Quotes about hearing
page 7

“There's no place you can go on the prairie that you don't hear the white noise of the wind, steady and rough as surf curling along a non-existant shore.”

Diane Ackerman (1948) Author, poet, naturalist

“Animals hear about death for the first time when they die.”

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German philosopher

Death, Time, Animals

“It is your responsibility to find fault with me, it is mine to hear you out. But don't expect me to change.”

John Irving book A Prayer for Owen Meany

Source: A Prayer for Owen Meany

Change

“They did not hear Grimble, as he lay dying, chant in the true voice of the Boreal Owl, in tones like chimes in the night, an ancient owl prayer”

Kathryn Lasky (1944) American children's writer

Source: The Capture

Night

“The small are always dependent on the great; they are “small” precisely because they think they are independent. The great thinker is one who can hear what is greatest in the work of other “greats” and who can transform it in an original manner.”

Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) German philosopher

Source: Nietzsche (1961), p. 35

Thinking, Dependency

“He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis

Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (1905) Ch. 2 : The First Dream
1900s
Source: Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis
Context: He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.

Secret

“In times of war, you often hear leaders—Christian, Jewish, and Muslim—saying, ‘God is on our side.’ But that isn’t true. In war, God is on the side of refugees, widows, and orphans.”

Greg Mortenson (1957) American mountaineer and humanitarian

Source: Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace ... One School at a Time

God, War, Time

“You will hear thunder and remember me,
And think: "she wanted storms.”

Anna Akhmatova (1889–1966) Russian modernist poet

Variant: You will hear thunder and remember me,
and think: she wanted storms...

Thinking

“Angel screeched with fury and despair to the empty walls around her. "I'm human, do you hear me? It hurts!”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: Nevermore

Angels, Hurt, Despair

“The darkness enveloped us. All I could hear was the violin and it was as if Juliek's soul had become the bow. He was playing his life… He played that which he would never play again.”

Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor

Life, Soul

“Fate already warned us to pack it in. We just didn’t hear it in time.”

Jonathan Tropper (1970) American writer

Source: This is Where I Leave You

Fate, Time

“Sisters are the true friends who ask how you are, and then wait to hear the answer.”

Jill Shalvis (1963) American writer

Source: Simply Irresistible

Sister, Waiting

“Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer.”

Barbara Kingsolver (1955) American author, poet and essayist

People

“Her curiosity was too much for her. She felt almost as if she could hear the books whispering on the other side of the half-open door. They were promising her a thousand unknown stories, a thousand doors into worlds she had never seen before.”

Cornelia Funke Inkheart trilogy

Source: Inkheart

Books, World

“One of the illusions of life is that the present hour is not the critical, decisive hour. Write it on your hear that every day is the best day of the year.”

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

Life, Decision

“The only thing we don't have a god for is premature ejaculation… but I hear that it's coming quickly.”

Mel Brooks (1926) American director, writer, actor, and producer

God

“As for monkeys, I would have five, and they would be named: See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, Do Pretty Much Whatever The Hell You Want, and Expensive Attorney.”

Tad Williams (1957) novelist

Hell, Evil

“That which others hear or read of, I felt and practised myself; they get their knowledge by books, I mine by melancholizing.”

Robert Burton book The Anatomy of Melancholy

Source: The Anatomy of Melancholy

Books, Knowledge, Reading

“She snuggled back under the blanket with me, turned toward me so that she could rest her head on my chest. “I hear your heart,” she said.
“Do you check every once in a while, just to make sure I’m not undead?”

Richelle Mead book The Fiery Heart

Source: The Fiery Heart

Heart

“To be silent the whole day long, see no newspaper, hear no radio, listen to no gossip, be thoroughly and completely lazy, thoroughly and completely indifferent to the fate of the world is the finest medicine a man can give himself.”

Henry Miller (1891–1980) American novelist

Fate, World, Indifference

“All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Speak

Source: Speak

Lie, Feeling, Communication

“Forest, I fear you! In my ruined heart your roaring wakens the same agony as in cathedrals when the organ moans and from the depths I hear that I am damned.”

Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) French poet

Fear, Heart

“He was healthier than the rest of us, but when you listened with the stethoscope you could hear the tears bubbling inside his heart.”

