Quotes about anything
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“It was a peculiar marriage of interests- Lord Averill and Captain Byrne and Lord Bayar and Han Alister agreeing on anything was as rare as gold in Ragmarket.”

Cinda Williams Chima (1952) Novelist

Source: The Gray Wolf Throne

Marriage

“I would give up everything for you, Giulia"
I smiled at him gently. "But you must understand. I should never want a man to give up anything for me. I should want him to feel in winning me he has won the whole world…”

Deanna Raybourn (1968) American writer

Source: Silent in the Sanctuary

World, Smile, Feeling, Understanding

“It's all your fault, Mother,' said Larry austerely; 'you shouldn't have brought us up to be so selfish.' 'I like that!' exclaimed Mother. 'I never did anything of the sort!' 'Well, we didn't get as selfish as this without some guidance,' said Larry.”

Gerald Durrell book My Family and Other Animals

Source: My Family and Other Animals

Selfishness

“Everything Iʹd been taught about eluding someone came rushing back to my head. What I wanted to do more than anything was look around and see if I had a follower, but that would have definitely attracted attention.”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Source: Last Sacrifice

“That word again. Happy. It’s a curse. The pursuit of happiness makes us deeply unhappy. It’s a trap. Before anything else happened, there was me in bed, thinking of who you used to be.
I don’t want you to think I forgot.”

David Levithan book Every You, Every Me

Source: Every You, Every Me

Happiness, Thinking

“Aside from velcro, time is the most mysterious substance in the universe. You can't see it or touch it, yet a plumber can charge you upwards of seventy-five dollars per hour for it, without necessarily fixing anything.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

Universe, Time

“Always sleep with one eye open. Never take anything for granted. Your best friends might just be your enemies.”

Sara Shepard The Lying Game

Source: The Lying Game

Sleep

“We do not want to be beginners [at prayer]. but let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything but beginners, all our life!”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

Life

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. -John Muir, naturalist, explorer, and writer (1838-1914)”

John Muir (1838–1914) Scottish-born American naturalist and author

Universe

“If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original.”

Ken Robinson (1950) UK writer

Source: The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

“Her hand touched me at the wrist. "If I gave you my life, you would drop it. Wouldn't you?"

I didn't say anything.”

Michael Ondaatje book The English Patient

Source: The English Patient

Life

“If there was a universal law regarding mankind, it was that they’d find a way to ferment anything, given time.”

Brandon Sanderson (1975) American fantasy writer

Source: Firefight

Law, Way, Universe, Time

“I felt like a kid standing in the world's greatest video arcade without any quarters, unable to do anything but walk around and watch the other kids play.”

Ernest Cline book Ready Player One

Source: Ready Player One

World

“If you don't know history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree.”

Michael Crichton Timeline

Variant: Professor Johnston often said that if you didn't know history, you didn't know anything. You were a leaf that didn't know it was part of a tree.
Source: Timeline

History, Tree, Parting

“Yes, but you need to learn your maths."
"I don't need to, really. I already know how to count to a hundred. And I'm sure I'll never need ore than a hundred of anything.”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

Source: Love in the Afternoon

Learning

“Anything we have, we are only borrowing. Anything. Any time.”

Elizabeth Berg (1948) American novelist

Source: True to Form

Time

“To me, these people were as exotic as animals in a zoo. I'd never seen anything like them. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to be one of them or simply live among them taking notes and photographs.”

Augusten Burroughs (1965) American writer

People, Animals

“Life is wonderful. It's a gift to be alive, to see the sun and breathe the air. And there isn't really anything else.”

Michael Crichton book The Lost World

Seventh Configuration "Departure"
Source: The Lost World (1995)
Context: A hundred years from now, people will look back on us and laugh. They'll say, 'You know what people used to believe? They believed in photons and electrons. Can you imagine anything so silly?' They'll have a good laugh, because by then there will be newer and better fantasies. And meanwhile, you feel the way the boat moves? That's the sea. That's real. You smell the salt in the air? You feel the sunlight on your skin? That's all real. You see all of us together? That's real. Life is wonderful. It's a gift to be alive, to see the sun and breathe the air. And there isn't really anything else.

