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Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes - Page 2

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I'm grateful for anything that reminds me of what's possible in this life. Books can do that. Films can do that. Music can do that. School can do that. It's so easy to allow one day to simply follow into the next, but

I'm grateful for anything that reminds me of what's possible in this life. Books can do that. Films can do that. Music can do that. School can do that. It's so easy to allow one day to simply follow into the next, but every once in a while we encounter something that shows us that anything is possible, that dramatic change is possible, that something new can be made, that laughter can be shared.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Laughter, Book, Grateful

She wants to know if I love her, that's all anyone wants from anyone else, not love itself but the knowledge that love is there, like new batteries in the flashlight in the emergency kit in the hall closet.

Jonathan Safran Foer
I Hate You, Love Is, Batteries
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.130, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

It broke my heart into more pieces than my heart was made of, why can't people say what they mean at the time?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Heart, Mean, People
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.279, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

...people with nothing to declare carry the most.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Struggle, People
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.268, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I missed you even when I was with you. That’s been my problem. I miss what I already have, and I surround myself with things that are missing.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Missing, Problem, I Missed You
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.174, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Why are you leaving me? He wrote, I do not know how to live. I do not know either but I am trying. I do not know how to try. There were some things I wanted to tell him. But I knew they would hurt him. So i buried them and let them hurt me

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hurt, Leaving, Trying
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.181, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I put my hand on him. Touching him has always been important to me, it was something I lived for. I never could explain why. Little, nothing touches, my fingers against his shoulder, the outsides of our thighs touching as we squeeled together on the bus. I couldnt explain it, but I needed it. Sometimes I imagined stiching all of our little touches together. How many hundreds of thousands of fingers brushing against each other does it take to make love?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hands, Making Love, Touching
"Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, April 1, 2005.

There were things I wanted to tell him. But I knew they would hurt him. So I buried them, and let them hurt me.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hurt, Buried, Hurt Me
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.181, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I looked at everyone and wondered where they came from, and who they missed, and what they were sorry for.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Sorry
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.247, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

So many people enter and leave your life! Hundreds of thousands of people! You have to keep the door open so they can come in! But it also means you have to let them go!

Jonathan Safran Foer
Mean, Doors, People
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.153, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

We can't plead ignorance, only indifference. Those alive today are the generations that came to know better. We have the burden and the opportunity of living in the moment when the critique of factory farming broke into the popular consciousness. We are the ones of whom it will be fairly asked, What did you do when you learned the truth about eating animals?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Ignorance, Opportunity, Animal
Jonathan Safran Foer (2010). “Eating Animals”, p.208, Penguin UK

It was not the feeling of completeness I so needed, but the feeling of not being empty.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Life, Feelings, Emptiness
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.37, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

She laughed enough to migrate an entire flock of birds. That was how she said yes

Jonathan Safran Foer
Bird, Enough, Flocks
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.80, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

He promised us that everything would be okay. I was a child, but I knew that everything would not be okay. That did not make my father a liar. It made him my father.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Children, Dad, Father

One day you will do things for me that you hate. That is what it means to be family.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Family, Hate, Mean
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.2, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

We spent our lives making livings.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Making A Living, Our Lives
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.175, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I have so much to say to you. I want to begin at the beginning, because that is what you deserve. I want to tell you everything, without leaving out a single detail. But where is the beginning? And what is everything?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Leaving, Want, What You Deserve
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.75, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

If there is no love in the world, we will make a new world, and we will give it walls, and we will furnish it with soft red interiors, from the inside out, and give it a knocker that resonates like a diamond falling to a jeweller's felt so that we should never hear it. Love me, because love doesn't exist, and I have tried everything that does.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Love, Wall, Fall
"Everything Is Illuminated". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, 2002.

We shared the smile of recognizing ourselves in each other, how many imposters do I have? Do we all make the same mistakes, or has one of us gotten it right, or even just a bit less wrong, am I the imposter?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Mistake, Imposter, Recognizing
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.119, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I put my hand on the doorknob because I thought maybe her hand was on the doorknob on the other side.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hands, Sides
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.172, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

It is not a thing that you can imagine. It only is. After that, there can be no imagining.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Imagine
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.188, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

This is my heart. You are touching it with your left hand. You are touching it with your left hand, not because you are left-handed, although you might be, but because I am holding it against my heart. What you are feeling is the beating of my heart. It is what keeps me alive.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Heart, Hands, Touching
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.43, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The French, who love their dogs, sometimes eat their horses. The Spanish, who love their horses, sometimes eat their cows. The Indians, who love their cows, sometimes eat their dogs.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Dog, Horse, Cows

I brought the birdcages to the windows. I opened the windows, and opened the birdcages. I poured the fish down the drain. I took the dogs and cats downstairs and removed their collars. I released the insects onto the street. And the reptiles. And the mice. I told them, Go. All of you. Go. And they went. And they didn’t come back

Jonathan Safran Foer
Dog, Cat, Reptiles
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.185, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

There's nothing good about being certain about things. And I don't think there's any real talent in using language in a manipulative way, with phrases like "tax relief" or "Social Security reform." It's politically clever, but it's also completely disingenuous, and it's not something to aspire to.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Clever, Real, Thinking
Interview with Joshua Wolf Shenk, www.motherjones.com. May 2005.

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