Quotes from The Witch of Portobello

“You are what you believe yourself to be.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“What is a teacher? I'll tell you: it isn't someone who teaches something, but someone who inspires the student to give of her best in order to discover what she already knows.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“After all, what is happiness? Love, they tell me. But love doesn't bring and never has brought happiness. On the contrary, it's a constant state of anxiety, a battlefield; it's sleepless nights, asking ourselves all the time if we're doing the right thing. Real love is composed of ecstasy and agony.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“If there is any possible consolation in the tragedy of losing someone we love very much, it's the necessary hope that perhaps it was for the best.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Love fills everything. It cannot be desired because it is an end in itself. It cannot betray because it has nothing to do with possession. It cannot be held prisoner because it is a river and will overflow its banks. Anyone who tries to imprison love will cut off the spring that feeds it, and the trapped water will grow stagnant.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Reason lost the battle, and all I could do was surrender and accept I was in love.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“You are what you believe yourself to be”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“No one places her dreams in the hands of those who might destroy them.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Everything, absolutely everything on this earth makes sense, and even the smallest things are worthy of our consideration.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“People learn twenty-five percent from their teacher, twenty-five percent from listening to themselves, twenty-five percent from their friends, and twenty-five percent from time.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Don't be like those people who believe in "positive thinking" and tell themselves that they're loved and strong and capable. You don't need to do that because you know it already. And when you doubt it — which happens, I think, quite often at this stage of evolution — do as I suggested. Instead of trying to prove that you're better than you think, just laugh. Laugh at your worries and insecurities. View your anxieties with humor. It will be difficult at first, but you'll gradually get used to it. Now go back and meet all those people who think you know everything. Convince yourself that they're right, because we all know everything, it's merely a question of believing.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“They say that extroverts are unhappier than introverts and have to compensate for this by constantly proving to themselves how happy and contented and at ease with life they are.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“I start to think that I'm losing the love I have without having yet won the love I hope to win.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“music isn't just something that comforts or distracts us, it goes beyond that - it's an ideology. you can judge people by the kind of music they listen to.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Because all my life I've learned to suffer in silence - Athena”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“The day is made up of 24 hours and an infinite number of moments. We need to be aware of those moments and make the most of them regardless of whether we're busy doing something or contemplating life.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“And the best way to know who we are is often to find out how others see us.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“If theater is ritual, then dance is too... It's as if the threads connecting us to the rest of the world were washed clean of preconceptions and fears. When you dance, you can enjoy the luxury of being you.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“But time, as well as healing all wounds, taught me something strange too: that it's possible to love more than one person in a lifetime. I remarried. I'm very happy with my new wife, and I can't imagine living without her. This, however, doesn't mean that I have to renounce all my past experiences, as long as I'm careful not to compare my two lives. You can't measure love the way you can the length of a road or the height of a building.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“We women, when we’re searching for a meaning to our lives or for the path of knowledge, always identify with one of four classic archetypes.
The Virgin (and I’m not speaking here of a sexual virgin) is the one whose search springs from her complete independence, and everything she learns is the fruit of her ability to face challenges alone.
The Martyr finds her way to self-knowledge through pain, surrender and suffering.
The Saint finds her true reason for living in unconditional love and in her ability to give without asking anything in return.
Finally, the Witch justifies her existence by going in search of complete and limitless pleasure.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“How many of us will be saved the pain of seeing the most important things in our lives disappearing from one moment to the next? I don't just mean people, but our ideas and dreams too: we might survive a day, a week, a few years, but we're all condemned to lose. Our body remains alive, yet sooner or later our soul will receive the mortal blow. The perfect crime - for we don't know who murdered our joy, what their motives were, or where the guilty parties are to be found...they too are the victims of the reality they created.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Her silence was the blank space between the words.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“What does learning mean: accumulating knowledge or transforming your life?”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“In order for us to liberate the energy of our strength, our weakness must first have a chance to reveal itself.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“I think classical ballet dancers dance on pointe because they're simultaneously touching the earth and reaching up to the skies”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“No one can manipulate anyone else. In any relationship, both parties know what they're doing. even if one complains later on that they were used.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“You have understood what all great painters understand: in order to forget the rules, you must know them and respect them.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

“Our body remains alive, yet sooner or later our soul will receive a mortal blow. The perfect crime--for we don't know who murdered our joy, what their motives were, or where the guilty parties are to be found.”
― Paulo Coelho, quote from The Witch of Portobello

About the author

Popular quotes

“Сезоните на миналото образуваха планини в него, имената и лицата се блъскаха едни други в търсене на допълнително място, а претоварването от незабравени думи и дела го оставяха с разширени от ужас очи. По правило от времето се очакваше да лекува цялата болка, нали така? Ала ножът на неодобрението на покойния му баща отказваше да се притъпи, независимо от отминаващите месеци.”
― Salman Rushdie, quote from Shalimar the Clown

“I am convinced that when Nietzsche came to Switzerland and went insane, it was not because of venereal disease, though he did have this disease. Rather, it was because he understood that insanity was the only philosophic answer if the infinite-personal God does not exist.”
― Francis A. Schaeffer, quote from How Should We Then Live? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture

“The front door of the Flippant Witch gave a series of loud clicks and swung inward. Renard Lambert, his blue-and-purple finery resembling a plum in the twitching lanterns, practically hurled himself through the open doorway
“Widdershins!” he called loudly, cape flowing behind him, “I—gaaack!” He ducked, barely in time to avoid the carafe that shattered loudly against the wall just behind his head. The tinkling of broken glass, a dangerous entry chime indeed, sounded around him.
“Oh,” Genevieve said, her tone only vaguely contrite. “It's just your friend. Sorry, Renard.”
“Sorry? Sorry?! What the hell were you—ah. Um, hello, ah, Widdershins."
Widdershins, who had lurched to her feet as the door opened, was suddenly and forcibly reminded by Renard's stunned stare that Genevieve had disrobed her in order to get at the rapier wound. Blushing as furiously as a nun in a brothel, she ducked behind her blonde-haired friend and groped desperately for her shirt.
“Didn't mean to take your head off, Renard,” Genevieve said, mainly to distract him. “But you rather startled us.”
“Quite understandable,” the popinjay responded absently, his eyes flickering madly as he fought to locate some safe place to put them.”
― quote from Thief's Covenant

“I think I should learn to get along better with people," he explained to Miss Benson one day, when she came upon him in the corridor of the literature building and asked what he was doing wearing a fraternity pledge pin (wearing it on the chest of the new V-neck pullover in which his mother said he looked so collegiate). Miss Benson's response to his proposed scheme for self-improvement was at once so profound and so simply put that Zuckerman went around for days repeating the simple interrogative sentence to himself; like Of Times and the River, it verified something he had known in his bones all along, but in which he could not placed his faith until it had been articulated by someone of indisputable moral prestige and purity : "Why," Caroline Benson asked the seventeen-year-old boy, "should you want to learn a thing like that?”
― Philip Roth, quote from My Life as a Man

“There’s a brown leather section, a green leather section, a red leather section and a tan leather section. Upstairs, there are four bedrooms, all in a row. And everywhere you look there are fireplaces. There’s one in every bedroom, there’s one in the living room, another in the dining room and still another in the library. There aren’t any in the bathrooms or the kitchen. My mother and father call the”
― Judy Blume, quote from Superfudge

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.