Life, Sun

““You can prove anything you want by coldly logical reason—if you pick the proper postulates. We have ours and Cutie has his.”
“Then let’s get at those postulates in a hurry. The storm’s due tomorrow.”
Powell sighed wearily. “That’s where everything falls down. Postulates are based on assumptions and adhered to by faith. Nothing in the Universe can shake them. I’m going to bed.””

Isaac Asimov book I, Robot

Source: I, Robot (1950), “Reason”, p. 63

Faith, Universe

“We are a family, and the loyalty of the family must come before anything and everyone else. For if we honor that commitment, we will never be vanquished-but if we falter in that loyalty we will all be condemned.”

Mario Puzo book The Family

Source: The Family

Family, Loyalty

“India, the new myth--a collective fiction in which anything was possible, a fable rivalled only by the two other mighty fantasies: money and God.”

Salman Rushdie book Midnight's Children

Source: Midnight's Children

Money, God

“Sebastian never does anything just for fun.” Jace took Clary’s hand and pulled her toward him. “But I do.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Source: City of Lost Souls

“So if you think this is going to save you… If you think anything is going to save you… Please consider this your final warning.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Choke

Source: Choke

Thinking

“I was scared. Do you know what it's like to hold someone else's life in
your hands? It's like playing God. Can you think of anything scarier than
that?”

Sidney Sheldon book Rage of Angels

Source: Rage of Angels

Life, God, Thinking

“(J)ust because your version of normal isn't the same as someone else's version doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you.”

John Boyne book The Terrible Thing That Happened to Barnaby Brocket

Source: The Terrible Thing That Happened to Barnaby Brocket

“We can do anything you like. Just be with me.”

Christine Feehan American writer

Source: Magic in the Wind

“This does not matter. This is not anything yet. It all depends on what you do with it, afterward.”

William Faulkner (1897–1962) American writer

Dependency

“That’s a pretty lame superhero name,” I told him.

“Scooby-Doo is already taken,” he said with dignity. “Anything else sounds lame in comparison.”

Patricia Briggs book Bone Crossed

Source: Bone Crossed

“All I am is literature, and I am not able or willing to be anything else.”

Franz Kafka (1883–1924) author

Literature

“Yeah, well, we're all writers, aren't we? He's a writer that hasn't been published, and I'm a writer who hasn't written anything.”

Steve Martin (1945) American actor, comedian, musician, author, playwright, and producer

Source: Picasso at the Lapin Agile and Other Plays

“I loved this woman the way you love… well, nothing," he said, a note of suprise in his voice. "You can’t compare that kind of love to anything, can you? It’s its own unique gift.”

Dennis Lehane book Shutter Island

Source: Shutter Island

Love, Way

“If you are anything like me --- Clever, fond of goat cheese, and devilishly handsome --- then you have undoubtedly read many books.”

Brandon Sanderson Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

Source: Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

Books, Reading

“As if I could stop loving you. As if I would want to give up the thing that makes me stronger than anything else ever has. Since the first time I saw you, I have belonged to you completely.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Variant: And now I'm looking at you, he said, and you're asking me if I still want you, as if I could stop loving you. As if I would want to give up the thing that makes me stronger than anything ever has.
Source: City of Glass

Love, Time

“My dear, I'm seldom sure of anything. Life at best is a precarious business, and we aren't told that difficult or painful things won't happen, just that it matters. It matters not just to us but to the entire universe.”

Madeleine L'Engle An Acceptable Time

Source: An Acceptable Time

Life, Pain, Business, Universe

“There is a beautiful transparency to honest disciples who never wear a false face and do not pretend to be anything but who they are.”

