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7c40127 Stories you read when you're the right age never quite leave you. You may forget who wrote them or what the story was called. Sometimes you'll forget precisely what happened, but if a story touches you it will stay with you, haunting the places in your mind that you rarely ever visit. life mind stories youth Neil Gaiman
e7de926 In youth, it was a way I had, To do my best to please. And change, with every passing lad To suit his theories. But now I know the things I know And do the things I do, And if you do not like me so, To hell, my love, with you. change character empowerment love men nature pleasing self-discovery self-esteem self-respect truthfulness wisdom women youth Dorothy Parker
e2a4df6 "The Little Boy and the Old Man Said the little boy, "Sometimes I drop my spoon." Said the old man, "I do that too." The little boy whispered, "I wet my pants." I do that too," laughed the little old man. Said the little boy, "I often cry." The old man nodded, "So do I." But worst of all," said the boy, "it seems Grown-ups don't pay attention to me." old-age poetry youth Shel Silverstein
790a068 What a weary time those years were -- to have the desire and the need to live but not the ability. poverty youth Charles Bukowski
129715b Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines, And too often is his gold complexion dimm'd: And every fair from fair sometimes declines, By chance or natures changing course untrimm'd; By thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee. shakespeare youth William Shakespeare
8b3f8cc It's never too late to have a happy childhood. children innocence youth Tom Robbins
ae3b9d5 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, NIV) life love romance scripture youth Anonymous
8ebcece What should young people do with their lives today? Many things, obviously. But the most daring thing is to create stable communities in which the terrible disease of loneliness can be cured. community daring loneliness purpose youth Kurt Vonnegut
0bb5f54 It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched for they are full of the truthless ideal which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real, they are bruised and wounded. It looks as if they were victims of a conspiracy; for the books they read, ideal by the necessity of selection, and the conversation of their elders, who look back upon the past through a rosy haze of forgetfulness, prepare them for an unreal life. They must discover for themselves that all they have read and all they have been told are lies, lies, lies; and each discovery is another nail driven into the body on the cross of life. ideals nostalgia real truth youth W. Somerset Maugham
3ff6d10 When you're young, you think everything you do is disposable. You move from now to now, crumpling time up in your hands, tossing it away. You're your own speeding car. You think you can get rid of things, and people too--leave them behind. You don't yet know about the habit they have, of coming back. Time in dreams is frozen. You can never get away from where you've been. the-past youth Margaret Atwood
95d995f may my heart always be open to little birds who are the secrets of living whatever they sing is better than to know and if men should not hear them men are old may my mind stroll about hungry and fearless and thirsty and supple and even if it's sunday may i be wrong for whenever men are right they are not young and may myself do nothing usefully and love yourself so more than truly there's never been quite such a fool who could fail pulling all the sky over him with one smile youth E.E. Cummings
6de30c6 I've met a man and fallen in love with him. I allowed myself to fall in love for one simple reason: I'm not expecting anything to come of it. I know that, in three months' time, I'll be far away and he'll be just a memory, but I couldn't stand living without love any longer; I had reached my limit... Generally speaking, these meetings occur when we reach a limit, when we need to die and be reborn emotionally. These meeting are waiting for us, but more often than not, we avoid them happening. If we are desperate, though, if we have nothing to lose, or if we are full of enthusiasm for life, then the unknown reveals itself, and our universe changes directions. youth Paulo Coelho
710b7c4 It is easy, when you are young, to believe that what you desire is no less than what you deserve, to assume that if you want something badly enough, it is your God-given right to have it. inexperience krakauer mccandless naivete youth Jon Krakauer
21ddacb Youth offers the promise of happiness, but life offers the realities of grief. life nicholas-sparks the-rescue youth Nicholas Sparks
0381fc7 So wise so young, they say, do never live long. wisdom youth William Shakespeare
1aae45b I'd like to get away from earth awhile And then come back to it and begin over. May no fate wilfully misunderstand me And half grant what I wish and snatch me away Not to return. Earth's the right place for love: I don't know where it's likely to go better. love nature time youth Robert Frost
02fb7e8 Youth ends when egotism does; maturity begins when one lives for others. existentialism maturity youth Hermann Hesse
5f2576e I was not a hypocrite, with one real face and several false ones. I had several faces because I was young and didn't know who I was or wanted to be. youth Milan Kundera
80221d4 Vanity was stronger than love at sixteen and there was no room in her hot heart now for anything but hate. unrequited-love youth Margaret Mitchell
d797f3c He stood at the window of the empty cafe and watched the activites in the square and he said that it was good that God kept the truths of life from the young as they were starting out or else they'd have no heart to start at all. growing-up innocence life loss-of-innocence truths youth Cormac McCarthy
e151052 If you're young and talented, it's like you have wings. talent writing youth Haruki Murakami
dccda48 A young outcast will often feel that there is something wrong with himself, but as he gets older, grows more confident in who he is, he will adapt, he will begin to feel that there is something wrong with everyone else. adaptation anger attitude bullied bully bullying confidence confidence-and-attitude encouragement growth inspirational introvert loneliness motivational outcast pain youth Criss Jami
993807a His name is Marcus: he is four and a half and possesses that deep gravity and seriousness that only small children and mountain gorillas have ever been able to master. gravity youth Neil Gaiman
07b5c1e The voice so filled with nostalgia that you could almost see the memories floating through the blue smoke, memories not only of music and joy and youth, but perhaps, of dreams. They listened to the music, each hearing it in his own way, feeling relaxed and a part of the music, a part of each other, and almost a part of the world. comfort joy music youth Hubert Selby Jr.
