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Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes - Page 7

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You need to have a reader's sympathy in order to accomplish anything. It's like at a reading, I find it's better to read something funny than to read something tragic. It just goes over better because you have a finite

You need to have a reader's sympathy in order to accomplish anything. It's like at a reading, I find it's better to read something funny than to read something tragic. It just goes over better because you have a finite amount of time with somebody. Of course, in a book, you have a lot of time. But you still do want to make a certain impression right when you begin.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Book, Reading, Order
Source: www.guernicamag.com

What is suffering? I'm not sure what it is, but I know that suffering is the name we give to the origin of all the sighs, screams, and groans — small and large, crude and multifaceted — that concern us. The word defines our gaze even more than what we are looking at.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Names, Giving, Suffering
"Eating Animals". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, 2009.

My point is that there are a lot of forces, like the media and the general political rhetoric tells us we should have more. That we should do better than our parents and have a bigger house or a better car.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Media, Should Have, Car
Source: www.nydailynews.com

We know, at least, that this decision (ending factory farming) will help prevent deforestation, curb global warming, reduce pollution, save oil reserves, lessen the burden on rural America, decrease human rights abuses, improve publish health, and help eliminate the most systematic animal abuse in history.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Animal, America, Rights

This is love, she thought, isn't it? When you notice someone's absence and hate that absence more than anything? More, even, than you love his presence?

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hate, Absence, Everything Is Illuminated
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.121, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I’d rather somebody hate what I do than be indifferent to it.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Hate, Indifferent
Interview with Joshua Wolf Shenk, www.motherjones.com. May, 2005.

No matter how much I feel, I’m not going to let it out. If I have to cry, I’m gonna cry on the inside. If I have to bleed, I’ll bruise. If my heart starts going crazy, I’m not gonna tell everyone in the world about it. It doesn’t help anything. It just makes everyone’s life worse.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Crazy, Heart, Bruises

It will never be the case that people won't eat meat. I think it could conceivably be the case one day that people eat very small amounts of it. That it's a special thing, rather than reach for it because it's cheap or reach for it because it's convenient, that it becomes something festive or something celebratory, once a week, and that could actually be achieved on small farms if we really changed our habits.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Thinking, People, One Day
"Extremely Dead and Incredibly Gross". Interview with Kiera Butler, www.motherjones.com. November 25, 2009.

When we eat factory-farmed meat we live, literally, on tortured flesh. Increasingly, that tortured flesh is becoming our own.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Vegetarianism, Meat, Flesh
"Eating Animals". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, March 4, 2010.

We had everything to say to each other, but no ways to say it

Jonathan Safran Foer
Way
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.81, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

[S]o if the device of the person in the ambulance detected the device of the person he loved the most, or the person who loved him the most, and the person in the ambulance was really badly hurt, and might even die, the ambulance could flash GOODBYE! I LOVE YOU! GOODBYE! I LOVE YOU!

Jonathan Safran Foer
Goodbye, Hurt, Love You
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.72, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

It's so hard to express yourself.' I understand this.' I want to express myself.' The same is true for me.' I'm looking for my voice.' It's in your mouth.' I want to do something I'm not ashamed of.' Something you are proud of, yes?' Not even. I just don't want to be ashamed.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Voice, Mouths, Want
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.70, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The only thing more painful than being an active forgetter is to be an inert rememberer.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Painful, Active

Ninety-nine percent of all land animals eaten or used to produce milk and eggs in the United States are factory farmed. So although there are important exceptions, to speak about eating animals today is to speak about factory farming.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Animal, Ninety Nine, Land
"Eating Animals". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, November 2, 2009.

Tomorrow was over the horizon, and would take an entire day to reach.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Horizon, Tomorrow

Every night before putting her to sleep, Yankel counts her ribs, as if one might have disappeared in the course of the day and become the seed and soil for some new companion to steal her away from him.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Sleep, Night, Ribs
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.76, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Also, I designed a pretty fascinating bracelet, where you put a rubber band around your favorite book of poems for a year, and then you take it off and wear it.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Book, Years, Band
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.106, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

We talked about nothing in particular, but it felt like we were talking about the most important things.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Talking, Important, Particular
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.113, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I wasn’t having second thoughts, but I was having thoughts.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Second Thoughts
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.132, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

We burned with love for ourselves, all of us, starters of the fire we suffered- our love was the affliction for which only our love was the cure.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Fire, Affliction, Our Love
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.41, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I was more alone than if I had been alone.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Ifs
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.82, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

I watched the sheets breathe when she breathed, like how Dad used to say that trees inhale when people exhale, because I was too young to understand the truth about biological processes.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Dad, People, Tree
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: A Novel”, p.107, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

In my family, Father is the world champion at ending conversations.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Father, Champion, World
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.27, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

This brings me back to the image of Kafka standing before a fish in the Berlin aquarium, a fish on which his gaze fell in a newly found peace after he decided not to eat animals. Kafka recognized that fish as a member of his invisible family- not as his equal, of course, but as another being that was his concern.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Animal, Aquariums, Berlin
"Eating Animals". Book by Jonathan Safran Foer, 2009.

Everything is to protect you. I exist in case you need to be protected.

Jonathan Safran Foer
Needs, Protect You, Cases
Jonathan Safran Foer (2013). “Everything Is Illuminated”, p.227, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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