Gabriel García Márquez book Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Source: Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Tear, Heart

“It is quite common to hear high officials in Washington and elsewhere speak of changing the map of the Middle East, as if ancient societies and myriad peoples can be shaken up like so many peanuts in a jar.”

Edward Said (1935–2003) Professor of English and literature

People, Change

“Only you," he said, so softly I could barely hear him. "To worship ye with my body, give ye all the service of my hands. To give ye my name, and all my heart and soul with it. Only you. Because ye will not let me lie--and yet ye love me.”

Diana Gabaldon book Voyager

Source: Voyager

Love, Lie, Soul, Heart

“Hearing nuns' confessions is like being stoned to death with popcorn.”

Fulton J. Sheen (1895–1979) Catholic bishop and television presenter

Death

“Before speaking, consult your inner-truth barometer, and resist the temptation to tell people only what they want to hear.”

Wayne W. Dyer (1940–2015) American writer

People, Truth

“"Was it weird hearing from Jace? I mean, since you found out…"
"Yes? Since I found out what? That he's a killer transvestite who molests cats?"
"No wonder that cat of his hates everyone."”

Cassandra Clare book City of Bones

Simon and Clary, pg. 472-473
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Bones (2007)

Hate, Cats

“I just want someone to hear what I have to say. And maybe if I talk long enough, it’ll make sense.”

Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451

Source: Fahrenheit 451

Sense

“Well, hi, CeeCee," I said. "Hi, Adam. Nice of you two to drop by. Ever heard of knocking?"
"Oh, please," CeeCee said. "Why? Because we might interrupt you and your precious Jesse?"
Jesse, upon hearing this, raised his eyebrows. Way up.”

Meg Cabot book Haunted

Source: Haunted

Way

“Every book, remember, is dead until a reader activates it by reading. Every time that you read you are walking among the dead, and, if you are listening, you just might hear prophecies.”

Kathy Acker (1947–1997) American novelist, playwright, essayist, and poet

"On Delany the Magician", a foreword to Trouble on Triton (1996) by Samuel R. Delany, and reprinted in Acker's collection Bodies of Work (1996)
Source: Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia
Context: Every book, remember, is dead until a reader activates it by reading. Every time that you read you are walking among the dead, and, if you are listening, you just might hear prophecies. Aeneas did. Odysseus did. Listen to Delany, a prophet.

Books, Time, Reading, Dead

“I hear much of people's calling out to punish the guilty, but very few are concerned to clear the innocent.”

Daniel Defoe (1660–1731) English trader, writer and journalist

People

“But that was the problem with having the answers. It was only after you gave them that you realized they sometimes weren't what people wanted to hear.”

Sarah Dessen book The Truth About Forever

Source: The Truth About Forever

People, Problem

“Drinking would shut down my seeing and my hearing and my feeling,' she used to say. 'Why would I want to be in the world if I couldn't touch the world with all of my senses intact?”

Sherman Alexie book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Source: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

World, Feeling, Drink, Sense

“If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.”

Henry David Thoreau book Walden ou la vie dans les bois

Source: Walden

Inspirational, For Men

“but it's not safe and I can feel him slipping away, so I just get out one more sentence. "Stay with me."
As the tendrils of sleep syrup pull me down, I hear him whisper a word back but I don't catch it.”

Suzanne Collins book Catching Fire

Source: Catching Fire

Feeling, Sleep

“Another world is not only possible, she's on the way and, on a quiet day, if you listen very carefully you can hear her breathe.”

Arundhati Roy (1961) Indian novelist, essayist

From a speech entitled Confronting Empire http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=51&ItemID=2919 given at the World Social Forum in Porto Allegre, 28 January 2003 <br class="br">Speeches <br class="br">Variant: Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing. <br class="br">Source: War Talk

World, Way

“Just watch this moment, without trying to change it at all. What is happening? What do you feel? What do you see? What do you hear?”

Jon Kabat-Zinn (1944) American academic

Source: Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life

Feeling, Change

“It is in the interests of both sexes to hear the other sex's experience of powerlessness.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. xvii.
Context: Was it possible for the sexes to hear each other without saying, My powerlessness is greater than your powerlessness? It was becoming obvious each sex had a unique experience of both power and powerlessness. In my mind's eye I began to visualize a listening matrix as a framework within which we could hear these different experiences. It looked like this:

Sex

“Last night it had been my father who had finally said it: "She’s never coming home." A clear and easy piece of truth that everyone who had ever known me had accepted. But he needed to say it, and she needed to hear him say it.”