04e2134 "He was waving. "Saukerl," she laughed, and as she held up her hand, she knew completely that he was simultaneously calling her a Saumensch. I think that's as close to love as eleven-year-olds can get." youth Markus Zusak
0a42a31 Our lives were just beginning, our favorite moment was right now, our favorite songs were unwritten. music youth Rob Sheffield
f75db62 Confusion is a luxury which only the very, very young can possibly afford and you are not that young anymore youth James Baldwin
051d5a2 Asleep, he looked a lot younger than going-on-seventeen, but I had noticed that Johnny looked younger when he was asleep too, so I figured everyone did. Maybe people are younger when they are asleep. youth S. E. Hinton
5ac7146 The ugly and stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live-- undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. They never bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Henry; my brains, such as they are-- my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks-- we shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly. curse dorian-gray gods good-looks inspirational intelligence oscar-wilde power stupid-people wealth youth brains Oscar Wilde
fbd850b It's such a stupid question, in my opinion. I mean, how do you know what you're going to do till you it? The answer is, you . I I am, but how do I know? I swear it's a stupid question. spontaneity youth J.D. Salinger
385dd18 I am glad it cannot happen twice, the fever of first love. For it is a fever, and a burden, too, whatever the poets may say. They are not brave, the days when we are twenty-one. They are full of little cowardices, little fears without foundation, and one is so easily bruised, so swiftly wounded, one falls to the first barbed word. To-day, wrapped in the complacent armour of approaching middle age, the infinitesimal pricks of day by day brush one but lightly and are soon forgotten, but then--how a careless word would linger, becoming a fiery stigma, and how a look, a glance over a shoulder, branded themselves as things eternal. A denial heralded the thrice crowing of a cock, and an insincerity was like the kiss of Judas. The adult mind can lie with untroubled conscience and a gay composure, but in those days even a small deception scoured the tongue, lashing one against the stake itself. love youth Daphne du Maurier
a4efea7 Idealisme adalah kemewahan terakhir yang hanya dimiliki oleh pemuda. idealism inspirational spirit youth Tan Malaka
8879576 In beauty of face no maiden ever equaled her. It was the radiance of an opium-dream - an airy and spirit-lifting vision more wildly divine than the fantasies which hovered about the slumbering souls of the daughters of Delos. greek-mythology youth Edgar Allan Poe
fd209fa He owned an expensive camera that required thought before you pressed the shutter, and I quickly became his favorite subject, round-faced, missing teeth, my thick bangs in need of a trim. They are still the pictures of myself I like best, for they convey that confidence of youth I no longer possess, especially in front of a camera. photography photos pictures youth Jhumpa Lahiri
3cbec93 Teachers are the one and only people who save nations. education inspirational youth Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
73cddf9 Life goes on. Get over it. You're still young. It'll get better. Blah, Blah, Blah youth David Levithan
bd5b93f What hurts so bad about youth isn't the actual butt whippings the world delivers. It's the stupid hopes playacting like certainties. hope youth Mary Karr
5786f3e In war, our elders may give the orders...but it is the young who have to fight. war youth T.H. White
c276615 It must be wonderful to be seventeen, and to know everything. youth Arthur C. Clarke
d9f8578 There were books about how to be gay; he'd seen them in stores and libraries. Some of them even had diagrams. But there weren't any diagrams about how to fall in love with your best friend and not fuck everything up. love romance unrequited-love youth Poppy Z. Brite
9c69cae They are not brave, the days when we are twenty-one. They are full of little cowardices, little fears without foundation, and one is so easily bruised, so swiftly wounded, one falls to the first barbed word. To-day, wrapped in the complacent armour of approaching middle age, the infinitesimal pricks of day by day brush one but lightly and are soon forgotten, but then--how a careless word would linger, becoming a fiery stigma, and how a look, a glance over a shoulder, branded themselves as things eternal. youth Daphne du Maurier
0b6f41c That's the duty of the old, to be anxious on behalf of the young. And the duty of the young is to scorn the anxiety of the old. maturity youth Philip Pullman
bcba7a2 That's the trouble with you young people. You think because you ain't been here long, you know everything. In my life I already forgot more than you ever know. youth Neil Gaiman
