Jacqueline Woodson Quotes

Diversity is about all of us, and about us having to figure out how to walk through this world together.

There is something so deeply visceral about libraries for me-rooms and rooms full of people dreaming and remembering.

People are going to judge you all the time no matter what you do...Don't worry about other people. Worry about you.

I do believe that books can change lives and give people this kind of language they wouldn't have had otherwise.

Even the silence has a story to tell you. Just listen. Listen.

But on paper, things can live forever. On paper, a butterfly never dies.

From a really young age, I was reading like a writer. I was reading for the deep understanding of the literature; not simply to hear the story but to understand how the author got the story on the page.

When I was a kid, I got in trouble for lying a lot, and I had a teacher say, instead of lying, write it down, because if you write it down, it's not a lie anymore; it's fiction.

That's what makes best friends. It's not whether or not you live on the same block or go to the same school, but how you feel about each other in your hearts.

I believe in one day and someday and this perfect moment called Now.

In all your getting, get understanding.

I think writers are the history keepers, right? We're the ones who are bearing witness to what's going on in the world. And I feel like it's our job to put that down on paper, and put it out into the world, so that it can be remembered.

Time comes to us softly, slowly. It sits beside us for a while. Then, long before we are ready, it moves on.

Sometimes you do have to laugh to keep from crying. And sometimes the world feels all right and good and kind of like it's becoming nice again around you. And you realize it, and realize how happy you are in it, and you just gotta laugh.

I always say I write because I have lots of questions, not because I have any answers.

What you say is what matters.

Racism doesn't know color, death doesn't know age, and pain doesn't know might.

No matter how big you get, it's still okay to cry because everybody's got a right to their own tears.

I loved and still love watching words flower into sentences and sentences blossom into stories.

I think it's important to remember that writing is a gift and our stories are gifts to ourselves and to the world and sometimes giving isn't always the easiest thing to do but it comes back.

There's me in every character I put on the pages.

I feel like the world stopped. And I got off...and then it started spinning again, but too fast for me to hop back on. I feel like I'm still trying to get a...to get some kind of foothold on living

I've learned about marrying poetry and prose and making both accessible.

I think in terms of being a New Yorker, as my friends would say, I don't take a lot of mess. I have no tolerance for people who are not thinking deeply about things. I have no tolerance for the kind of small talk that people need to fill silence. And I have no tolerance for people not - just not being a part of the world and being in it and trying to change it.

We do inherently know that poetry is about the way we speak. It's about where we pause, where we drop our words in the middle of a sentence. It's about the rhythm and the cadence of the way we speak. It's about putting that down at the end of the day.