Alice Sebold book The Lovely Bones

Source: The Lovely Bones

Truth, Home, Night

“Buddha had said:
"Each of us is a God. Each of us knows all. We need only open our minds to hear our own wisdom.”

Dan Brown book Angels & Demons

Source: Angels & Demons

Wisdom, God

“I am a woman, hear me roar," I said.
Gosh, what prompted that?" Amelia asked, and I jumped”

Charlaine Harris book From Dead to Worse

Source: From Dead to Worse

“Toohey: "Mr. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us."
Roark: "But I don't think of you.”

Ayn Rand book The Fountainhead

Source: The Fountainhead

Thinking

“I can almost hear Haymitch groaning as I team up with this wispy child. But I want her. Because she's a survivor, and I trust her, and why not admit it? She reminds me of Prim.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Source: The Hunger Games

“That boy is your company. And if he wants to eat up that tablecloth, you let him, you hear?”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

Boy

“In truth, the degree of anyone's success depends on how often they can say the word yes and hear the word no.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Tell-All

Source: Tell-All

Truth, Success, Dependency

“She never utters a sound even when she's crying, and that makes me a little sad. Doesn't seem right. When you cry, people should hear you. The world should stop.”

Libba Bray Going Bovine

Source: Going Bovine

People, World, Sadness, Cry

“As Rilke observed, love requires a progressive shortening of the senses: I can see you for miles; I can hear you for blocks, I can smell you, maybe, for a few feet, but I can only touch on contact, taste as I devour”

William H. Gass (1924–2017) Fiction writer, critic, philosophy professor

Love, Sense

“I lie on the floor, washed by nothing and hanging on. I cry at night. I am afraid of hearing voices, or a voice. I have come to the edge, of the land. I could get pushed over.”

Margaret Atwood (1939) Canadian writer

Source: CAT'S EYE.

Lie, Cry, Night

“I'll scream!"
"Likely. If not before, certainly during. I expect they'll hear ye at the next farm; you've got good lungs.”

Diana Gabaldon book Outlander

Source: Outlander

“You shouldn't believe everything you hear you're young, not stupid.”

Terry Brooks The Wishsong of Shannara

Source: The Wishsong of Shannara

Stupidity

“I'm in a wild mood tonight. I want to go dance in the foam. I hear the banshees calling.”

Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) Novelist, screenwriter

Mood, Dance

“You dwell in whitened castles
with deep and poisoned moats
and cannot hear the curses
which fill your children's throats.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Children

“I trust you all slept well,” I said, deliberately keeping my tone light. I returned Malich’s glare with a tight-lipped grin.

“Yes, we did,” Kaden answered quickly.

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

Mary E. Pearson book The Kiss of Deception

Source: The Kiss of Deception

Light

“What we don't let out traps us. We think, "No one else feels this way, I must be crazy." So we don't say anything. And we become enveloped by a deep loneliness, not knowing where our feelings come from or what to do with them. "Why do I feel this way? Last week, I was on top of the world and now my feelings don't make sense." Voicing it, getting it out and letting it other people hear it, helps to dissipate it. The fears and self-criticisms begin to leak. And we begin to heal.”

Sabrina Ward Harrison (1975) Canadian writer

Quoted by Katherine Martin in Women of Courage: Inspiring Stories from the Women Who Lived Them, p. 268 (1999)

People, World, Fear, Way

“What I cannot forgive is dishonesty - and no matter what, or how hard, I would rather know the truth of which I today had such a clear & devastating vision from his mouth than hear foul evasions, blurrings and rattiness.”

Sylvia Plath (1932–1963) American poet, novelist and short story writer

Source: The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

Truth, Forgiveness

“Why can’t the world hear? I ask myself. Within a few moments I ask it many times. Because it doesn’t care, I finally answer, and I know I’m right. It’s like I’ve been chosen. But chosen for what? I ask.”

Markus Zusak (1975) Australian author

Source: I Am the Messenger

World, Time

“I listened to them fade away till all I could hear was my memory of the sound.”

