Quotes about time
page 55

“Like a flame is real enough, isn't it, while it's burning?-even if there's a time it goes out?”

Joyce Carol Oates book Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang

Source: Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang

“For me, forgiveness and compassion are always linked: how do we hold people accountable for wrongdoing and yet at the same time remain in touch with their humanity enough to believe in their capacity to be transformed?”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist

People, Forgiveness

“I’d learned a long time ago that you can’t prove a negative. You can prove that you did something, but it’s the devil to prove you didn’t do something.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book Bullet

Source: Bullet

Learning

“My heart is broken.
It really is. All the signs are there. I can't sleep- not even burgers. Every time the phone rings, my pulse leaps… But it's never for me, it's never him.”

Meg Cabot book All American Girl

Source: All-American Girl

Sleep, Heart

“Wisdom's daughter walks alone—”
“Ella!” Frank stood suddenly. “Maybe it's not the best time—”Ella continued, cupping her hands over her ears and raising her voice.”

Rick Riordan The Mark of Athena

Source: The Mark of Athena

Wisdom, Daughters

“The first time I read an excellent book, it is to me just as if I had gained a new friend. When I read a book over I have perused before, it resembles the meeting with an old one.”

Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774) Irish physician and writer

Source: The Citizen of the World, Or, Letters from a Chinese Philosopher, Residing in London, to His Friends in the Country, by Dr. Goldsmith

Books, Reading

“Saliva causes cancer, but only if swallowed in small amounts over a long period of time.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

“Cosmic time is the same for everyone, but human time differs with each person. Time flows in the same way for all human beings; every human being flows through time in a different way.”

Yasunari Kawabata (1899–1972) Japanese author, Nobel Prize winner

Way, Personality

“How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth,
Stol'n on his wing my three-and-twentieth year!”

John Milton (1608–1674) English epic poet

On His Having Arrived at the Age of Twenty-three (1631)

Youth

“Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.”

Earl Nightingale (1921–1989) American motivational speaker

Motivational, Deep, Inspirational, For Team

“When you start with a necessary evil, and then over time the necessity passes away, what's left?”

Matthew Scully (1959) American political writer and speechwriter

Source: Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy

Evil

“The self-prepared dinner is a great time killer for lonely people and as much time should be spent on it as possible.”

Steve Martin book Shopgirl

Source: Shopgirl

People

“Tell me a story.
In this century, and moment, of mania,
Tell me a story.
Make it a story of great distances, and starlight.
The name of the story will be Time,
But you must not pronounce its name.
Tell me a story of deep delight.”

Robert Penn Warren (1905–1989) American poet, novelist, and literary critic

"Tell me A Story"

“These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Self-Reliance
Context: These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blown flower there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. Its nature is satisfied, and it satisfies nature, in all moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, above time.
This should be plain enough. Yet see what strong intellects dare not yet hear God himself, unless he speak the phraseology of I know not what David, or Jeremiah, or Paul. We shall not always set so great a price on a few texts, on a few lives. We are like children who repeat by rote the sentences of grandames and tutors, and, as they grow older, of the men of talents and character they chance to see, —painfully recollecting the exact words they spoke; afterwards, when they come into the point of view which those had who uttered these sayings, they understand them, and are willing to let the words go; for, at any time, they can use words as good when occasion comes. If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong man to be strong, as it is for the weak to be weak. When we have new perception, we shall gladly disburden the memory of its hoarded treasures as old rubbish. When a man lives with God, his voice shall be as sweet as the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn.

God, Perfection

“Youth hasn't got anything to do with chronological age. It's times of hope and happiness.”

Wallace Stegner book Crossing to Safety

Source: Crossing to Safety

Youth, Age, Hope, Happiness

“She liked to imagine that when she passed, the world looked after her, but she also knew how anonymous she was. Except when she was at work, no one knew where she was at any time of day and no one waited for her. It was immaculate anonymity.”

Alice Sebold book The Lovely Bones

Source: The Lovely Bones

World, Imagination, Waiting

“Lesson one in time travel, Thursday. First of all, we are all time travellers. The vast majority of us manage only one day per day.”