Brennan Manning (1934–2013) writer, American Roman Catholic priest and United States Marine

Beauty, Falseness

“The 3-legged stool of understanding is held up by history, languages, and mathematics. Equipped with those three you can learn anything you want to learn. But if you lack any one of them you are just another ignorant peasant with dung on your boots.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Expanded Universe

Source: "The Happy Days Ahead" in Expanded Universe (1980)
Context: I started clipping and filing by categories on trends as early as 1930 and my "youngest" file was started in 1945.
Span of time is important; the 3-legged stool of understanding is held up by history, languages, and mathematics. Equipped with these three you can learn anything you want to learn. But if you lack any one of them you are just another ignorant peasant with dung on your boots.

History, Mathematics, Understanding, Learning

“… we all must admit that everything is fine and there's no need in the world to worry, and in fact we should realize what it would mean to us to UNDERSTAND that we're not REALLY worried about ANYTHING.”

Jack Kerouac book On the Road

Source: On the Road

World, Understanding

“Greed is not defined by what something costs; it is measured by what it costs you. If anything costs you your faith or your family, the price is too high. Such is the point Jesus makes in the parable of the portfolio.”

Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer

Source: When God Whispers Your Name

Family, Faith

“I don't pray because it doesn't work. Prayer doesn't fix anything. Bad things happen anyway.”

Nicholas Sparks (1965) American writer and novelist

Source: Three Weeks With My Brother

“Anything can happen in the blink of an eye. Anything at all.
One.
Two.
Three.
Blink.”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Abandon

“She hasn't your strength. She's never had any strength. She's never had anything but heart.”

Margaret Mitchell book Vom Winde verweht (1937 German edition)

Source: Gone with the Wind

Heart

“I can’t imagine anything worse than being required to have fun.”

Scott Westerfeld (1963) American science fiction writer

Imagination

“You can't love anyone or anything until you love your own existence first. Love can only grow out of a respect for your own life.”

Terry Goodkind book The Pillars of Creation

Source: The Pillars of Creation

Love, Life

“Anything that doesn't take years of your life and drive you to suicide hardly seems worth doing.”

Cormac McCarthy (1933) American novelist, playwright, and screenwriter

The Wall Street Journal, November 20, 2009, "Hollywood's Favorite Cowboy" http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704576204574529703577274572.html by John Jurgensen  Variant: I’m not interested in writing short stories. Anything that doesn’t take years of your life and drive you to suicide hardly seems worth doing. Context: I'm not interested in writing short stories. Anything that doesn't take years of your life and drive you to suicide hardly seems worth doing.

Life, Suicide

“This is how it has always been with me. Give me something good, I’ll destroy it. Love me, I’ll destroy you. I have never felt deserving of anything in my life.”

James Frey book A Million Little Pieces

Source: A Million Little Pieces

Love, Life

“An ugliness unfurled in the moonlight and soft shadow and suffused the whole world. If I were an amoeba, he thought, with an infinitesimal body, I could defeat ugliness. A man isn’t tiny or giant enough to defeat anything.”

Yukio Mishima book The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea

Source: The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea

World

“Anything can become a children's book if you give it to a child… Children are actually the best (and worst) audience for literature because they have no patience with pretence.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Children, Books, Literature, Patience

“and taught him the only thing he had to learn about love: that nobody teaches life anything.”

Gabriel García Márquez book Love in the Time of Cholera

Source: Love in the Time of Cholera

Love, Life, Learning

“I get glimpses of the horror of normalcy. Each of these innocents on the street is engulfed by a terror of their own ordinariness. They would do anything to be unique.”

Katherine Dunn book Geek Love

Source: Geek Love

“I realized then that I didn't understand anything. I read all the books I could.”

Marjane Satrapi (1969) Artist

Source: Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood

Books, Understanding, Reading

“Anything I tell you is an alibi for something else."

Then let's be quiet together.”

Leonard Cohen (1934–2016) Canadian poet and singer-songwriter

Source: The Favorite Game

“But words are more powerful than anything.”