e604023 Being sixteen forever sounded good until you really thought about it. Then it didn't seem like such a great prospect. simon-lewis vampire youth Cassandra Clare
92ceb6a There is no man...however wise, who has not at some period in his youth said things, or lived a life, the memory of which is so unpleasant to him that he would gladly expunge it. And yet he ought not entirely to regret it, because he cannot be certain that he has indeed become a wise man... youth Marcel Proust
6696532 It is a very strange sensation to inexperience youth to feel itself quite alone the world, cut adrift from every connection, uncertain whether the port to which it is bound can be reached, and prevented by many impediments from returning to that it has quitted. The charm of adventure sweetens that sensation, the glow of pride warms it; but then the throb of fear disturbs it; and fear with me became predominant when half an hour elapsed, and still I was alone. fear independence loneliness youth Charlotte Brontë
8c07ed2 But youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. charm youth Oscar Wilde
948be75 Children are very wise intuitively; they know who loves them most, and who only pretends. intuition intuitive kids love pretending youth V.C. Andrews
d074be2 But you don't need anything. You have everything,' I tell him. Rip looks at me. 'No I don't.' 'What?' 'No I don't.' There's a pause and then I ask, 'Oh, shit, Rip, What don't you have?' 'I don't have anything to loose. los-angeles rip youth Bret Easton Ellis
69ccc45 She looked out the window; in her eyes was the light that you see only in children arriving at a new place, or in young people still open to new influences, still curious about the world because they have not yet been scarred by life. influence life world youth Orhan Pamuk
3babefd It was awful to be Negro and have no control over my life. It was brutal to be young and already trained to sit quietly and listen to charges brought against my color with no chance of defense. We should all be dead. I thought I should like to see us all dead, one on top of the other. A pyramid of flesh with the whitefolks on the bottom, as the broad base, then the Indians with their silly tomahawks and teepees and wigwams and treaties, the Negroes with their mops and recipes and cotton sacks and spirituals sticking out of their mouths. The Dutch children should all stumble in their wooden shoes and break their necks. The French should choke to death on the Louisiana Purchase (1803) while silkworms ate all the Chinese with their stupid pigtails. As a species, we were an abomination. All of us. i-know-why-the-caged-bird-sings maya-angelou racism rage youth Maya Angelou
0211800 When things were very bad his soul just crawled behind his heart and curled up and went to sleep belief heart soul youth Maya Angelou
c61fdab I had given up some youth for knowledge, but my gain was more valuable than the loss life wisdom youth Maya Angelou
a6a8fac It was not their irritating assumption of equality that annoyed Nicholai so much as their cultural confusions. The Americans seemed to confuse standard of living with quality of life, equal opportunity with institutionalized mediocrity, bravery with courage, machismo with manhood, liberty with freedom, wordiness with articulation, fun with pleasure - in short, all of the misconceptions common to those who assume that justice implies equality for all, rather than equality for equals. youth Trevanian
e4c5ed9 Life seemed even more of a guessing game than usual. conversation interaction youth Julian Barnes
257c716 I come to a red light, tempted to go through it, then stop once I see a billboard sign that I don't remember seeing and I look up at it. All it says is 'Disappear Here' and even though it's probably an ad for some resort, it still freaks me out a little and I step on the gas really hard and the car screeches as I leave the light. clay light los-angeles lost meaning meaninglessness signs youth Bret Easton Ellis
50b2d2f The langour of Youth - how unique and quintessential it is! How quickly, how irrecoverably, lost! The zest, the generous affections, the illusions, the despair, all the traditional attributes of Youth - all save this come and go with us through life...These things are a part of life itself; but languor - the relaxation of yet unwearied sinews, the mind sequestered and self-regarding, the sun standing still in the heavens and the earth throbbing to our own pulse - that belongs to Youth alone and dies with it. life youth Evelyn Waugh
2f02565 Senseless violence is a prerogative of youth, which has much energy but little talent for the constructive. violence youth Anthony Burgess
ddcc79a Grown people know that they do not always know the way of things, and even if they think they know, they do not know where and how they got the proof. experience wisdom youth Zora Neale Hurston
