Quotes about likeness
page 56

“The arrogance of the able-bodied is staggering. Yes, maybe we'd like to be able to get places quickly, and carry things in both hands, but only because we have to keep up with the rest of you. We would rather be just like, and have that be all right.”

Barbara Kingsolver The Poisonwood Bible

Source: The Poisonwood Bible

“Let me tell you something straight off. This is a love story, but not like any you've ever heard. The boy and the girl are far from innocent. Dear lives are lost. And good doesn't win.”

Jodi Lynn Anderson American children's writer

Source: Tiger Lily

Love, Girl, Boy

“It’s like a cotillion, this partners business, except with killing.”
“So, exactly like a cotillion,” said Simon.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

Business

“A postcard. Neat handwriting fills the rectangle.

Half my days I cannot bear to touch you.
The rest of my time I feel like it doesn’t matter if I will ever see you again. It isn’t the morality, it’s how much you can bear.

No date. No name attached.”

Michael Ondaatje book The English Patient

Source: The English Patient

Feeling, Time

“Galatea never does quite like Pygmalion: his relation to her is too godlike to be altogether agreeable.”

George Bernard Shaw Pygmalion

Source: Pygmalion

“Her mouth was a gash of red, like the torn-open stomach of a sacrifice, bloody and oracular. Behind it her teeth shone sharp and white as bone.”

Madeline Miller book The Song of Achilles

Source: The Song of Achilles

“A part of us stayed like that: fearful of the world around us, and-no matter how much we despised ourselves for it-unable quite to let each other go.”

Kazuo Ishiguro book Never Let Me Go

Source: Never Let Me Go

World, Fear, Parting

“It sounded artificial, like a beauty pageant contestant pledging world peace. I did feel sad, but articulating it seemed cheap to me.”

Gillian Flynn book Sharp Objects

Source: Sharp Objects

World, Sadness, Peace, Beauty

“Why is it that words like these seem dull and cold? Is it because there is no word tender enough to be your name?”

James Joyce book The Dead

Source: The Dead

“PROS: things that make it look like I could be

….

5. K'Vruck poked at me mentally, then said, "Ah, there you are." (WTF????)”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Shadowfever

“Imagineminus 'Mack the Knife.' That's what my life would be like without you.”

Haruki Murakami book Sputnik Sweetheart

Source: Sputnik Sweetheart

Life

“So he didn't have to prove how he felt about me. Like so much else, I should just know.”

Sarah Dessen book The Truth About Forever

Source: The Truth About Forever

“I don't like my language watered down, I don't like my edges rounded off.”

Ani DiFranco (1970) musician and activist

Water

“Write like it matters, and it will.”

Libba Bray (1964) American teen writer

“Listen, every object's in flux. The Earth, time, concepts, love, life, faith, justice, evil-they're all fluid and in transition. They don't stay in one form or in one place forever. The whole universe is like some big FedEx box.”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore (2002), Chapter 30, Colonel Sanders

Love, Life, Faith, Justice

“Simply handing over your iPod to a friend, your blind date, or the total stranger sitting next to you on the plane opens you up like a book." (Steven Levy)”

Walter Isaacson book Steve Jobs

Source: Steve Jobs

Books

“She breathed deeply of the scent of decaying fiction, disintegrating history, and forgotten verse, and she observed for the first time that a room full of books smelled like dessert: a sweet snack made of figs, vanilla, glue, and cleverness.”

Joe Hill (1879–1915) Swedish-American labor activist, songwriter, and member of the Industrial Workers of the World

Source: NOS4A2

Books, History, Time

“The underground of the city is like what's underground in people. Beneath the surface, it's boiling with monsters.”

Guillermo del Toro (1964) Mexican film director

People

“The small wad of burning paper drew down to a wisp of flame and then died out leaving a faint pattern for just a moment in the incandescence like the shape of a flower, a molten rose. Then all was dark again.”

Cormac McCarthy book The Road

Source: The Road

Flowers

“Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears.”

Barbara Johnson (1947–2009) American literary critic

Feeling, Patience

“The journey is difficult, immense. We will travel as far as we can, but we cannot in one lifetime see all that we would like to see or to learn all that we hunger to know.”

Loren Eiseley (1907–1977) US philosopher (1907-1977)

Hunger, Travel, Learning

“It's not like in the movies. It's better, because it's real.”

Jenny Han book To All the Boys I've Loved Before

Source: To All the Boys I've Loved Before

Romantic

“I really like Septimus Heap. he is my favorite guy in the story. I should make you all read it.”

Angie Sage (1952) English author and illustrator

Guy, Reading

“Wondering aloud, If we were orcs, wouldn't we, at a racial level, ourselves to look like elves?”

Junot Díaz book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Source: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

“Two of my fav pieces of wisdom from Phoebe:

- Men are like parking spots. All the good ones are taken, and those that aren't are inaccessible.

