“Why do you have to be the same as the others? ...Most of them are stupid.”
“Why was it, Lloyd wondered, that the people who wanted to destroy everything good about their country were the quickest to wave the national flag?”
“And here's my advice to you. If you get the chance of the mad kind of love, grab it with both hands, and to hell with the consequences.”
“The Führer's judgement will be proved right - again.'
'Of course it will, Erik.'
'He has never yet been wrong!'
'A man thought he could fly, so he jumped off the top of a ten-storey building, and as he fell past the fifth floor, flapping his arms uselessly in the air, he was heard to say: So far, so good!”
“Most rich people have a gangster in their ancestry somewhere.”
“Ethel said: "Lloyd, there's someone here you may remember-"
Daisy could not restrain herself. She ran to Lloyd and threw herself into his arms. She hugged him. She looked into his green eyes, then kissed his brown cheeks and his broken nose and then his mouth. "I love you, Lloyd," she sad madly. "I love you, I love you, I love you."
"I love you, too, Daisy," he said.
Behind her, Daisy heard Ethel's wry voice. "You do remember, I see.”
“Americans talked about voters the same way Russians talked about Stalin. They had to be obeyed.”
“You’re a queer?”
“That’s exactly what I am. I didn’t choose to be.”
After a while Woody put his arm around Chuck’s shoulders.
“Well, what the hell,” he said. “At least you’re not a Republican.”
“Why is it that those who want to destroy everything good about their country are the quickest to waive the national flag?”
“Erik was one of those inadequate people who were so scared by life that they preferred to live under harsh authority, to be told what to do and what to think by a government that allowed no dissent. They were foolish and dangerous, but there were an awful lot of them.”
“She had believed that love was something she could bestow upon whomever she liked, and that her main responsibility was to choose cleverly.”
“You don’t give up on democracy every time you lose a vote”, Ethel said crisply.”
“This is amazing,” Volodya said. “He’s the President, yet he has to make excuses all the time for what he does!”
“Something like that,” Woody said. “We call it democracy.”
“He was looking forward to letting Joanne know, in a casual way, that he had read these books.”
“man thought he could fly, so he jumped off the top of a ten-story building, and as he fell past the fifth floor, flapping his arms uselessly in the air, he was heard to say: ‘So far, so good.”
“After the Battle of Midway it was clear that the Pacific war would be won by planes launched from ships. Both Japan and the United States began crash programs to build aircraft carriers as fast as possible. During 1943 and 1944, Japan produced seven of these huge, costly vessels. In the same period, the United States produced ninety.”
“At last it faded away, and the mushroom cloud began to disperse. Greg heard Frank Oppenheimer say: “It worked.” Oppie said: “Yes, it worked.” The two brothers shook hands. And the world is still here, Greg thought. But it has been forever changed.”
“No candidate is perfect' said Lloyd. 'It's how you deal with your weaknesses that matters”
“If you don’t take an interest, then what happens is your fault.”
“Greg heard Frank Oppenheimer say: “It worked.” Oppie said: “Yes, it worked.” The two brothers shook hands. And the world is still here, Greg thought. But it has been forever changed.”
“Everything is ultimately the Prime Minister's fault', said Lloyd. 'That's what it means to be the leader”
“politicians often had the knack of seeming to know everyone intimately. Either they had remarkable memories, or their secretaries reminded them efficiently.”
“In the dynamics of the main family of the story, a rising socialist in England's postwar government expects his grandparents to be pleased that the local aristocrat's garden is commandeered to allow the people to get coal underneath. Instead, the grandparents grieve because the garden represents something more than a resource to be divided. It is a symbol of community and beauty.”
“A man thought he could fly, so he jumped off the top of a ten-storey building, and as he fell past the fifth floor, flapping his arms uselessly in the air, he was heard to say: So far, so good.”
“Carla had never before realized how much she had been protected by politicians, newspapermen, and lawyers. Without them, she saw now, the government could do anything it liked, even kill people.”
“Desperate men are dangerous. And I do know that the United States is not ready to go to war against Japan. Our navy isn’t ready and our air force isn’t ready.”
“She had always liked what Scarlett O'Hara said in Gone with the Wind: I'll think about it tomorrow. Not anymore.”
“Weißt du denn nicht, dass du die Seele verlierst, wenn du die Wahrheit über dich selbst abstreitest?”
“You’d be surprised. Look, most Republicans are decent men who simply have a view of the world that is different from ours. But there is a hard core of fucking nutcases.”
“He stabs his fingers through his drying hair and resumes his pacing. “You think I don’t know this went really fast? I didn’t plan for this to happen. Hell, I didn’t even know if you’d let me talk to you, much less be with you. But then you did and we did and…” He stops in the center of the room and stares at me, his shoulders sagging. “I figured out pretty quick that this is a forever thing for me. I think it has been from the very beginning.”
“When someone stirs a world of emotion in you and it’s so intense you can barely stand to be with him.”
“...[T]wo of you can be no match for the three giants, I will find you, if I can, a third brother, who will take on himself the third share of the fight, and the preparation...I will show him to you in a glass, and, when he comes, you will know him at once. If he will share your endeavors, you must teach him all you know, and he will repay you well, in present song, and in future deeds.'
She opened the door of a curious old cabinet that stood in the room. On the inside of this door was an oval convex mirror...we at length saw reflected the place where we stood, and the old dame seated in her chair...at the feet of the dame lay a young man...weeping.
'Surely this youth will not serve our ends,' said I, 'for he weeps.'
The old woman smiled. 'Past tears are present strength,'said she.”
“Then Furo’s canoe came through the reeds and Maia hugged Clovis and said good-bye. If everything went according to plan, he would be on the boat the day after tomorrow, and it was hard leaving him.
“But I expect you’ll come to England, won’t you?” Clovis said. He had given her the address of his foster mother. “I wish you were coming now,” he said, and his eyes filled with tears.
As Finn helped Maia into the boat, he leaned forward and whispered in her ear. “Don’t worry about Clovis,” he said. “I’ll see he’s all right. I won’t let him get too scared, I promise.”
And Maia nodded and got into the canoe and was paddled away.”
“Like no longer having something could be a good thing, and the proof of it as well. I was used to the opposite, when absence equaled heartbreak.”
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.