9e8869d If you were offered the chance to live your own life again, would you seize the opportunity? The only real philosophical answer is automatically self-contradictory: 'Only if I did not know that I was doing so.' To go through the entire experience once more would be banal and Sisyphean--even if it did build muscle--whereas to wish to be young again and to have the benefit of one's learned and acquired existence is not at all to wish for a repeat performance, or a Groundhog Day. And the mind ought to, but cannot, set some limits to wish-thinking. All right, same but with more money, an even sturdier penis, slightly different parents, a briefer latency period... the thing is absurd. I seriously would like to know what it was to be a woman, but like blind Tiresias would also want the option of re-metamorphosing if I wished. How terrible it is that we have so many more desires than opportunities. conundrums desire groundhog-day life money old-age opportunity parents philosophy self-contradiction tiresias wishful-thinking women youth Christopher Hitchens
fac232f I cried to think of how lucky we both were to have found each other, since it was clear that we were the only ones in the world who could understand what we understood in the instantaneous manner in which we understood it. naivete optimism romance soul-mate youth Audre Lorde
cd00c9c I am often described to my irritation as a 'contrarian' and even had the title inflicted on me by the publisher of one of my early books. (At least on that occasion I lived up to the title by ridiculing the word in my introduction to the book's first chapter.) It is actually a pity that our culture doesn't have a good vernacular word for an oppositionist or even for someone who tries to do his own thinking: the word 'dissident' can't be self-conferred because it is really a title of honor that has to be won or earned, while terms like 'gadfly' or 'maverick' are somehow trivial and condescending as well as over-full of self-regard. And I've lost count of the number of memoirs by old comrades or ex-comrades that have titles like 'Against the Stream,' 'Against the Current,' 'Minority of One,' 'Breaking Ranks' and so forth--all of them lending point to Harold Rosenberg's withering remark about 'the herd of independent minds.' Even when I was quite young I disliked being called a 'rebel': it seemed to make the patronizing suggestion that 'questioning authority' was part of a 'phase' through which I would naturally go. On the contrary, I was a relatively well-behaved and well-mannered boy, and chose my battles with some deliberation rather than just thinking with my hormones. contrarianism dissent dissidents free-thought harold-rosenberg honorifics hormones independence memoirs oppositionism rebellion words youth Christopher Hitchens
fe55068 "Seven Ages: first puking and mewling Then very pissed-off with your schooling Then fucks, and then fights limerick middle-age old-age seven-ages-of-man william-shakespeare youth Robert Conquest
f5752aa In those days, we imagined ourselves as being kept in some kind of holding pen, waiting to be released into our lives. And when the moment came, our lives -- and time itself -- would speed up. How were we to know that our lives had in any case begun, that some advantage had already been gained, some damage already inflicted? Also, that our release would only be into a larger holding pen, whose boundaries would be at first undiscernible. youth Julian Barnes
f382cbc Youth is terrible: it is a stage trod by children in buskins and a variety of costumes mouthing speeches they've memorized and fanatically believe but only half understand. And history is terrible because it so often ends up a playground for the immature; a playground for the young Nero, a playground for the young Bonaparte, a playground for the easily roused mobs of children whose simulated passions and simplistic poses suddenly metamorphose into a catastrophically real reality. youth Milan Kundera
99b0ce5 "Now that lilacs are in bloom She has a bowl of lilacs in her room And twists one in her fingers while she talks. "Ah, my friend, you do not know, you do not know What life is, you who hold it in your hands"; (slowly twisting the lilac stalks) "You let it flow from you, you let it flow, And youth is cruel, and has no remorse And smiles at situations which it cannot see." I smile, of course, And go on drinking tea." nostalgia remorse tea youth T.S. Eliot
eb28368 But there was a time when each of us stood naked before the world, confronting life as a serious problem with which we were intimately and passionately concerned. There was a time when it was of vital interest to us to find out whether there was a God or not. Obviously the existence or otherwise of a future life must be of the very first importance to somebody who is going to live her present one, because her manner of living it must hinge on the problem. There was a time when Free Love versus Catholic Morality was a question of as much importance to our hot bodies as if a pistol had been clapped to our heads. Further back, there were times when we wondered with all our souls what the world was, what love was, what we were ourselves. morality understanding-oneself-and-others youth T.H. White
