Quotes from Waltzing the Cat

Pam Houston ·  288 pages

Rating: (1.4K votes)


“It's September 21st, a day I love for the balance it carries with it.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“Do you write novels?" I said.

"Novels, Lord no," she said. "I can't even stay married.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“For the people of my country," Renato said, "water is everything: love, life, religion... even God."

"It is like that for me too," I said. "In English we call that a metaphor."

"Of course," said Renato, "and water is the most abundant metaphor on earth.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“The more important question, of course, was what the new Lucy would do, and even though I was pretty sure the old Lucy wouldn't be around much anymore, I was a little bit afraid the new Lucy hadn't yet shown up.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“If a situation requires swearing to God it is — by definition — extreme.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat



“Like sometimes when you go to a movie and you get so lost in the story that when you’re walking out of the theater you can’t remember anything at all about your own life.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“Find yourself a place in the universe,' she said, 'a place where the dirt feels like goodness under your feet. Take the right picture and a man will walk into it. If you can bear him even a little, then for a while let him stay.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


“People are supposed to accumulate, I thought, as they get older, but I seem to be sloughing off, like a person wrapped in a hundred layers of cellophane, tearing one layer off at a time, trying to get down to me.”
― Pam Houston, quote from Waltzing the Cat


About the author

Pam Houston
Born place: in The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“According to Buddhism, the root of suffering is neither the feeling of pain nor of sadness nor even of meaninglessness. Rather, the real root of suffering is this never-ending and pointless pursuit of ephemeral feelings, which causes us to be in a constant state of tension, restlessness and dissatisfaction. Due to this pursuit, the mind is never satisfied. Even when experiencing pleasure, it is not content, because it fears this feeling might soon disappear, and craves that this feeling should stay and intensify. People are liberated from suffering not when they experience this or that fleeting pleasure, but rather when they understand the impermanent nature of all their feelings, and stop craving them. This is the aim of Buddhist meditation practices. In meditation, you are supposed to closely observe your mind and body, witness the ceaseless arising and passing of all your feelings, and realise how pointless it is to pursue them. When the pursuit stops, the mind becomes very relaxed, clear and satisfied. All kinds of feelings go on arising and passing – joy, anger, boredom, lust – but once you stop craving particular feelings, you can just accept them for what they are. You live in the present moment instead of fantasising about what might have been. The resulting serenity is so profound that those who spend their lives in the frenzied pursuit of pleasant feelings can hardly imagine it. It is like a man standing for decades on the seashore, embracing certain ‘good’ waves and trying to prevent them from disintegrating, while simultaneously pushing back ‘bad’ waves to prevent them from getting near him. Day in, day out, the man stands on the beach, driving himself crazy with this fruitless exercise. Eventually, he sits down on the sand and just allows the waves to come and go as they please. How peaceful!”
― Yuval Noah Harari, quote from Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind


“I wish you could have felt that slap I wish you could feel the pain.”
― Neal Shusterman, quote from Everlost


“Sheep hurt my father, and through my father, sheep have also hurt me.”
― Haruki Murakami, quote from A Wild Sheep Chase


“You're not leaving me behind. Or I'll do a spell to make you smell like ass. Forever.”
― Kresley Cole, quote from Demon from the Dark


“K.S., baby. Lesion number one. Lookit. The wine-dark kiss of the angel of death.”
― Tony Kushner, quote from Millennium Approaches


Interesting books

The Kiss of Deception
(59K)
The Kiss of Deceptio...
by Mary E. Pearson
The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight
(100.2K)
The Statistical Prob...
by Jennifer E. Smith
Tortilla Flat
(36.6K)
Tortilla Flat
by John Steinbeck
Magic Study
(59.8K)
Magic Study
by Maria V. Snyder
A Million Suns
(47.8K)
A Million Suns
by Beth Revis
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
(174.5K)
The Mysterious Affai...
by Agatha Christie

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.