man with his bit getting short. He was the first to attempt to teach me to control my emotions. He would say, “Always remember whether you be sucker or hustler in the world out there, you’ve got that vital edge if you can iron-clad your feelings. I picture the human mind as a movie screen. If you’re a dopey sucker, you’ll just sit and watch all kinds of mindwrecking, damn fool movies on that screen.” He said. “Son, there is no reason except a stupid one for anybody to project on that screen anything that will worry him or dull that vital edge. After all, we are the absolute bosses of that whole theatre and show in our minds. We even write the script. So always write positive, dynamic scripts and show only the best movies for you on that screen whether you are pimp or priest.” His rundown of his screen theory saved my sanity many years later. He was a twisted wise man and one day when he wasn’t looking, a movie flashed on the screen. The title was “Death For an Old Con.”
― Iceberg Slim, quote from Pimp: The Story of My Life

“But now that the vivid consciousness of an earlier state had come back to him, the Professor felt that life with this Kansas boy, little as there had been of it, was the realest of his lives, and that all the years between had been accidental and ordered from the outside. His career, his wife, his family, were not his life at all, but a chain of events which had happened to him. All these things had nothing to do with the person he was in the beginning. The”
― Willa Cather, quote from The Professor's House

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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.

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