573c41d She had to live in this bright, red gabled house with the nurse until it was time for her to die... I thought how little we know about the feelings of old people. Children we understand, their fears and hopes and make-believe. elderly youth Daphne du Maurier
5f3fca0 The years nineteen and twenty are a crucial stage in the maturation of character, and if you allow yourself to become warped when you're that age, it will cause you pain when you're older. books life morality youth Haruki Murakami
0d7d3fc I had begun to think my ripening body would wither untasted on the vine. eagerness horniness sex virginity youth Jacqueline Carey
c1f047e Youth is only being in a way like it might be an animal. No, it is not just like being an animal so much as being like one of these malenky toys you viddy being sold in the streets, like little chellovecks made out of tin and with a spring inside and then a winding handle on the outside and you wind it up grrr grrr grrr and off it itties, like walking, O my brothers. But it itties in a straight line and bangs straight into things bang bang and it cannot help what it is doing. Being young is like being like one of these malenky machines. machines youth Anthony Burgess
9ed3579 Running in the wind, in the pollen and dust, a flower in flight girls running wild youth Vladimir Nabokov
75e3961 What do you do?' she asks, holding out the vest. 'What do you do?' 'What do you do?' she asks, her voice shaking. 'Don't ask me, please. Okay, Clay?' 'Why not?' She sits on the mattress after I get up. Muriel screams. 'Because... I don't know,' she sighs. I look at her and don't feel anything and walk out with my vest. kim los-angeles vest youth Bret Easton Ellis
756057b We shouldn't have been so scornful; we should have had compassion. But compassion takes work, and we were young. wisdom youth Margaret Atwood
336feaf Whose little boy are you? black church coming-of-age epiphany god harlem institution james-baldwin racism religion renaissance youth James Baldwin
3df454c If I could get back my youth, I'd do anything in the world except get up early, take exercise or be respectable. humor youth Oscar Wilde
21d6ec8 Perhaps this was one of the tragedies life plots for us: it is our destiny to become in old age what in youth we would have most despised. old-age tragedy youth Julian Barnes
41f82cd Beauty is one of the great facts of the world, like sunlight,or springtime, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you...Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed...Ah! realise your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar...Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing...The world belongs to you for a season...how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will last. The common hillflowers wither, but they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty, becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to...Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth. life temptations world youth Oscar Wilde
4994d1a She was not too young to be wise, but she was too young to know that wisdom shouldn't be spoken aloud when you are happy. wisdom youth Graham Greene
2ed738d And, too ignorant to be scared, too young to be awed, Tristan Thorn traveled beyond the fields we know... youth Neil Gaiman
cdc0a70 When a tree is polled, it will sprout new shoots nearer its roots. A soul that is ruined in the bud will frequently return to the springtime of its beginnings and its promise-filled childhood, as though it could discover new hopes there and retie the broken threads of life. The shoots grow rapidly and eagerly, but it is only a sham life that will never be a genuine tree. hermann-hesse maturity roots soul youth Hermann Hesse
d06a26c God help us for we knew the worst too young. life youth Rudyard Kipling
0a21afb "A DEAD STATESMAN I could not dig: I dared not rob: Therefore I lied to please the mob. Now all my lies are proved untrue And I must face the men I slew. What tale shall serve me here among deceit dishonesty irony lies politics truth war youth Rudyard Kipling
7c121fb I don't like being with grown-up people. I've known that a long time. I don't like it because I don't know how to get on with them. growing-up kids nostalgia teach teachers teaching youth Fyodor Dostoyevsky
bf43405 Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I shall kill myself. youth Oscar Wilde
19a91da I'd sit around dreaming that the boys I saw at shows or at work - the boys with silver earrings and big boots - would tell me I was beautiful, take me home and feed me Thai food or omelets and undress me and make love to me all night with the palm trees whispering windsongs about a tortured gleaming city and the moonlight like flame melting our candle bodies. dreams love youth Francesca Lia Block