Jasper Fforde book Lost in a Good Book

Source: Lost in a Good Book

Travel

“Spending time with you showed me what I’ve been missing in my life.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Choice

Source: The Choice

For Her, Life

“Do not act meanly, do not be unkind, because the time for setting things right may pass before your heart changes course.
Isabel Dalhousie”

Alexander McCall Smith book The Careful Use of Compliments

Source: The Careful Use of Compliments

Change, Heart

“Shame was an emotion he had abandoned years earlier. Addicts know no shame. You disgrace yourself so many times you become immune to it.”

John Grisham book The Testament

Source: The Testament

“Success is falling down 7 times but getting up 8!”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Success

“Often-times it's madness, not genius that moves the world forward. Who else but the mad would reach so far, stretching for the impossible and, in so doing, prove the impossible possible!”

James Rollins Black Order

Source: Black Order

World, Madness

“in due time you'll learn there is life after a lost love!”

Brenda Jackson (1953) American writer

Source: Perfect Timing

Love, Life, Learning

“Your time's running out, Valkyrie." Fegley gave another wallop before he squeaked off.

Regin narrowed her eyes, watching him till he was out of sight. "One day I'm going to make that little piggy cry all the way home.”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Dreams of a Dark Warrior

Way, Home, Cry

“All the time you spend tryin to get back what's been took from you there's more goin out the door. After a while you just try and get a tourniquet on it.”

Cormac McCarthy book No Country for Old Men

Source: No Country for Old Men (2005)

“We found out a long time ago that we weren’t meant to fall in love with each other. But a part of me still fell in hope with him.”

David Levithan (1972) American author and editor

Love, Hope, Parting

“You just said you were sorry."

…

"I was only apologizing," he said stiffly, "for startling you. The applause was to compliment you on the improvement in your life-saving techniques since the last time you-”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Abandon

Life

“The last time I was at a supernatural shindig, I got poisoned and then everything there tried to kill me. So I burned the whole place to the ground.”

Jim Butcher book Cold Days

Source: Cold Days

“Advice to young writers? Always the same advice: learn to trust our own judgment, learn inner independence, learn to trust that time will sort the good from the bad– including your own bad.”

Doris Lessing (1919–2013) British novelist, poet, playwright, librettist, biographer and short story writer

Learning

“This is the first time I've really looked at my reflection in months." To the Lykae [Bowen], she said, "No wonder you love me. Could I be any cuter?”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Dark Needs at Night's Edge

Love

“We look for the Secret - the Philosopher's Stone, the Elixir of the Wise, Supreme Enlightenment, 'God' or whatever… and all the time it is carrying us about… It is the human nervous system itself.”

Robert Anton Wilson (1932–2007) American author and polymath

Source: Cosmic Trigger Volume I: Final Secret of the Illuminati

God, Secret

“There comes a time for everybody when words and reasons can become such a great weariness.”

Christopher Pike book Sati

Source: Sati

“Did you just use juxtaposition in a sentence?"
"Yes, Sage" he said patiently. "We use it all the time with art,… That, and I know how to use a dictionary”

Richelle Mead book The Golden Lily

Source: The Golden Lily

Art

“But with your life you make a few bad decisions, get unlucky a few times, whatever, but you have to keep going, right?”

Cecelia Ahern (1981) Irish novelist

Source: The Time of My Life

Life, Decision

“She would grab whatever she could -a look, a whisper, a moan - to salvage from perishing, to perserve. But time is most unforgivving of fires, and she couldn't, in the end, save it all.”

Khaled Hosseini book A Thousand Splendid Suns

Source: A Thousand Splendid Suns

“At the time, my life just seemed too complete, and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.”

Chuck Palahniuk Fight Club

Variant: ... and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.
Source: Fight Club

Life

“If I look upon my whole life, I cannot think of another time when I felt more comfortable: when I had no worries, fears, or desires, when my life seemed as soft and lovely as lying inside a cocoon of rose silk.”

