Quotes about opening
page 9

“Of this I am quite sure, that if we open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall find that we have lost the future.”

Winston S. Churchill book The Second World War

Speech in the House of Commons, June 18, 1940 "War Situation" http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1940/jun/18/war-situation#column_52. <br class="br">The Second World War (1939–1945)

Past, Future

“When I pray for another person, I am praying for God to open my eyes so that I can see that person as God does, and then enter into the stream of love that God already directs toward that person.”

Philip Yancey (1949) American writer

Love, God, Personality

“Do as you like with me. I'm your parcel. I have only our address on me. Open me, or readdress me.”

Ted Hughes Birthday Letters

Source: Birthday Letters

“Elizabeth's voice had a door in it. When you opened that door you found another door, and that door opened yet another door. All the doors were nice and led out of her.”

Richard Brautigan (1935–1984) American novelist, poet, and short story writer

“Some people have a thick skin and you don't. Your heart is really open and that is going to cause pain, but that is an appropriate response to this world.”

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

Source: Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope, and Repair

Pain, People, World, Heart

“You have to keep your mind as wide-open as your eyes, because almost nothing is what it seems.”

Jonathan Maberry book Rot & Ruin

Source: Rot & Ruin

“I learned so much from listening to people. And all I knew was, the only thing I had was honesty and openness.”

Audre Lorde (1934–1992) writer and activist

People, Learning

“I was attracted to science fiction because it was so wide open. I was able to do anything and there were no walls to hem you in and there was no human condition that you were stopped from examining.”

Octavia E. Butler (1947–2006) American science fiction writer

Science

“If you were to open up a baby's head - and I am not for a moment suggesting that you should - you would find nothing but an enormous drool gland.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

Baby

“What happened? Did a house fall on your sister?" I asked. Maybe there was a benefit to our language barrier. She pursed her lips.
"You can't stay here much longer," she said.
My mouth dropped open.
"You… you speak English?"
She snorted. "Of course.”

Richelle Mead Blood Promise

Source: Blood Promise

Sister, Housing

“Quite collected at cocktail parties,
meanwhile in my head
I'm undergoing open-heart surgery.”

Anne Sexton (1928–1974) poet from the United States

Variant: Meanwhile in my head, I’m undergoing open-heart surgery.
Source: Transformations

Heart

“Edward knew what it was like to say over and over again the names of those you had left behind. He knew what it was like to miss someone. And so he listened. And in his listening, his heart opened wide and then wider still. (page 103)”

Kate DiCamillo book The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Source: The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Heart

“I guess I always felt even if the world came to an end, McDonald's would still be open.”

Susan Beth Pfeffer book Life As We Knew It

Source: Life As We Knew It

World

“Now, Max, I think we both know your parents aren't missionaries."
I opened my eyes wide. "No? Well, for God's sake, don't tell them. They'd be crushed. Thinking they're doing the
Lord's work and all.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: School's Out—Forever

God, Thinking, Parent

“But I also meant that loving someone really opening your heart to them is just asking to have your heart smashed and handed back to you in little pieces.”

Cate Tiernan (1961) American novelist

Source: The Calling

Love, Heart

“The cemetery is an open space among the ruins covered in winter with violets and daisies. It might make one in love with death, to think that one should be buried in so sweet a place.”

Percy Bysshe Shelley Adonaïs

Preface
Source: Adonais (1821)

Love, Death, Thinking, Winter

“may my heart always be open to little birds who are the secrets of living”

E.E. Cummings Him

Source: Him

Secret, Bird, Heart

“I get in the dumps at times, and don't open my mouth for days on end. You must not think I am sulky when I do that. Just let me alone, and I'll soon be right.”

Arthur Conan Doyle book A Study in Scarlet

Source: A Study in Scarlet

Thinking, Time

“For me, singing sad songs often has a way of healing a situation. It gets the hurt out in the open into the light, out of the darkness.”

Reba McEntire (1955) American country music artist and actress

Sadness, Way, Light, Singing

“Now, 75 years [after], in an abundant society where people have laptops, cell phones, iPods, and minds like empty rooms, I still plod along with books.

[Open Letter,, July 2006]”

Harper Lee (1926–2016) American author

People, Books

“Life is what you make of it. There's always fun and laughs right under your nose if you're willing to open your eyes to see it.”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

Life

“He was the kind of guy that made a woman want to rip his shirt open and watch the buttons scatter along with her inhibitions.”

Sylvia Day book Bared to You

Source: Bared to You

Guy

“To sing you must first open your mouth. You must have a pair of lungs, and a little knowledge of music. It is not necessary to have an accordion, or a guitar. The essential thing is to want to sing. This then is a song. I am singing.”