Jennifer Donnelly A Northern Light

Source: A Northern Light

“Human beings, as I know better than most, can get used to anything. Over time, even the unthinkable gradually wears a little niche for itself in your mind and becomes just something that happened.”

Tana French In the Woods

Source: In the Woods

Time

“The magic of autumn has seized the countryside; now that the sun isn't ripening anything it shines for the sake of the golden age; for the sake of Eden; to please the moon for all I know.”

Elizabeth Coatsworth (1893–1986) American writer

Source: Personal Geography: Almost an Autobiography

Age, Autumn, Sun

“Tobias loved her more than he’d loved anything—his family, his duty, even himself. There, perhaps, the Herondale blood ran true.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: The Lost Herondale

Love, Family

“I can DO ANYTHING I want, but I can't DO EVERYTHING I want.”

Gretchen Rubin (1966) American writer

Source: The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun

“I waste at least an hour every day lying in bed. Then I waste time pacing. I waste time thinking. I waste time being quiet and not saying anything because I'm afraid I'll stutter.”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

Lying, Thinking, Time, Sad

“I’m not attached to anything.
I’m attached to what it feels it's my duty, to do my duty.
I think that I will die with the boots on.”

Fidel Castro (1926–2016) former First Secretary of the Communist Party and President of Cuba

Feeling, Thinking

“Use language what you will, you can never say anything but what you are.”

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

“You realize that people take drugs because it's the only real personal adventure left to them in their time-constrained, law-and-order, property-lined world. It's only in drugs or death we'll see anything new, and death is just too controlling.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Survivor

Source: Survivor

Death, People, World, Law

“The reward is in doing, but doing without expecting anything… doing unselfishly.”

Brian L. Weiss

“But what had happened, had happened, and it was no longer possible to right anything.”

Milan Kundera book Laughable Loves

Source: Laughable Loves

“Worry a little bit every day and in a lifetime you will lose a couple of years. If something is wrong, fix it if you can. But train yourself not to worry: Worry never fixes anything.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

Training

“Is Joe your father, Zach?'

I don't know where the question came from, but it was out, and I couldn't take it back even if I'd wanted to.

'No.' Zach shook his head. 'I never knew my dad. I don't know anything about him.”

Ally Carter Out of Sight, Out of Time

Source: Out of Sight, Out of Time

Question

“I hate news and information and anything that threatens to puncture the bubble of oblivion in which I live.”

Augusten Burroughs (1965) American writer

Source: Magical Thinking: True Stories

Hate

“My will can control anything that’s empty.”

Michael Ende book The Neverending Story

Source: The Neverending Story

“They always said on TV you could do anything you wanted, but here I was trying to do something and it wasn't working. I would never be able to do it.”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

“Never become attached to anything that continues to hurt God. For you to be free of it, God must be allowed to hurt whatever it may be.”

Oswald Chambers (1874–1917) British missionary

Source: My Utmost for his Highest

God, Hurt

“Fifteen minutes later I was an expert. That's all you need. I think I was even getting the upper hand, which is very simple with a guy. Anything seems to turn them on.”

Melina Marchetta book Looking for Alibrandi

Source: Looking for Alibrandi

Guy, Thinking

“Jace was probably the safest boyfriend in the world since he was pretty much banned from (1) getting angry, (2) making sexual advances, and (3) doing anything that would produce an adrenaline rush.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Source: City of Heavenly Fire

World

“Theology is never any help; it is searching in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn't there. Theologians can persuade themselves of anything.”

Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) American science fiction author

Search, Cats, Help

“There are no absolutes in relationships. You can't take anything for granted. You can count on absolutely nothing but the unexpected. You only get in trouble when you start thinking that you're some kind of exception to the rule.”

Emily Giffin (1972) American writer

Source: Baby Proof

Thinking

“You’re the only thing I’ve ever done right in my entire life and if anything ever happened to you, they’d have to dig two graves ‘cause I couldn’t live a single day without my baby beside me. (Cherise)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Infinity

Life, Baby

“It is terrible to have to ask for anything ever. We wish we were something that needed nothing, like paint. But even paint needs repainting.”