Amy Tan The Joy Luck Club

Source: The Joy Luck Club

Love, Life, Fear, Lying

“I wondered if emotions were like menstrual cycles, if you get enough women together. Give it time, and everyone was crying.”

Sarah Dessen book Along for the Ride

Source: Along for the Ride

Women, Cry

“Please God, please suh, don't let him love nobody else but me. Maybe Ah'm is uh fool, Lawd, lak dey say, but Lawd, Ah been so lonesome, and Ah been waitin', Jesus. Ah done waited uh long time.”

Zora Neale Hurston book Their Eyes Were Watching God

Source: Their Eyes Were Watching God

Love, God, Fools, Waiting

“as a child
i suppose
i was not quite
normal.

my happiest times were
when
i was left alone in
the house on a
saturday.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Housing

“If a writer wrote merely for his time, I would have to break my pen and throw it away.”

Victor Hugo (1802–1885) French poet, novelist, and dramatist

“Quiet Prayer:
As long as the sun shall rise goes the old lovers vow. But we are children of a scientific age & have no time for poetry. Still, I offer a quiet prayer of thanks for the sunlight each time I see your face.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

Children, Age, Lovers, Sun

“Because I know that time is always time
And place is always and only place
And what is actual is actual only for one time
And only for one place
I rejoice that things are as they are and
I renounce the blessèd face”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

Ash-Wednesday (1930)

“FUTURE, n.
That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is assured.”

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914) American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist

Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Future, Happiness

“I long ago abandoned myself to a blind lust for the written word. Literature is my sandbox. In it I play, build my forts and castles, spend glorious time.”

Rabih Alameddine book An Unnecessary Woman

Source: An Unnecessary Woman

Literature

“Do days exist without calendars? Does time pass when there are no human hands left to wind the clocks?”

Howard Koch (1901–1995) American screenwriter

Source: War Of The Worlds : The Invasion From Mars

“There are times when you don't know yourself. There are times when you don't want to know yourself. There are times when you want to be what you have never allowed yourself to be before.”

Aidan Chambers (1934) British children's writer

Source: This is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn

“Have you ever wondered why Republicans are so interested in encouraging people to volunteer in their communities? It’s because volunteers work for no pay. Republicans have been trying to get people to work for no pay for a long time.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

People, Communication

“My first time I jacked off, I thought I'd invented it. I looked down at my sloppy handful of junk and thought, This is going to make me rich.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Choke

Source: Choke

“There is a certain part of all of us that lives outside of time. Perhaps we become aware of our age only at exceptional moments and most of the time we are ageless.”

Milan Kundera (1929–2023) Czech author of Czech and French literature

Age, Parting

“Grover: It’s a very sweet love story. I get misty-eyed every time I play it. So does Percy, but I think that’s because he’s laughing at me.”

Rick Riordan book The Demigod Files

Source: The Demigod Files

Love, Thinking

“Above all, she wanted to look as though she had not given the matter a moment's thought, and that would take time.”

Ian McEwan book Atonement

Source: Atonement

“And also, there are so many times when you need to make a quick escape, but humans don't have their own wings, or not yet, anyway, so what about a birdseed shirt?”

Jonathan Safran Foer book Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Source: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

“Human females, they're kind of crazy during this time aren't they?

If you chose to believe the stories written by male writers.

They heard a bang and thump from the kitchen. Followed by Meg yelling at something.

That many males can't be wrong.”

Anne Bishop book Murder of Crows

Source: Murder of Crows

“The time to make up your mind about people, is never.”

Philip Barry The Philadelphia Story

Source: The Philadelphia Story

People

“In life, you have to take lots of decisions and if you don't take decisions you would never do anything because you would spend all your time choosing between things you could do.”

Mark Haddon book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

Source: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

Life, Decision

“The time is now, the place is here. Stay in the present. You can do nothing to change the past, and the future will never come exactly as you plan or hope for.”

Dan Millman (1946) American self help writer

Hope, Change, Past, Future

“Nothing but good times ahead.”