Henry Miller book Tropic of Cancer

Source: Tropic of Cancer

Music, Knowledge, Singing

“It is very risky. But each time a child opens a book, he pushes open the gate that separates him from Elsewhere.”

Lois Lowry (1937) American writer

Books, Time

“Reading is like looking through several windows which open to an infinite landscape…. For me life without reading would be like being in prison, it would be as if my spirit were in a straightjacket; life would be a very dark and narrow place.”

Isabel Allende (1942) Chilean writer

Life, Reading

“Some issues stay fresh every time you open them up. It's like evil magical Tupperware -- it stays fresh forever.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book Affliction

Source: Affliction

Evil, Time

“There are many great authors of the past who have survived centuries of oblivion and neglect, but it is still an open question whether they will be able to survive an entertaining version of what they have to say.”

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

Question, Past

“Libraries allow children to ask questions about the world and find the answers. And the wonderful thing is that once a child learns to use a library, the doors to learning are always open.”

Laura Bush (1946) First Lady of the United States from 2001 to 2009

As quoted in The 21st Century Elementary Library Media Program (2009) by Carl A. Harvey, p. 3

Children, World, Question, Learning

“I open a paperclip and scratch it across the inside of my left wrist. Pitiful. If a suicide attempt is a cry for help, then what is this. A whimper, a peep? I draw little window cracks of blood, etching line after line until it stops hurting.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Speak

Source: Speak

Suicide, Help, Hurt, Drawing

“Open the pod bay doors, Hal.”

Arthur C. Clarke book 2001: A Space Odyssey

Source: 2001: A Space Odyssey

“Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult, I've decided, is only a slow sewing shut.”

Jodi Picoult My Sister's Keeper

Source: My Sister's Keeper

Thinking

“She opened her eyes and met his. The impact was so strong he was amazed that his fingers continued playing without pause.”

Patricia Briggs book Cry Wolf

Source: Cry Wolf

Strong

“Open yourself to an encounter with heaven, be as a little child. Release your desire to the winds of the universe. Trust your angels to catch your wish and bring it to you in a delightfully surprising way.”

Doreen Virtue (1958) American writer

Angels, Way, Universe

“Write what disturbs you, what you fear, what you have not been willing to speak about. Be willing to be split open.”

Natalie Goldberg (1948) American writer

Source: Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within

Fear

“She had the look in her eye when you kick and kick at the door and it doesn't open, when you write a boy letters and letters and he never loves you, not ‘til the day he dies. Not even then.”

Daniel Handler book The Basic Eight

Source: The Basic Eight

Love, Boy

“Open your eyes, Clevinger. It doesn't make a damned bit of difference who wins the war to someone who's dead.”

Joseph Heller book Catch-22

Source: Catch-22 (1961)

War, Dead

“All of the life-changing awesome
words and pictures and ideas
inside your library are useless
without just one word outside
your library: Open.”

Mo Willems (1968) American children's illustrator and writer

Life, Idea, Change

“Oh, Claire," he said. "You think me a far better man than I am. That's kind, and flattering."
"Are you saying that you -"

"Doughnuts!" Myrnin interrupted her and darted away, to zip back in seconds with an open box.”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Ghost Town

Thinking, Box

“Charming villains have always had a decided social advantage over well-meaning people who chew with their mouths open.”

Judith Martin (1938) American etiquette expert

People

“It depends. If I don't let you in, will you huff and puff and blow my house down?"
She had no idea. "I'm more of a kick the door open and cut everyone inside to ribbons kind of wolf.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Bayou Moon

Idea, Wolf, Housing, Dependency

“(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands”

E.E. Cummings (1894–1962) American poet

W [ViVa] (1931) LVII

Understanding

“Delight in itself is the approach of sanity. Delight is to open our eyes to the reality of the situation rather than siding with this or that point of view.”

Chögyam Trungpa (1939–1987) Tibetan Buddhist lama and writer

Source: The Myth of Freedom and the Way of Meditation

Reality

“Sometimes when you open the door to the past, what you confront is your destiny.”

Diane Setterfield book The Thirteenth Tale

Source: The Thirteenth Tale

Past

“There is how we
were before, and how we are now, and the time between is spent choosing
which doors to open, and which to close.”

Karen White (1964) American writer

Source: The Time Between

Time

“… and the distance between them, millimeters only, the space of a breath, opened up and deepened, became a cavern at whose edge he stood.”

Kim Edwards book The Memory Keeper's Daughter

Source: The Memory Keeper's Daughter

“Each day the storm clouds were opening like great purple flowers and pouring out their dark thunder. Each nightfall, the storm was laid down on their houses like a burden the day had carried.”

