Best 33 quotes of Cynthia Voigt on MyQuotes

All I wanted to do was read, to be told stories. Stories were full of excitement and emotions and characters that entertained and often inspired.

...a really good friend, the kind of friend who - when they were together both of them were more able to be who they really were.

But I'll tell you something else, too. Something I've learned, the hard way. I guess"—Gram laughed a little—"I'm the kind of person who has to learn things the hard way. You've got to hold on. Hold on to people. They can get away from you. It's not always going to be fun, but if you don't—hold on—then you lose them.

By the time I started high school, I knew I wanted to be a writer. After graduating from Smith College in Massachusetts, I moved to New York City and worked for the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson.

Hiding under the bed doesn't make the worry stop.

I didnt write anything at all except book reports until I was in seventh grade, and then I wrote mostly poetry for myself.

I do have trouble starting books. I have ideas that I have trouble starting to write. But I'm the kind of person who tends to finish everything she starts out of sheer stubbornness.

If I'm writing by intuition, generally that calculation works itself out. But if I'm writing a mystery, and somebody has to have a reason for doing what he's doing, and it's not anything I can imagine myself wanting to do, things get a little more difficult to write, and careless mistakes are made.

I got to thinking—when it was too late—you have to reach out to people. To your family, too. You can't just let them sit there, you should put your hand out. If they slap it back, well you reach out again if you care enough. If you don't care enough, you forget about them, if you can.

I got used to being a writer. To compare it to teaching - I taught for twenty-five years; for the first two or three years it was heady. I was discovering that I could do something and do it well. Be useful to people. It was exhilarating, sort of like the first two weeks of being in love with somebody, and then it becomes like the third bite of pizza. The first bite is wonderful. The second bite is not disappointing. The third? Meh. You get used to it.

I have the feeling that I know who I am, only I'm not anymore.

I love teaching; I love little kids.

I was no scholar in college, and was arrogant about what I thought.

Kids are really tougher than adults, but we tend to forget this in an affluent society that lets kids indulge themselves.

Maybe life was like a sea, and all the people were like boats ... Everybody who was born was cast into the sea. Winds would blow them in all directions. Tides would rise and turn, in their own rhythm. And the boats - they just went along as best they could, trying to find a harbor.

People can be unimaginably foolish...and they can be unimaginably grand, at times.

Rebellion is necessary for development of character.

She couldn’t get any farther away inside from her skin. She couldn’t get away.

The worst things weren't outside of you.

When a daring idea first crosses one's mind, if it is to be realized in the future it is often appealing. Then, as the time for its execution comes nearer, one begins to dread that which had once been anticipated.

...When this map was made, there was only empty forest in the south," Gran told Birle."Not empty," Granda corrected her. "The forest is never empty.

You could say that all of life is a series of last chances.

...all work is worth doing well. And there are things to be enjoyed about most jobs...

As best she could, in her secluded position, she was considering how she might secure further choices, and what they might be — once this, her first free choice, had played itself out.

I could never do what you did," they said, to which Fredle responded, "You'd be surprised at what you can do, if you need to, if you have to, if you really want to.

It took another time, more waves rolling up, to understand that he had no idea what it would be like to live without fear at his elbow, warning him, keeping him safe, keeping him frightened.

It wasn't the worst time when Melody left me," the Professor said. "The worst time was the years before. Because I didn't know I couldn't hate anybody that much; it was like she'd stuck a sword into me, one of those Japanese samurai swords, do you know the kind I mean? Heavy and razor sharp-and she'd stuck it in me and then she was...pushing it around." His hand rested on his stomach, remembering. "I couldn't get free from the feelings. I didn't know how frightened I could be, all the time. But whenever we had to go out together, she'd smile at me and talk to me and listen and look at me the way she did-and I wanted to hit her," he said, his voice low and ashamed. Jeff let his head down to rest on his fists. "When I found out how many lies she was telling me, I finally realized that she had always lied to me. About my lectures. About boyfriends; and even after she knew I knew, she'd still lie about it. I hated her. Or the bills she ran up, without asking, without telling; then she'd say she'd taken care of them but she just-ignore them. I know I looked all right to other people-maybe more of a dry stick than usual, maybe even more of boring than usual-but inside I was knotted up, all the time, because I hated her so much, and I hated myself, and I was scared." Jeff looked up at his father. "I didn't think she'd do that to you, Jeff," the Professor said. "But she did, didn't she." Jeff nodded. He knew he was crying, but he didn't know what to do about it. Neither did the Professor. He just sat and waited, until Jeff got up to blow his nose. "It was the lies," the Professor said. "They were what really scared me. Even now, if I think about her-and the kinds of things she says....I don't know what she told you, but I never was sorry I'd married her or loved her because of you. You always made a difference, made a real difference, from the very beginning. I always knew that, inside me, but I didn't bother to learn how to show you. I'm sorry, Jeff, I should have taken the trouble.

Mina wanted some of the kind of love Momma gave to her children, wheere love was the first and deepest thing, and the questions came later and the answers wouldn't matter much measured up against the love.

Mina wanted some of the kind of love Momma gave to her children, where love was the first and deepest thing, and the questions came later and the answers wouldn't matter much measured up against the love.

The people they had been last summer, the person she had been--Dicey guessed she'd never be afraid again, not the way she had been all summer. She had taken care of them all, sometimes well, sometimes badly. And they had covered the distances. For most of the summer, they had been unattached. Nobody knew who they were or what they were doing. It didn't matter what they did, as long as they all stayed together. Dicey remembered that feeling, of having things pretty much her own way. And she remembered the feelings of danger. It was a little bit like being a wild animal, she thought to herself. Dicey missed that wildness. She knew she would never have it again. And she missed the sense of Dicey Tillerman against the whole world and doing all right.

When Jeff Greene was in second grade, seven and a half years old, he got home from school one Tuesday afternoon in early March, and found a note from his mother, saying that she had gone away and would not be coming back.

Where the veil broke, you could see silvery clouds on which tall angels might stand. Not cute little Christmas angels, but high, stern angels in white robes, whose faces were sad and serious from being near God all day and hearing His decisions about the world.

Your grandmother thought--no, she believed, it was like a faith for her. She believed it the way some people believe in God or science. She believed that it was the rules that made her life so easy. She thought life was about the rules people make for it, as if life was some kind of a board game and if you had a little luck, and you kept to the rules, you'd end up winning. Or maybe she thought it was like a game of solitaire and once the cards had been shuffled and laid out, if you had a good draw you were safe, as if it was arranged for you to win. Or to lose, although Grandmother considered herself someone who had won, since all she had to do once she was born was follow the rules. But really, life's like a game of bridge: You're dealt a hand and it can be a winning hand or a losing one, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you'll win or lose because there are other people at the table, your partner for one, and the other ream for another, that's three people...playing too, and people make mistakes, multiply that times three too, or you can just be smarter than they are. And luckier too, because anybody who sits down to play bridge or life without figuring out how much luck is involved is making a Big Mistake. I don't want you girls doing that.