Kate DiCamillo Quotes

“It is important that you say what you mean to say. Time is too short. You must speak the words that matter.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“But, reader, there is no comfort in the word "farewell," even if you say it in French. "Farewell" is a word that, in any language, is full of sorrow. It is a word that promises absolutely nothing.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Stories are light. Light is precious in a world so dark.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“It is a bad thing to have love and nowhere to put it.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“Say it, reader. Say the word "quest" out loud. It is an extraordinary word, isn't it? So small and yet so full of wonder, so full of hope. so trthen despererux died i n heaven and in peace”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Edward knew what it was like to say over and over again the names of those you had left behind. He knew what it was like to miss someone. And so he listened. And in his listening, his heart opened wide and then wider still. (page 103)”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux (2004)

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“Despereaux marveled at his own bravery. He admired his own defiance. And then, reader, he fainted. :(”

“Perhaps," said the man, "you would like to be lost with us. I have found it much more agreeable to be lost in the company of others.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux (2004)

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“Magic is always impossible…. It begins with the impossible and ends with the impossible and is impossible in between. That is why it's magic.”

“You can always trust a dog that likes peanut butter.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Nothing
would be
easier without
you,
because you
are
everything,
all of it-
sprinkles, quarks, giant
donuts, eggs sunny-side up-
you
are the ever-expanding
universe
to me.”

Source: Because of Winn-Dixie

“That is surely the truth, at least for now. But perhaps you have not noticed: the truth is forever changing.”

Source: Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures

“Did you think that rats do not have hearts? Wrong. All living things have a heart. And the heart of any living thing can be broken.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Have you, in truth, ever seen something so heartbreakingly lovely? What are we to make of a world where stars shine bright in the midst of so much darkness and gloom?”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“There ain't a body, be it mouse or man, that ain't made better by a little soup.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Forgiveness, reader, is, I think, something very much like hope and love - a powerful, wonderful thing.
And a ridiculous thing, too.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“It is a horrible, terrible thing, the worst thing, to watch somebody you love die right in front of you and not be able to do nothing about it.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“You are down there alone, the stars seemed to say to him. And we are up here, in our constellations, together.”

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“I promise to always turn back toward you.”

“And so he was reading the story as if it were a spell and the words of it, spoken aloud, could make magic happen.”

Source: Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures

“Pea was aware suddenly of how fragile her heart was, how much darkness was inside it, fighting, always, with the light. She did not like the rat. She would neverlike the rat, but she knew what she must do to save her own heart.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“But let's not speak of what might have been. Let us speak instead of what is. You are whole.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“He was reading from the beginning so that he could get to the end, where the reader was assured that the knight and the fair maiden lived together happily ever after.”

“Life was so short; so many beautiful things slipped away.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“Don't we all live in our heads? Where else could we possibly exist? Our brainsthe universe.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“No one cared what she wanted. No one had ever cared. And perhaps, worst of all, no one ever would care.”

Source: Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures

“Other people’s tragedies should not be the subject of idle conversation.”

“Like most hearts, it was complicated, shaded with dark and dappled with light.”

Source: Because of Winn-Dixie

“Men and boys always want to go fight. They are always looking for a reason to go to war. It is the saddest thing. They have this abiding notion that war is fun. And no history lesson will convince them differently.”

“And hope is like love… a ridiculous, wonderful, powerful thing.”

Source: Because of Winn-Dixie

“Thinking about her was the same as the hole you keep on feeling with your tongue after you lose a tooth. Time after time, my mind kept going to that empty spot, the spot where I felt like she should be.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux (2004)

“They were always on the move. But in truth said bull we are all going nowhere”

Source: Because of Winn-Dixie

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

“What was it like… to have someone who knew you would always return and who welcomed you with open arms?”

“We forget that the simple gesture of putting a book in someone's hands can change a life. I want to remind you that it can. I want to thank you because it did. - 2010 Indies Choice Award”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“You are the ever-expanding universe to me”

“We must ask ourselves these questions as often as we dare. How will the world change if we do not question it?”

Source: Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures

“Longing is not always a reciprocal thing.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Despereaux," she whispered.
And then she shouted it, "Despereaux!"
Reader, nothing is sweeter in this sad world than the sound of someone you love calling your name.
Nothing.”

Source: The Magician's Elephant

“Everything, as you well know… cannot always be sweetness and light.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“The shapes arranged themselves into words, and the words spelled out a delicious and wonderful phrase: Once upon a time.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux

“So many miracles have not yet happened.”

Source: The Tale of Despereaux (2004)
Context: Despereaux looked down at the book, and something remarkable happened. The marks on the pages, the "squiggles" as Merlot referred to them, arranged themselves into shapes. The shapes arranged themselves into words, and the words spelled out a delicious and wonderful phrase: Once upon a time