Miranda July (1974) American performance artist, musician and writer

Source: No One Belongs Here More Than You

Painting

“Men are always ready to respect anything that bores them.”

Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer

Source: My Story

Men

“People never learn anything by being told, they have to find out for themselves.”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Source: Veronika Decides to Die

People, Learning, Wise

“She was like a drowning person, flailing, reaching for anything that might save her. Her life was an urgent, desperate struggle to justify her life.”

Jonathan Safran Foer book Everything Is Illuminated

Source: Everything Is Illuminated

Life, Personality

“Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between.”

Maya Angelou book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Source: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Hope

“Those you love will not drown or burn. They will fly away.'…'Now we both have people we love who are like birds. They have flown far from anything in this world that can hurt them. They're flying away still.”

Alice Hoffman (1952) Novelist, young-adult writer, children's writer

Source: Incantation

Love, People, World, Bird

“But they're already singing our praises!"
"They are Americans. They toot their horns for anything.”

Scott Westerfeld book Goliath

Source: Goliath

Singing

“Grover didn't say anything for awhile. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?”

Rick Riordan book The Lightning Thief

Source: The Lightning Thief

Feeling

“Little kids are amazing. They seem able to adjust to anything.”

Judy Blume Tiger Eyes

Source: Tiger Eyes

“Their reasons don't mean anything unless I have a choice.”

Scott Westerfeld book Pretties

Source: Pretties

“Anything you do fully is an alone journey.”

Natalie Goldberg (1948) American writer

Variant: Anything we fully do is an alone journey.
Source: Writing Down the Bones

“Now before we get into anything, ladies, no scratching, no spitting and no tattling to mummy.”

Eoin Colfer (1965) Irish author of children's books

“I wonder if the reason I tend to say yes to everything is because I deeply believe that I can survive anything.”

Scarlett Thomas book The End of Mr. Y

Source: The End of Mr. Y

“Anything that works against you can also work for you once you understand the Principle of Reverse.”

Maya Angelou book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Source: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Understanding

“I don't think anything might have been. What is, is.”

Edward Gorey (1925–2000) American writer, artist, and illustrator

Thinking

“I may turn out an intellectual, but I'll never write anything but mediocre poetry.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald book This Side of Paradise

Source: This Side of Paradise

“[They] agreed that it was neither possible nor necessary to educate people who never questioned anything.”

Joseph Heller book Catch-22

Source: Catch-22

People, Education, Question

“Yeah, about that,” says Peeta, entwining his fingers in mine. “Don’t try something like that again.” “Or what?” I ask. “Or… or…” He can’t think of anything good. “Just give me a minute.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Source: The Hunger Games

Thinking

“There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.”

James Thurber (1894–1961) American cartoonist, author, journalist, playwright

"The Fairly Intelligent Fly", The New Yorker (4 February 1939), a tale of a fly who avoided getting caught in an empty spider web, but then disregarding a warning by a bee, settled down among other flies he believed to be "dancing", and "became stuck to the flypaper with all the other flies."; Fables for Our Time & Famous Poems Illustrated (1940); Quote Investigator notes that this statement was referred to as "Thurber’s Law", in 1,001 Logical Laws (1979) https://quoteinvestigator.com/2019/07/21/safety/ Ref: en.wikiquote.org - James Thurber / Quotes / Fables for Our Time and Further Fables for Our Time From Fables for Our Time and Further Fables for Our Time

“Jem knotted his fingers in the material of Will's sleeve. "You are my parabatai," he said, "You said once I could ask anything of you.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Princess

Source: Clockwork Princess

“Angel says that rich people don't like to tolerate much. Money gives you permission to just walk away from everything that isn't pretty and perfect. You can't put up with anything less than lovely. You spend your life running, avoiding, escaping.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Diary

Source: Diary

Love, Life, Money, People