Quotes about time
page 41

“Eternity is said not to be an extension of time but an absence of time, and sometimes it seemed to me that her abandonment touched that strange mathematical point of endlessness, a point with no width, occupying no space.”

Graham Greene (1904–1991) English writer, playwright and literary critic

Mathematics

“Trying to forget really doesn't work. In fact, it's pretty much the same as remembering. But I tried to forget anyway, and to ignore the fact that I was remembering you all the time.”

Rebecca Stead (1968) American children's writer

Forgetting

“That's beautiful,' Valkyrie said, looking at it.

Isn't it? This necklace has cost two very fine men their lives. At times, I wear it in tribute to their sacrifice. Other times, I wear it because it goes with this skirt.”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Playing with Fire

Men, Beauty

“How many times could you give up on someone you loved?”

Ann Brashares book My Name is Memory

Source: My Name Is Memory

Love

“To paraphrase several sages: Nobody can think and hit someone at the same time.”

Susan Sontag Regarding the Pain of Others

Source: Regarding the Pain of Others

Thinking

“Sometimes, when things take longer than you thought they would, it's just a gentle reminder from your greater self that you have more time than you thought, and that there's a journey to enjoy.”

Mike Dooley (1961) American writer

“I had my own bed. I slept in it alone, except for those times when we needed—not sex—but sex was how we got there.”

Amy Hempel (1951) Short story writer

Source: The Collected Stories

Sex

“The sun burnt every day. It burnt time.”

Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451

Source: Fahrenheit 451

Sun

“Yes, a dark time passed over this land, but now there is something like light.”

Dave Eggers Zeitoun

Source: Zeitoun

Light

“I think you ought to let me take poor Tessa into town to get some new clothes. Otherwise, the first time she takes a deep breath, that dress will fall right off her."
Will looked interested. "I think she should try that out now and see what happens.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

Thinking, Clothes

“Congratulations," I tell her with a slight bow. "I hope you and your power trip will be very happy together. Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for me to go.”

Ally Carter book All Fall Down

Source: All Fall Down

Hope, Happiness

“There are those who know and those who don't know. And for every ten thousand who don't know there's only one who knows. That's the miracle of all time--the fact that these millions know so much but don't know this.”

Carson McCullers book The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter

Source: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

“Suppose time is a circle, bending back on itself. The world repeats itself, precisely, endlessly.”

Alan Lightman book Einstein's Dreams

Source: Einstein's Dreams

World

“Each time I wake, I think, At last, this is over, but it isn't.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Source: The Hunger Games trilogy, The Hunger Games (2008), p. 194
Context: I enter a nightmare from which I wake repeatedly only to find a greater terror awaiting me. All the things I dread most, all the things I dread for others manifest in such vivid detail I can’t help but believe they're real. Each time I wake, I think, At last, this is over, but it isn't. It's only the beginning of a new chapter of torture. How many ways do I watch Prim die? Relive my father's last moments? Feel my own body ripped apart? This is the nature of the tracker jacker venom, so carefully created to target the place where fear lives in your brain.

Thinking

“Opportunity is a haughty goddess who wastes no time with those who are unprepared. a”

George S. Clason (1874–1957) British businessman and writer

“And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic nor popular - but one must take it because it is right.”

David Levithan book Wide Awake

Source: Wide Awake

“We all make mistakes at some time in our lives, some more than others. It is only when the cost is counted in human lives that people really take notice.”

Jasper Fforde book The Eyre Affair

Source: The Eyre Affair

People

“Time cant be given. But it can be shared.”

Cecelia Ahern (1981) Irish novelist

Source: The Gift

“She hoped to be wise and reasonable in time; but alas! Alas! She must confess to herself that she was not wise yet.”

Jane Austen book Persuasion

Source: Persuasion

Hope

“You have to learn how to help a wounded child while still practicing mindful breathing. You should not allow yourself to get lost in action. Action should be meditation at the same time.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Learning, Help

“Hope is the deep orientation of the human soul that can be held at the darkest times.”