Eudora Welty (1909–2001) American author

Source: The Wide Net and Other Stories

Flowers, Housing

“opening the book, i inhaled. the smell of old books, so sharp, so dry you can taste it.”

Diane Setterfield book The Thirteenth Tale

Source: The Thirteenth Tale

Books

“Listen, real poetry doesn't say anything; it just ticks off the possibilities. Opens all doors. You can walk through anyone that suits you.”

Jim Morrison (1943–1971) lead singer of The Doors

“The worst criticism seeks to have the last word and leave the rest of us in silence; the best opens up an exchange that need never end.”

Rebecca Solnit book Men Explain Things To Me

Source: Men Explain Things to Me

Silence

“I opened myself to you only to be skinned alive. The more vulnerable I became, the faster and more deft your knife. Knowing what was happening, still I stayed and let you carve more. That's how much I loved you. That's how much.”

Rabih Alameddine (1959) Lebanese-American painter and writer.

Source: I, The Divine: A Novel in First Chapters

Love

“I keep a close watch on this heart of mine;
I keep my eyes wide open all the time.
I keep the ends out for the tie that binds.
Because you're mine, I walk the line.”

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) American singer-songwriter

I Walk the Line
Song lyrics, Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar (1957)

Time, Heart

“Mouse sandwiches and open graves?" Meredith arched an elegant eyebrow. "I think you're getting Stephen King mixed up with Lewis Carroll.”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: Dark Reunion

Thinking

“I hate it when she tabs a line," Ivy whispered to Kisten in the corner. "You ever see anything freakier than that?" "You should see the face she makes when she—"
"Shut up, Kist!" I exclaimed, my eyes flashing open to find him grinning at me.”

Kim Harrison (1966) Pseudonym

Source: A Fistful of Charms

Hate

“now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened”

E.E. Cummings (1894–1962) American poet

65
XAIPE (1950)

“… Genuine pathological openness is about as seductive as Tourette's Syndrome.”

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

“There is, in every event, whether lived or told, always a hole or a gap, often more than one. If we allow ourselves to get caught in it, we find it opening onto a void that, once we have slipped into it, we can never escape.”

Brian Evenson book Fugue State

Source: Fugue State

“I have always loved a window, especially an open one.”

Wendell Berry (1934) author

Source: Jayber Crow

Love

“Here's to opening and upward…
and to yourself and up with you and up with and up with laughing.”

E.E. Cummings (1894–1962) American poet

“And I have no desire to get ugly,
But I cannot help mentioning that the door of a bigoted mind opens outwards so that the only result of the pressure of facts upon it is to close it more snugly.”

Ogden Nash (1902–1971) American poet

Good Intentions (1942), Seeing Eye to Eye is Believing

Help

“The book smelled dusty and old but also carried a sweet tang, a hint of something inviting. She opened to the first page and started to read, pronouncing the words in a reverent whisper.”

Shannon Hale (1974) American fantasy novelist

Books, Reading

“This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right you claim for yourself. Keep your mind open to the influences of nature. Receive new thoughts with hospitality. Let us advance.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Source: The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child

Nature

“There is no question that there is an unseen world. The problem is, how far is it from midtown and how late is it open?”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

World, Question, Problem

“Betsy returned to her chair, took off her coat and hat, opened her book and forgot the world again.”

Maud Hart Lovelace book Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown

Source: Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown

Books, World

“You know someone for a while and then one day a hole opens underneath them, and they fall out of your world.”

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

Source: 20th Century Ghosts

World

“The closet door is open for me, where I left it, since I left it open, it has graciously stayed open.”

Allen Ginsberg book Howl and Other Poems

Source: Howl and Other Poems

“The only thing that guarantees an open-ended collaboration among human beings, the only thing that guarantees that this project is truly open-ended, is a willingness to have our beliefs and behaviors modified by the power of conversation.”

Sam Harris (1967) American author, philosopher and neuroscientist

Behavior

“Old Dan must have known he was dying. Just before he drew his last breath, he opened his eyes and looked at me. Then with one last sigh, and a feeble thump of his tail, his friendly gray eyes closed forever.”

Wilson Rawls book Where the Red Fern Grows

Source: Where the Red Fern Grows

“Their house had real hard-cover books in it, and you often saw them lying open on the sofa, the words still warm from being read.”

David Sedaris book Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls

Variant: Their house had real hardcover books in it, and you often saw them lying open on the sofa, the words still warm from being read.
Source: Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls

Books, Lying, Reading, Housing