“If I ever have kids and they are upset, I won't tell them that people are starving in China or anything like that, because it wouldn't change the fact that they were upset. Even if somebody else has it much worse, that doesn't change the fact that you have what you have.”

“Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all? Millions of people in this world, all of them yearning, looking to others to satisfy them, yet isolating themselves. Why? Was the earth put here just to nourish human loneliness?”

“It's just that I don't want to be somebody's crush. If somebody likes me, I want them to like the real me, not what they think I am. And I don't want them to carry it around inside. I want them to show me, so I can feel it too.”

“The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts, while the stupid ones are full of confidence.”

“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.”

“Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.”

“That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.”

“As usual, there is a great woman behind every idiot.”

“Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.”

“I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.”

“I cannot remember the books I've read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me.”

“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”

“Sometimes crying or laughing are the only options left, and laughing feels better right now.”

“But luxury has never appealed to me. I like simple things: books, being alone, or being with somebody who understands.”

“Respect other people's feelings. It might mean nothing to you, but it could mean everything to them.”

“A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.”

“Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”

“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.”

“Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.”

“I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn't know.”

“In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you.”

“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.”

“If he’s not calling you, he’s not on his mind. If he creates expectations and doesn’t follow through on little things, he will do the same for bigger things. Be aware that he’s okay with disappointing you. Don’t stay with someone who doesn’t do what they say they’re going to do. If he chooses not to make a simple effort that would ease a recurring fight, he doesn’t respect your feelings and needs. “Busy” is often an excuse. You deserve a f**king phone call.”

“Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.”

“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.”

“There are too many books I haven't read, too many places I haven't seen, too many memories I haven't kept long enough.”

“It's strange because sometimes I read a book and think I am the people in the book.”

“The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter. 'Tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”

“You probably wouldn't worry about what people think of you if you could know how seldom they do.”

“It is a curious thing, the death of a loved one. We all know that our time in this world is limited, and that eventually all of us will end up underneath some sheet, never to wake up. And yet it is always a surprise when it happens to someone we know. It is like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is. Your foot falls down through the air, and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try to readjust the way you thought of things.”

“Do you think I am an automaton, a machine without feelings? Can I bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! I have as much soul as you and full as much heart. If God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through custom, conventionalities, nor even through mortal flesh; it is my spirit that addresses your spirit, just as if both had passed through the grave and we stood at God's feet equal as we are.”

“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”

“Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.”

“The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the surface of a gas-covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90 million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.”

“When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

““Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.””

“"To douchebags!" he said, gesturing to Brad. "And to girls who break your heart," he bowed his head to me. His eyes lost focus. "And to the absolute fucking horror of losing your best friend because you were stupid enough to fall in love with her."”

“Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.”

“You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.”

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

“He never went out without a book under his arm, and he often came back with two.”

“She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”

“There are no good girls gone wrong; just bad girls found out.”

“Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.”

“Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.”

“One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.”

“I like the night. Without the dark, we'd never see the stars.”

“Just because you have the emotional range of a teaspoon doesn't mean we all have.”

“Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; often we call a man cold when he is only sad.”

“There are infinite numbers between 0 and 1. There's .1, .12, .112, and an infinite collection of others. Of course there is a bigger infinite set of numbers between 0 and 2, or between 0 and a million. Some infinities are bigger than other infinities. A writer we used to like taught us that. There are days, many of them, when I resent the size of my unbounded set. I want more numbers than I'm likely to get, and God, I want more numbers for Augustus Waters than he got. But, Gus, my love, I cannot tell you how thankful I am for our little infinity. I wouldn't trade it for the world. You gave me a forever within the numbered days, and I'm grateful.”