- Remember, it's always better to be the smartass rather than the dumbass.”

Jill Shalvis (1963) American writer

Source: Simply Irresistible

Wisdom, Men

“He just didn't look like the kind of creep that would messily murder a woman in her hotel room; he looked like the kind of creep that could line her up in the sights of an assassins rifle without a shred of emotion.”

Karen Marie Moning book Darkfever

Source: Darkfever

“Mac." He said my name and laughed. "What a name for something like you. Mac.”

Karen Marie Moning book Darkfever

Source: Darkfever

“For politics is not like the nursery; in politics obedience and support are the same.”

Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) Jewish-American political theorist

Source: Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil

Support

“Ybon was the one who suggested calling the wait something else. Yeah, like what? Maybe, she said, you could call it life.”

Junot Díaz book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Source: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Life, Waiting

“Like anyone nostalgic for a time he didn't live through, I chose to weed out the little inconveniences: polio, say, or the thought of eating stewed squirrel. The world was simply grander back then, somehow more civilized, and nicer to look at.”

David Sedaris When You Are Engulfed in Flames

Source: When You Are Engulfed in Flames

World, Time

“The human heart is like a night bird. Silently waiting for something, and when the time comes, it flies straight toward it.”

Haruki Murakami book Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Source: Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Bird, Time, Waiting, Heart

“Not forgiving is like drinking rat poison, and then waiting around for the rat to die.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Traveling Mercies
Source: Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith

Forgiveness, Drink, Waiting

“Kids are like heroin, a little heroin addiction. When it’s bad, you’ve never been so miserable, but when it’s good you’ve never been so high.”

Dan Savage (1964) American sex advice columnist and gay rights campaigner

“Chrestomanci smiled and swept out of the room like a very long procession of one person.”

Diana Wynne Jones Charmed Life

Source: Charmed Life

Smile, Personality

“Your heart is like the ocean, mysterious and dark.”

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

Heart

“Friendship, like the immortality of the soul, is too good to be believed. When friendships are real, they are not glass threads or frost work but the solidest things we know.”

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

Friendship, Soul

“Don’t talk like that, Dill,” said Aunt Alexandra. “It’s not becoming to a child. It’s – cynical.”

“I ain’t cynical, Miss Alexandra. Tellin’ the truth’s not cynical, is it?”

“The way you tell it, it is.”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

Truth, Way

“He kisses like… like it could be his job.” Margot giggles and lifts the spoons off her eyes. “Like a male prostitute?”

Jenny Han book P.S. I Still Love You

Source: P.S. I Still Love You

Kiss

“What an ugly beast is the ape, and how like us.”

Marcus Tullius Cicero (-106–-43 BC) Roman philosopher and statesman

“When he moves, a streetlight stabs him, and the words flow out like blood.”

Markus Zusak (1975) Australian author

Source: I Am the Messenger

“Foaly: Caballine likes me to be masterful. She calls me her stallion.”

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

Source: Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony (2006)

“And for the briefest instant, it almost feels like we're together again.”

Nicholas Sparks book Dear John

Source: Dear John

Feeling

“No one is like me," Sadie agreed. "My amazingness is unique.”

Rick Riordan book The Staff of Serapis

Source: The Staff of Serapis

“I was young I was so young it hurt like a knife
inside
because there was no alternative except to hide as long
as possible---
not in self-pity but with dismay at my limited chance:
trying to connect.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Chance, Hurt

“Maybe Liz was right and she'd wanted someplace safe. Maybe Mr. Solomon really did understand that running was the only way Macey would find out if we'd run after her. Or maybe, like me, she just wanted to disappear for a little while”

Ally Carter book Don't Judge a Girl by Her Cover

Source: Don't Judge a Girl by Her Cover

Way, Understanding

“Sometimes, she reflected, she dressed for courage, sometimes for success, and sometimes for the consolation of knowing that whatever else went wrong, at least she liked her clothes.”

Emma Bull book War for the Oaks

Source: War for the Oaks

Courage, Success, Clothes

“We don't even love each other.
I do a bit, you know.
You do what a bit?
You know. Like you… whatever… love you a bit.
I think I kind of love you too.”

Melina Marchetta book Looking for Alibrandi

Source: Looking for Alibrandi

Love, Thinking

“Maybe that's why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn't able to do what it was meant to do… Maybe it's the same with people," Hugo continued. "If you lose your purpose… it's like your broken.”

Brian Selznick book The Invention of Hugo Cabret

Source: The Invention of Hugo Cabret

People, Sadness

“he wanted to say. And not “we” as in the Brotherhood.

Not even “we” as in he and John.

More like … “me”.”

Jessica Bird (1969) U.S. novelist

Source: Lover Reborn

“Someday you're really going to have to describe to me in more detail what life is like on the planet you live on. Because it sounds really great, and I'd like to visit there one day.”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Queen of Babble in the Big City

Life

“This is what I like about photographs. They're proof that once, even if just for a heartbeat, everything was perfect.”