Jennifer Crusie book Welcome to Temptation

Source: Welcome to Temptation

“You tried to drink the East River,"Magnus said, and Alec saw, as if for the first time, that Magnus's clothes were soaking wet too, sticking to his body like a dark second skin.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

Drink, Clothes

“We'd spent maybe ten minutes together, during which time I'd accidentally swung a sword at her, she'd saved my life, and I'd run away chased by a band of supernatural killing machines. You know, your typical chance meeting.”

Rick Riordan book The Battle of the Labyrinth

Source: The Battle of the Labyrinth

Life, Chance

“I’m ALIVE. Thinking about it, noticing it, is new. You do things and don’t watch. Then all of a sudden you look and see what you’re doing and it’s the first time, really.”

Ray Bradbury book Dandelion Wine

Source: Dandelion Wine

Thinking

“Sometimes great tunes happen to bad times, and when the bad time is over, not all the tunes get to move on with you.”

Rob Sheffield (1966) American music journalist

Source: Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time

“The next time you're mad at me, talk to me,' he said. 'Don't shut me out. I don't like playing games. And by the way, I had a great time, too.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Last Song

Source: The Last Song

Way, Game, Madness

“I stood on Susan Boone's front porch, feeling lame. But then, since I've pretty much felt lame my entire life, this was no big surprise. On the other hand, usually I felt lame for no particular reason. This time I really had a reason to feel lame.”

Meg Cabot book All American Girl

Source: All-American Girl

Life, Feeling

“A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct.”

Frank Herbert (1920–1986) American writer

“He was impossibly gorgeous. I had trouble taking it in at times”

Sylvia Day book Bared to You

Source: Bared to You

“For the first time she had dimly realized that only the hopeless are starkly sincere and that only the unhappy can either give or take sympathy--even some of the bitter and dangerous voluptuousness of misery.”

Jean Rhys (1890–1979) novelist from Dominica

Sincerity

“For the first time, I saw what was in his heart, and I wondered if he might ever want to look deep enough to see mine.”

Jennifer Donnelly A Northern Light

Source: A Northern Light

Heart

“What's important is that a story changes every time you say it out loud. When you put it on paper, it can never change. But the more times you tell it, the more changes will occur. A story is a living thing; it moves and shifts”

Pat Conroy South of Broad

Source: South of Broad

Change

“The only time you seem honest is when you’re insulting someone!”
“The only honest things I can say to you are insults.”

Brandon Sanderson book Words of Radiance

Source: Words of Radiance

“I sometimes have the feeling you've been here a long time, more than one lifetime, and that you've dwelt in private places none of the rest of us has even dreamed about.”

Robert James Waller The Bridges of Madison County

Source: The Bridges of Madison County

Dreams, Feeling

“Patience is a form of wisdom. It demonstrates that we understand and accept the fact that sometimes things must unfold in their own time.”

Jon Kabat-Zinn (1944) American academic

Source: Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness

Wisdom, Understanding, Patience

“Sometimes I think that if it were possible to tell a story often enough to make the hurt ease up, to make the words slide down my arms and away from me like water, I would tell that story a thousand times.”

Anita Shreve book The Weight of Water

Source: The Weight of Water

Thinking, Water, Hurt

“I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me at once.”

Ashleigh Brilliant (1933) American author and cartoonist

“I was having a wonderful time and the whole world opened up before me because I had no dreams.”

Jack Kerouac book On the Road

Source: On the Road

World, Dreams

“After a good-looking boy gives you rabies two, three times, you'll settle down and marry somebody less exciting for the rest of your life”

Chuck Palahniuk book Rant

Source: Rant

Life, Boy

“For the first time, he heard something that he knew to be music. He heard people singing. Behind him, across vast distances of space and time, from the place he had left, he thought he heard music too. But perhaps, it was only an echo.”

Lois Lowry book The Giver

Source: The Giver

People, Music, Singing

“I can't imagine what possessed you to propose to me."
"Well that will give you something to puzzle over any time you can't sleep.”