d977f82 The achievement of maturity, psychologically speaking, might be said to be the realization and acceptance that we simply cannot live independently from the world, and so we must live within it, with whatever compromises that might entail. existence existentialism maturity selling-out youth Paul Murray
89f1e9a "It was always the view of my parents," Emily said, "that hot weather encouraged loose morals among young people." opinion youth Ian McEwan
99f77be When the light at Vernon turned green, we stepped into the street and George grabbed my hand and the ghosts of our younger selves crossed with us. memory past youth Aimee Bender
39bde67 What ever happened to the passion we all had to improve ourselves, live up to our potential, leave a mark on the world? Our hottest arguments were always about how we could contribute. We did not care about the rewards. We were young and earnest. contributions passion youth Wallace Stegner
bd22c80 The age of the pulp magazine was the last in which youngsters, to get their primitive material, were forced to be literate. youth Isaac Asimov
6106122 ...what splendid dreams young people build upon a word, and how bitter is the pain when the bright bubbles burst. jo-s-boys louisa-may-alcott youth Louisa May Alcott
eb769bf How strange it is that when I was a child I tried to be like a grownup, yet as soon as I ceased to be a child I often longed to be like one. child childhood grownup tolstoy youth Leo Tolstoy
c09318c If you really want to stay the same age you are now forever and ever, she'd be thinking, try jumping off the roof: death's a sure-fire method for stopping time. youth Margaret Atwood
43f5a3f Was it the case that colours dimmed as the eye grew elderly? Or was it rather that in youth your excitement about the world transferred itself onto everything you saw and made it brighter? ageing colour excitement perspective youth Julian Barnes
787cc9c The Three of them were beautiful, in the way all girls of that age are beautiful. It can't be helped, that sort of beauty, nor can it be conserved; it's a freshness, a plumpness of the cells, that's unearned and temporary, and that nothing can replicate. None of them was satisfied with it, however; already they were making attempts to alter themselves into some impossible, imaginary mould, plucking and pencilling away at their faces. I didn't blame them, having done the same once myself. makeup margaret-atwood the-blind-assassin young-girls youth Margaret Atwood
51d390d Your young white, who gathers his learning from books and can measure what he knows by the page, may conceit that his knowledge, like his legs, outruns that of his fathers', but, where experience is the master, the scholar is made to know the value of years, and respects them accordingly. humility youth James Fenimore Cooper
5ff3feb "Sister, why do you do that?" "Do what?" "Cage the animals at night?" "Well..." She looked up and out through the barred window before answering me."We don't want to, Jennings, but we have to. You see, the animals that are given to us we have to take care of. If we didn't cage them up in one place, we might lose them, they might get hurt or damaged. It's not the best thing, but it's the only way we have to take care of them." "But if somebody loved one them," I asked, "wouldn't it be a good idea to let them have one? To keep, I mean?" "Yes, it would be. But not everyone would love them and take care of them as you would. I wish I could give them all away tomorrow." She looked at me. There were tears in her eyes. "But I can't. My heart would break if I saw just one of those animals lying by the wayside uncared for, unloved. No, Jennings. It's better if we keep them together." -- family foster-care memoirs neglect nun runaway stuffed-animals youth Jennings Michael Burch
4638676 Youth is a failing only too easily outgrown. foolishness youth Agatha Christie
d67b8af When I was still quite young I had a complete presentiment of life. It was like the nauseating smell of cooking escaping from a ventilator: you don't have to have eaten it to know that it would make you throw up. humor life youth Julian Barnes
54f9252 She is nine, beloved, as open-faced as the sky and as self-contained. I have watched her grow. As recently as three or four years ago, she had a young child's perfectly shallow receptiveness; she fitted into the world of time, it fitted into her, as thoughtlessly as sky fits its edges, or a river its banks. But as she has grown, her smile has widened with a touch of fear and her glance has taken on depth. Now she is aware of some of the losses you incur by being here--the extortionary rent you have to pay as long as you stay. loss time youth Annie Dillard
