“Everything begins and ends at exactly the right time and place.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Although we are necessarily concerned, in a chronicle of events, with physical action by the light of day, history suggests that the human spirit wanders farthest in the silent hours between midnight and dawn. Those dark fruitful hours, seldom recorded, whose secret flowerings breed peace and war, loves and hates, the crowning or uncrowning of heads.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Marion Quade, the only member of the class to take Pythagoras in her stride, was a favourite pupil, in the sense that a savage who understands a few words of the language of a shipwrecked sailor is a favourite savage.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Except for those people over there with the wagonette we might be the only living creatures in the whole world,’ said Edith, airily dismissing the entire animal kingdom at one stroke.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Insulated from natural contacts with earth, air and sunlight, by corsets pressing on the solar plexus, by voluminous petticoats, cotton stockings and kid boots, the drowsy well-fed girls lounging in the shade were no more a part of their environment than figures in a photograph album, arbitrarily posed against a backcloth of cork rocks and cardboard trees.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Sometimes just to look at Miranda’s calm oval face and straight corn-yellow hair gave her a sharp little stab of pleasure.”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Why is it, Miranda,’ she whispered, ‘that such a sweet pretty creature is a schoolteacher – of all dreary things in the world . . .?”
― Joan Lindsay, quote from Picnic at Hanging Rock
“Quanto ad adottare le soluzioni offerte dallo Stato per portare rimedio al male - io, quelle soluzioni, non le conosco: richiedono troppo tempo e un uomo morirebbe prima di riuscire a metterle in atto. Ho altre cose cui badare. Venni al mondo non principalmente per trasformarlo in un luogo buono dove vivere ma per vivervi, buono o cattivo che fosse. Un uomo non deve fare tutto, ma qualche cosa; e poiché tutto non lo può fare, non è necessario che faccia qualcosa di sbagliato.”
― Henry David Thoreau, quote from Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
“But he - he hated pity as a cat hates water.”
― Richard Adams, quote from Shardik
“Choose whatever box you like, Mike. Just don't put me in one, son. Believe me, I won't fit.”
― Nikki Grimes, quote from Bronx Masquerade
“You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you odd.”
― Flannery O'Connor, quote from Collected Works: Wise Blood / A Good Man is Hard to Find / The Violent Bear it Away / Everything that Rises Must Converge / Essays and Letters
“Barbies are warm and tan and always the same, thought Janie, but real people are not always the same.”
― Caroline B. Cooney, quote from The Voice on the Radio
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.