Georgette Heyer (1902–1974) British historical romance and detective fiction novelist

Source: Behold, Here's Poison

Imagination, Sleep

“He touched the rough crucifix that lay against his chest and whispered to the moving air, "Lord, that she might be safe, she and my children." Then turned his cheek to her reaching hand and touched her throught the veils of time.”

Diana Gabaldon book The Scottish Prisoner

Source: The Scottish Prisoner

Children

“Everybody likes to go their own way–to choose their own time and manner of devotion.”

Jane Austen book Mansfield Park

Source: Mansfield Park

Way

“How we love others is affected by how we love ourselves, and for the first time in a long time, I was whole.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: Succubus Revealed

Love

“Time really is one big continuous cloth, no? We habitually cut out pieces of time to fit us, so we tend to fool ourselves into thinking that time is our size, but it really goes on and on.”

Haruki Murakami book A Wild Sheep Chase

Source: A Wild Sheep Chase

Fools, Thinking, Clothes

“What four realms? (Amanda)
Time, space, earth, and dreams. (Talon)
Okay, now that is scary. Some of you guys walk through time? (Amanda)
And space and dreams. (Talon)
Ah. So Rod Sterling was a Were-Hunter? (Amanda)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon book Night Pleasures

Source: Night Pleasures

Dreams, Guy

“Poor Finnick. Is this the first time in your life you haven't looked pretty?" I say.
"It must be. The sensation is completely new. How have you managed it all these years?" he asks.
"Just avoid mirrors. You'll forget about it," I say.”

Suzanne Collins book Mockingjay

Source: Mockingjay

Life, Forgetting

“Almost seventy years later I remember clearly how the magic of translating the words in books into images enriched my life, breaking the barriers of time and space…”

Mario Vargas Llosa (1936) Peruvian writer, politician, journalist, and essayist

Life, Books

“The truth was, history repeated itself on a daily basis; mistakes were made over and over. People were haunted by what they had done, and by what they hadn't had time to do.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

People, Truth, History

“I regret everything because it has just finished, and already when I was twelve, I lamented the time that had gone by. Even in the best of spirits, it's always been as though I wrestle with the present in a vain effort to stop its becoming the past.”

Andrew Solomon book The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression

Source: The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression

Effort, Past

“Then the two friends leaned back and watched the sun rise clear of the trees.
“Best time of day,” said Will.
Yes,” Horace agreed. “What’s for breakfast?”

John Flanagan (1873–1938) Irish-American hammer thrower

Source: Erak's Ransom

Tree, Sun

“And how are you?" said Winnie-the-Pooh.
Eeyore shook his head from side to side.
"Not very how," he said. "I don't seem to have felt at all how for a long time."
"Dear, dear," said Pooh, "I'm sorry about that. Let's have a look at you.”

A.A. Milne book Winnie-the-Pooh

Source: Winnie-the-Pooh

“Innovation is an evolutionary process, so it's not necessary to be radical all the time.”

Marc Jacobs (1963) American fashion designer

“All of us might wish at times that we lived in a more tranquil world, but we don't. And if our times are difficult and perplexing, so are they challenging and filled with opportunity.”

Robert F. Kennedy (1925–1968) American politician and brother of John F. Kennedy

World

“What a moron I was to think you were sweet and innocent, when it turns out you were actually college-educated the whole time!”

Margaret Atwood book The Edible Woman

Source: The Edible Woman

Education, Thinking

“When time passes, it's the people who knew you whom you want to see; they're the ones you can talk to. When enough time passes, what's it matter what they did to you?”

John Irving book The Cider House Rules

Source: The Cider House Rules

People

“Sydney spent a lot of time on my bed these days.
Unfortunately, it wasn't with me.”

Richelle Mead book The Fiery Heart

Source: The Fiery Heart

“The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone.”

Mitch Albom (1958) American author

The Five People You Meet in Heaven (2003)
Variant: "No life is a waste," the Blue Man said. "The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone."
Source: The Five People You Meet in Heaven - Meniti Bianglala

Thinking