Quotes By Author: alice hoffman
“I could hardly get a boy to look at me. All right, they’d look, they’d even take me out, but no one asked for a second date. I was too nasty, a real wise guy, and all the boys could tell what my rotten disposition was. Deep down, I wanted a commitment with a capital C. To get anywhere with me, a boy would have to sign his undying loyalty with his own blood.”
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“Helplessness and anger make for predictable behavior: Children are certain to shove each other and pull hair, teenagers will call each other names and cry, and grown women who are sisters will say words so cruel that each syllable will take on the form of a snake, although such a snake often circles in on itself to eat its own tail once the words are said aloud.”
“Still, she knows one thing for certain: never judge a relationship unless you are the one wrapped up in its arms.”
“All the same, there were some things they needed to learn. Do not drink milk after a thunderstorm, for it will certainly be sour. Always leave out seed for the birds when the first snow falls. Wash your hair with rosemary. Drink lavender tea when you cannot sleep. Know that the only remedy for love is to love more.”
“Life is a mystery, and it should be so, for the sorrow that accompanies being human and the choices one will have to make are a burden, too heavy for most to know before their time comes.”
“But in battle you cannot tell another when it is his time to enter the World-to-Come, nor is it possible to keep any man in this world when he wishes to leave it behind.”
“We are only an instant, that’s true. But we are eternal.”
“She knew it the way people say they know they are about to be hit by lightning, yet remain powerless to run, unable to avoid their fate. She panicked, as anyone might have when disparate parts of her life were about to crash into each other, certain to leave a path of anguish and debris. It was true that devotion could be lost as quickly as it was found, which was why some people insisted that love letters be written in ink. How easy it was for even the sweetest words to evaporate, only to be rewritten as impulse and infatuation might dictate. How unfortunate that love could not be taught or trained, like a seal or a dog. Instead it was a wolf on the prowl, with a mind of its own, and it made its own way, undeterred by the damage done. Love like this could turn honest people into liars and cheats, as it now did…”
“To want someone so much could be a terrible thing, or it could be the best hope a man could have”
“Love was never a mistake, even when it wasn’t returned.”
“Pride is a funny thing; it can make what is truly worthless appear to be a treasure.”
“It was a moment made of glass, this happiness; it was the easiest thing in the world to break. Every minute was a world, every hour a universe.”
“My mother was teaching me that the inside of something was not necessarily its outside. Always look carefully, she told me. Look with more than your eyes.”
“Still anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The wise see a creature for what it is, not what it says it may be.”