Ken Kesey book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Source: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Memory

“Death should be a celebration. Like a birthday. I want to go up like a rocket when my time comes, and fall down in a cloud of stars, and hear everyone go: ahh!”

Joanne Harris (1964) British author

Death, Star, Birthday, Time

“She was reflecting back on a truth she had learned over the years: that people heard what they wanted to hear, saw what they wanted, believed what they wanted.”

Jeffery Deaver book The Bodies Left Behind

Source: The Bodies Left Behind

People, Truth, Learning

“These days, most of the people you hear laughing are dead.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Lullaby

Source: Lullaby

People, Dead

“Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs,
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies;
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs.”

John Keats Ode to a Nightingale

Stanza 3
Poems (1820), Ode to a Nightingale

Men, Youth, Sadness, Thinking

“Digestion of words as well; I often read aloud to myself in my writing corner in the library, where no one can hear me, for the sake of better savouring the text, so as to make it all the more mine.”

Alberto Manguel (1948) writer

Source: The Library at Night

Reading

“Let God have you, and let God love you - and don’t be surprised if your heart begins to hear music you’ve never heard and your feet learn to dance as never before.”

Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer

Love, God, Music, Learning

“I've been saying it so long to you, you just wouldn't listen. Every time you said 'Farm Boy do this' you thought I was answering 'As you wish' but that's only because you were hearing wrong. 'I love you' was what it was, but you never heard.”

William Goldman book The Princess Bride

Source: The Princess Bride

Love, Boy, Time

“As they went by Assail, the male was watching them. "Jesus, he really is blind"
Wrath pulled up short and unsheathed his dagger, pointed it directly into the guys face. "But my hearing is just fine”

Jessica Bird (1969) U.S. novelist

Source: Lover Reborn

Guy

“I could hear hopefulness in her voice, but also doubt. She was waiting for me to admit the obvious: I’d forgotten. I was toast. I was boyfriend roadkill.”

Rick Riordan book The Demigod Diaries

Source: The Demigod Diaries

Hope, Waiting

“Look. Listen. Use ears I'd be proud to call our own. Listen to the silence behind the engines' noise. Jesus, Sweets,. Hear it? It's a love song.

For whom?

You are loved.”

David Foster Wallace book Girl with Curious Hair

Source: Girl with Curious Hair

Love, Silence

“Perhaps you can feel if you can't hear. Perhaps kind thoughts reach people somehow, even through windows and doors and walls. Perhaps you feel a little warm and comforted.”

Frances Hodgson Burnett A Little Princess

Source: A Little Princess

People, Feeling

“Choose silence of all virtues, for by it you hear other men's imperfections, and conceal your own.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

Men, Silence

“So many words get lost. They leave the mouthand lose their courage, wandering aimlessly until they are swept into the gutter like dead leaves. On rainy days you can hear their chorus rushing past.”

Nicole Krauss The History of Love

Source: The History of Love

Courage, Past, Dead

“Will: I say we sell her to the Gypsies on Hampstead Heath. I hear they puchase spare women as well as hoses.
Charlotte: Will, stop it. That's ridivulous.
Will:You're right. They'd never buy her. Too scrawny.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

Women

“Sometimes a person needs to hear you forgive them so they can start to forgive themselves.”

Rachel Gibson (1961) American writer

Source: Any Man of Mine

Forgiveness, Personality

“Good-bye -- if you hear of my being stood up against a stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease or falling down the cellar stairs.”

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

Life, Age, Disease, Way

“To feel forever its soft fall and swell, Awake for ever in a sweet unrest, Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath, And so live ever-or else swoon in death.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Death, Feeling

“Not only is love blind, it’s a little hard of hearing.”

Brian P. Cleary (1959) American writer

Source: You Oughta Know By Now

Love

“Where is this love? I can't see it, I can't touch it. I can't feel it. I can hear it. I can hear some words, but I can't do anything with your easy words”

Patrick Marber Closer

Source: Closer

Love, Feeling

“You are more likely to learn something by finding surprises in your own behavior than by hearing surprising facts about people in general.”