Václav Havel (1936–2011) playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and 1st President of the Czech Republic

Hope, Soul

“I had read a Tale of Two Cities and found it up to my standards as a romantic novel. She opened the first page and I heard poetry for the first time in my life… her voice slid in and curved down trough and over the words. She was nearly singing.”

Maya Angelou book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Source: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Life, Singing, Reading

“It makes me wonder, Do we spend most of our days trying to remember or forget things? Do we spend most of our time running towards or away from our lives? I don't know.”

Markus Zusak book Fighting Ruben Wolfe

Variant: Do we spend most of our days trying to remember or to forget? Do we spend most of our time running towards or away from our lives?
Source: Fighting Ruben Wolfe

Forgetting

“He did and said all the right things. Things that went straight to her heart, and worse, they inspired the one thing that she'd given up along time ago. Hope.”

Maya Banks (1964) Author

Source: Fever

Hope, Heart

“The trouble with me is that for a long time I have just been anperson. All people belong to aexcept me. Not to belong to amakes you too lonesome.”

Carson McCullers book The Member of the Wedding

Source: The Member of the Wedding

People

“Personally, I say, "Out of the frying pan and into the deadly pit filled with sharks who are wielding chainsaws with killer kittens stapled to them." However, that one's having a rough time catching on.”

Brandon Sanderson Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones

Source: Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones

Personality

“Do you believe a man can truly love a woman and constantly betray her? Never mind physically but betray her in his mind, in the very "poetry of his soul". Well, it's not easy but men do it all the time.”

Mario Puzo book Fools Die

Source: Fools Die

Love, Men, Soul

“He loved her for almost everything she was & she decided that was enough to let him stay for a very long time.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

Variant: Mr Right:
He loved her for almost everything she was & she decided that was enough to let him stay for a very long time.

Love

“Take her home. And-"
"Say nothing- yes, yes, I heard you the first seven hundred times," Myrnin said, much too sharply. "I'm ancient. I'm not deaf.”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Bite Club

Home

“If you don’t have the time to do something right, where are you going to find the time to fix it?”

Stephen King (1947) American author

“Stanislavski was right, you can find fresh pain every time you discover what you pretty much already know.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Diary

Source: Diary

Pain

“Great,” Simon said. “Maybe I’ll even make it back before my mother notices I’m gone. What’s the time difference between here and Manhattan?”
“You have a mother?” Aline looked amazed.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“I didnt pay atteniton to times or distance, instead focusing on how it felt just to be in motion, knowing it wasn't about the finish line but how I got there that mattered.”

Sarah Dessen book The Truth About Forever

Source: The Truth About Forever

“The Bible makes it clear that every time that there is a story of faith, it is completely original. God's creative genius is endless.”

Eugene H. Peterson (1932–2018) American translator

God, Faith

“We can't buy one minute of time with cash; if we could, rich people would live longer.”

O. Henry (1862–1910) American short story writer

Source: Selected Stories

People

“But to be quite oneself one must first waste a little time.”

Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973) Irish writer

“It was hard to feel the right emotions at the right times. They didn’t come at all when you set a place for them, and they sacked when you weren’t ready, when you were just innocently flossing your teeth, for example, or eating a bowl of cereal.”

Ann Brashares book The Last Summer

Source: The Last Summer

Feeling

“Take off your coat."
"Excuse me?"
"Take it off."
"No."
"I want it off."
"Then I suggest you hold your breath. Won't affect me in the slightest, but at least the suffocation will help pass the time for you. [Vishous to Jane]”

Jessica Bird book Lover Unbound

Source: Lover Unbound

Help

“Intelligence is so damn rare and the people who have it often have such a bad time with it that they get bitter or propagandistic and then it's not much use.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

People, Intelligence

“Sex is the biggest nothing of all time.”

Andy Warhol (1928–1987) American artist

Sex

“Now all you can do is wait. It must be hard for you, but there is a right time for everything. Like the ebb and flow of tides. No one can do anything to change them. When it is time to wait, you must wait.”