Jodi Picoult book Lone Wolf

Source: Lone Wolf

Perfection

“I’ve had a tense couple of days. And I’ve got to tell you, burning someone’s face off sounds like a great way to relax.”

Jim Butcher book Small Favor

Source: Small Favor

Way

“I figure if Eve could get us into this mess, I could get us out. After all, God really likes to see a go-getter.”

Chuck Palahniuk (1962) American novelist, essayist

God

“She stood in front of the mirror a long time, and finally decided she either looked like a sap or else she looked very beautiful. One or the other.”

Carson McCullers book The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter

Source: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

Beauty, Time

“I don't want to say something cheesy like 'home is where the heart is,' but home is definitely where the heart is. And my heart is, and has always been, with you.”

Melissa Senate (1965) american writer

Source: The Breakup Club

Home, Heart

“I swear, sometimes it feels like there's this monkey in my head who runs around turning the dials and changing channels on me. One minute I'm sitting around eating chocolate chip cookies and then all of a sudden I'm thinking about bears.”

Michael Thomas Ford (1968) American writer

Source: Suicide Notes

Feeling, Thinking, Change

“What have you gotten me into?" I hissed at him.
"Me? What have you gotten yourself into? Couldn't I have just picked you up at the police station for underage drinking, like most fathers?”

Richelle Mead book Spirit Bound

Source: Spirit Bound

Drink

“I feel safe with him because he is so not my ideal and I feel like I can be myself because I'm not in love with him.”

Gary Shteyngart Super Sad True Love Story

Source: Super Sad True Love Story

Love, Feeling

“Just as when we come into the world, when we die we are afraid of the unknown. But the fear is something from within us that has nothing to do with reality. Dying is like being born: just a change”

Isabel Allende book The House of the Spirits

Variant: Just as when we come into the world, when we die we are afraid of the unknown. But the fear is something from within us that has nothing to do with reality. Dying is like being born: just a change.
Source: The House of the Spirits

World, Fear, Reality, Change

“In our early youth we sit before the life that lies ahead of us like children sitting before the curtain in a theatre, in happy and tense anticipation of whatever is going to appear. Luckily we do not know what really will appear.”

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German philosopher

Life, Happiness, Children, Youth

“Technically, the dance worked best when done naked, but I didn't feel like prancing in the nude into Morrigan Hound's arms. I'm sure he'd be thrilled to see me.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Burns

Feeling, Dance

“I knew a girl, once, immortal like me-"

"And she was with someone mortal?" said Alec. "What happened?"

"He died," Magnus said. There was a finality to the way he said it that spoke of a deeper grief than words could paint.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Source: City of Heavenly Fire

Way, Girl, Painting

“Don't ever write anything you don't like yourself and if you do like it, don't take anyone's advice about changing it. They just don't know.”

Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) Novelist, screenwriter

Change

“Words are like Leaves; and where they most abound,
Much Fruit of Sense beneath is rarely found.”

Alexander Pope An Essay on Criticism

Source: An Essay on Criticism

Sense

“They all yelled in excitement. Tamara yelled because she was happy. Aaron yelled because he liked it when other people were happy, and Call yelled because he was sure they were going to die.”

Cassandra Clare book The Iron Trial

Source: The Iron Trial

Happiness, People

“I am looking for the human who admits his flaws
Who shocks the adversary
By being kinder not stronger
What would that be like?
We don't even know”

Naomi Shihab Nye (1952) American writer

Source: Honeybee: Poems Short Prose

“Also, when on a campaign to convince a stranger that you aren't a few fries short of a Happy Meal, throwing around phrases like "tangentially Swedish" is not the best way to go.”

Maureen Johnson book Let It Snow

Source: Let It Snow: Three Holiday Romances

Happiness, Way

“Unfinished Poem
I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.”

John O'Donohue (1956–2008) Irish writer, priest and philosopher

Love

“So while it seemed like you were seeing everything, you really weren't. Just bits and pieces that looked like a whole.”

Sarah Dessen book Just Listen

Source: Just Listen

“Believe it or not, that was the first time I recognized that in some ways she was just like the rest of us.”

Nicholas Sparks book A Walk to Remember

Source: A Walk to Remember

Way, Time

“Creativity - like human life itself - begins in darkness.”

Julia Cameron book The Artist's Way

Variant: Creativity — like human life itself — begins in darkness.
Source: The Artist's Way (1992)
Context: Creativity — like human life itself — begins in darkness. We need to acknowledge this. All too often, we think only in terms of light: "And then the lightbulb went on and I got it!" It is true that insights may come to us as flashes. It is true that some of these flashes may be blinding. It is, however, also true that such bright ideas are preceded by a gestation period that is interior, murky, and completely necessary.

Life