Daniel Kahneman book Thinking, Fast and Slow

Source: Thinking, Fast and Slow

People, Behavior, Learning

“Making love without noise is like playing a muted piano-fine for practice, but you cheat yourself out of hearing the glorious results.”

David Levithan (1972) American author and editor

Source: Dash & Lily's Book of Dares

Love, Making love, Cheating

“He could not feel her near him in the darkness nor hear her voice touch his ear. He waited for some minutes listening. He could hear nothing: the night was perfectly silent. He listened again: perfectly silent. He felt that he was alone.”

James Joyce book Dubliners

Source: Dubliners

Feeling, Waiting, Night

“You really love her don't you," she said.
With all my heart."
She looked as sad as I'd ever seen her.
What's your heart telling you to do?"
I don't know."
Maybe", she said gently,"You're trying to hard to hear it.”

Nicholas Sparks (1965) American writer and novelist

Love, Sadness, Heart

“A man in the jungle at night, as someone said, may suppose a hyena's growl to be a lion's; but when he hears the lion's growl, he knows damn well it's a lion.”

Sheldon Vanauken (1914–1996) American journalist

Source: A Severe Mercy: A Story of Faith, Tragedy and Triumph

Night

“Honey, you need to get laid. (Selena)
Why don’t you speak a little louder, Lanie? I don’t think the guys in Canada were able to hear you. (Grace)
Oh, I don’t know. They’re probably headed south even as we speak. (Waiter)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon Fantasy Lover

Source: Fantasy Lover

Guy, Thinking

“We need solitude, because when we're alone, we're free from obligations, we don't need to put on a show, and we can hear our own thoughts.”

Tamim Ansary (1948) Afghan-American author/public speaker

Source: West of Kabul, East of New York: An Afghan American Story

Solitude

“He balled up my discarded
sweatshirt and put it against his shoulder.
“Go on,” he said. “I don’t bite.”
“And from what I hear, that’s a good thing.”
He gave a rumbling chuckle. “Yeah, it is.”
I leaned against his shoulder.”

Kelley Armstrong The Awakening

Source: The Awakening

“And I'm moved, it's so beautiful. Not what I wrote, but to have it given back like this. To have her remember the words and the tune. To hear it in her voice.”

David Levithan (1972) American author and editor

Source: Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

Beauty

“Above all things physical, it is more important to be beautiful on the inside - to have a big hear and an open mind and a spectacular spleen.”

Ellen DeGeneres (1958) American stand-up comedian, television host, and actress

Source: Seriously... I'm Kidding

Beauty

“I needed her to stop. Needed not to hear the pain in her voice--to see the way she was twisting the pocketbook strap. If she kept talking, she might break down and tell me everything.”

Wally Lamb book I Know This Much Is True

Source: I Know This Much Is True

Pain, Way

“Wonderful. What's the point of throwing a hissy fit without friends and family on hand to hear it?"
-Amy Cahill”

Gordon Korman book The Medusa Plot

Source: The Medusa Plot

Family

“Let us away, my love, with happy speed;
There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see,
- Drown'd all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead.
Awake! arise! my love and fearless be,
For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Source: Bright Star: Love Letters and Poems of John Keats to Fanny Brawne

Love, Happiness, Home, Speed

“To give up our imaginary position as the center, to renounce it, not only intellectually but in the imaginative part of our soul, that means to awaken to what is real and eternal, to see the true light and hear the true silence.”

Simone Weil book Waiting for God

Source: Waiting for God

Soul, Imagination, Light, Silence

“So," Annabeth said, "are you going to argue about me coming along?"
"Nah. You'd just beat me up." Percy said.
She managed a laugh, which was good to hear”

Rick Riordan book The Last Olympian

Source: The Last Olympian

“If you tell them what they want to hear, they don't bother to try to see.”

Libba Bray A Great and Terrible Beauty

Source: A Great and Terrible Beauty

“At least Love your eyes that can see, your mind that can
Hear the music, the thunder of the wings. Love the wild swan.”

Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962) American poet

"Love the Wild Swan" (1935)
Context: This wild swan of a world is no hunter's game.
Better bullets than yours would miss the white breast
Better mirrors than yours would crack in the flame.
Does it matter whether you hate your... self?
At least Love your eyes that can see, your mind that can
Hear the music, the thunder of the wings. Love the wild swan.

Love, Music