Haruki Murakami book The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Source: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Change, Waiting

“Time heals all wounds. And if it doesn't, you name them something other than wounds and agree to let them stay.”

Emma Forrest (1976) British journalist, novelist and screenwriter

Source: Your Voice in My Head

“An unfamiliar city is a fine thing. That's the time and place when you can suppose that all the people you meet are nice. It's dream time.”

Louis-ferdinand Céline book Journey to the End of the Night

Source: Journey to the End of the Night

People, Dreams

“Chick Lit uses humor to reflect life back to us. It's a very comforting genre, and it's the first time our generation has had a voice. It's a very important genre for all of those reasons.”

Marian Keyes (1963) Irish writer

Life

“Any time gone by was better.”

Jorge Manrique (1440–1479) Spanish poet

“Using your own time to make someone else’s life better is, like, the nicest thing you can do for anybody.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Iced

Life

“You can write any time people will leave you alone and not interrupt you.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

Paris Review interview (1958)
Context: You can write any time people will leave you alone and not interrupt you. Or rather you can if you will be ruthless enough about it. But the best writing is certainly when you are in love.

People

“People say that time slips through our fingers like sand. What they don't acknowledge is that some of the sand sticks to the skin. These are memories that will remain, memories of the time when there was still time left.”

David Levithan (1972) American author and editor

Source: Invisibility

People, Memory

“Just because you're a gutless harlot doesn't mean I won't find your… attributes attractive. I might be immortal, but I'm still a red-blooded male."

"Harlot? Who talks like that? Father Time, meet the Flinstones.”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Endless Knight

“Do you know what I like about comedy? You can’t laugh and be afraid at the same time—of anything. If you're laughing, I defy you to be afraid.”

Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor

Parade interview http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2007/edition_09-23-2007/AStephen_Colbert (23 September 2007) <br class="br">Variant: You can’t laugh and be afraid at the same time—of anything. If you're laughing, I defy you to be afraid. <br class="br">Context: Not living in fear is a great gift, because certainly these days we do it so much. And do you know what I like about comedy? You can’t laugh and be afraid at the same time—of anything. If you're laughing, I defy you to be afraid.

“Saturday morning was their unrestricted television time, and they usually took advantage of it to watch a series of cartoon shows that would certainly have been impossible before the discovery of LSD.”

Jeff Lindsay book Dexter in the Dark

Source: Dexter in the Dark

“I'm 65 years old. Everyday the future looks a little bit darker. But the past, even the grimy parts of it, well, it just keeps on getting brighter all the time.”

Alan Moore book Watchmen

Source: Watchmen

Past, Future, Parting

“I found myself jealous of the people who wrote the books. They were dead and they were still taking up my time. Who did they think they were?”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

People, Books, Thinking, Dead

“I don’t want to forget any of this. The way he’s looking at me at this very moment. How, when he kisses me, I still get shivers down my back, every time. I want to hold on to everything so tight.”

Jenny Han book Always and Forever, Lara Jean

Source: Always and Forever, Lara Jean

Way, Kiss, Forgetting

“Nobody at any time is cut off from God.”

Meister Eckhart (1260–1328) German theologian

God

“Why do you think the old stories tell of men who set out on great journeys to impress the gods? Because trying to impress people just isn't worth the time and effort.”

Henry Rollins (1961) American singer-songwriter

Men, God, People, Thinking

“Sheriff Mossberg was one of those people who never stop speaking until
they are finished, so by this time he was saying: “Do you understand
these rights?”
“No, sir! Mi ne komprenas Dumbtalk!”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: Shadow Souls

People, Understanding

“Funny the only two times we use the phrase "seeing someone" are when we are referring to being in a a relationship or getting psychological help.”

Deb Caletti (1963) American writer

Source: Stay

Help

“In all times, and all countries especially in those countries which are divided within by religious faith, there are always fanatics who will be well contented to be regarded as martyrs.”

Alexandre Dumas book The Three Musketeers

Source: The Three Musketeers

Faith, Country

“The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself; my first homelands have been books.”

Marguerite Yourcenar book Memoirs of Hadrian

Le véritable lieu de naissance est celui où l'on a porté pour la première fois un coup d'oeil intelligent sur soi-même: mes premières patries ont été des livres.
Source: Memoirs of Hadrian (1951), p. 33

Books, Intelligence

“Now I wonder all the time how you go back after something like that. Whether we can ever be friends again, or if what we had is broken into pieces. Not because of her, but because of me.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“It took me a long time to learn that mistakes aren't good or bad,
they're just mistakes, and you clean them up and go on.”

Kaye Gibbons book A Virtuous Woman

Source: A Virtuous Woman

Learning

“If you're right & I'm not, I'm going to be hell to live with, she said. So, you better think about that next time you want to be right.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

Hell, Thinking

“I'd like to be the sort of person who can enjoy things at the time, instead of having to go back in my head and enjoy them.”

David Foster Wallace (1962–2008) American fiction writer and essayist

Personality

“College is the best time of your life. When else are your parents going to spend several thousand dollars a year just for you to go to a strange town and get drunk every night?”

David Wood (1946) British philosopher, born 1946

Life, Parent, Night

“I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me, certainly, but I am, also, much more than that. So are we all.”

James Baldwin book Notes of a Native Son

Variant: I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me, certainly, but I am also so much more than that. So are we all.
Source: Notes of a Native Son

History

“We do not influence the course of events by persuading people that we are right when we make what they regard as radical proposals. Rather, we exert influence by keeping options available when something has to be done at a time of crisis.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

People

“Only a short time ago, I learned that people laughed at me. Now I can see that unknowingly I joined them in laughing at myself. That hurts the most.”

Daniel Keyes book Flowers for Algernon

Source: Flowers for Algernon

People, Learning, Hurt

“Maybe the best thing to do with favorite books is to leave them be: to achieve such exalted position means that they entered your life at exactly the right time, in precisely the right place, and those conditions can never be recreated.”

Nick Hornby (1957) English novelist

Life, Books

“No," I said finally.
"Slowness in Answering," she said into the handheld. "When's the last time you slept?"
"1940" I said promptly, which is the problem with Quickness in Answering.”

Connie Willis book To Say Nothing of the Dog

Source: To Say Nothing of the Dog

Problem

“how we seek to spend our time may depend on how much time we perceive ourselves to have.”

Atul Gawande book Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End

Source: Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End

Dependency

“I don't even remember the season. I just remember walking between them and feeling for the first time that I belonged somewhere.”

Stephen Chbosky book The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Feeling, Season

“Eve: She told me last!
Shane: Boyfriend!
Michael: Landlord!
Eve: Crap. Right. Next time you sell your soul to the devil, I get first contact!”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Midnight Alley

Soul

“No. Haven’t you been listening?”

Marcus would always remember that moment. It was to be the first time he would ever be faced with that most vexing of female quirks: the question that had nothing but wrong answers.”

Julia Quinn (1970) American novelist

Source: Just Like Heaven

Question

“But I love him."
"So love him."
"But I miss him."
"So miss him. Send him love and light every time you think about him, and then drop it.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Eat, Pray, Love

Variant: So miss him. Send him some love and light every time you think about him, then drop it.
Source: Eat, Pray, Love

Love, Thinking, Light

“Every time I mention her, Magnus says, "Are you two getting along?" in raised, hopeful tones, like we're endangered pandas who need to make a baby.”

Sophie Kinsella book I've Got Your Number

Source: I've Got Your Number

Hope, Baby

“Yeah. Floyd is his batman."
His what?"
Batman, like in the British army, each officer had a batman, a personal servant."
You spend too much time reading, Spenser. You know more stuff that don't make you money than anybody I know.”

Robert B. Parker Mortal Stakes

Source: Mortal Stakes

Money, Reading, Personality

“Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’.”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

Song lyrics, The Times They Are A-Changin' (1964), The Times They Are A-Changin'
Context: Come gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown.
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’.