eeac5e2 The problems of today's youth were no longer a Sunday supplement, or a news broadcast, or anything so remote and intangible. They were suddenly become a dirty, shivering boy, who told us that in this world we had built for him with our sweat and our blood, he was not only tired of living, but so unscared of dying that he did it daily, sometimes for recreation. despondency drugs social-problems youth Spider Robinson
1ab0167 I had a neat stock of fixed opinions, but they dropped away one by one; and the further I get the less sure I am. I doubt if I have anything more for my present rule of life than following inclinations which do me and nobody else any harm, and actually give pleasure to those I love best. There, gentlemen, since you wanted to know how I was getting on, I have told you. Much good may it do you! I cannot explain further here. I perceive there is something wrong somewhere in our social formulas: what it is can only be discovered by men or women with greater insight than mine--if, indeed, they ever discover it-- at least in our time. 'For who knoweth what is good for man in this life?--and who can tell a man what shall be after him under the sun? life plans youth Thomas Hardy
b5c8c0f What moralists describe as the mysteries of the human heart are solely the deceiving thoughts, the spontaneous impulses of self-regard. The sudden changes in character, about which so much has been said, are instinctive calculations for the furtherance of our own pleasures. Seeing himself now in his fine clothes, his new gloves and shoes, Eugene de Rastignac forgot his noble resolve. Youth, when it swerves toward wrong, dares not look in the mirror of conscience; maturity has already seen itself there. That is the whole difference between the two phases of life. psychology youth Honoré de Balzac
c4888c0 "We have done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth, We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung, And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth. honor hope lost love torment truth youth Rudyard Kipling
344a82a It is a great thing to be young and to live without pain. And yet it is a blessing few of us count until we lose it. pain youth Geraldine Brooks
791e5f0 Who was the real me? I can only repeat: I was a man of many faces. At meetings I was earnest, enthusiastic, and committed; among friends, unconstrained and given to teasing; with Marketa, cynical and fitfully witty; and alone (and thinking of Marketa), unsure of myself and as agitated as a schoolboy. Was the last face the real one? No. They were all real: I was not a hypocrite, with one real face and several false ones. I had several faces because I was young and didn't know who I was or wanted to be. (I was frightened by the differences between one face and the next; none of them seemed to fit me properly, and I groped my way clumsily among them.) czech identity man-of-many-faces masks novel self youth Milan Kundera
5138a1f From the time he was young, he dressed the way you told him to dress; he acted the way you told him to act; he said the things you told him to say. He's been listening to somebody else tell him what to do... He hasn't changed. He is still listening to somebody else tell him what to do. The problem is, it isn't you any,ore; it's his peers. children parenting peer-pressure teenagers-and-parents youth Barbara Coloroso
9cca028 In the same way, teenagers imagine dying young because death is more imaginable than the person that all the decisions and burdens of adulthood may make of you. beath burden childhood decision dying future imagination present suicide teenager young-adult youth Rebecca Solnit
d9c35b2 Go on, glare your eyes at me, and cry and plead, and talk to me about money and what it can buy. But it can't buy back a child once he's dead! baby buy child children cry crying dead death eyes glare glares glaring kid kids life money-monetary plead pleading talk talking young young-adults youth V.C. Andrews
150478b Nature felt no change, and was ever young. helstone maragaret youth Elizabeth Gaskell
cbb1398 Muoth was right. On growing old, one becomes more contented than in one's youth, which I will not therefore revile, for in all my dreams I hear my youth like a wonderful song which now sounds more harmonious than it did in reality, and even sweeter youth Hermann Hesse
e9a32a9 I am life,' the girl said. 'What?' he said, startled. 'To you, I am life. What are you, thirty-eight? Forty? What have you learned? Have you done anything? Look at me, look. I'm life and when you're done with me, some of it rubs off on you. You don't feel so old now, do you? With me here in the squib beside you.' Nick said, 'I'm thirty-four and I don't feel old. As a matter of fact, sitting here with you makes me feel older, not younger. Nothing is rubbing off.' 'It will,' she said. youth Philip K. Dick
e17e3bb It seems to me that what we call beauty in a face lies in the smile: if the smile heightens the charm of the face, the face is a beautiful one; if it does not alter it, the face is ordinary, and if it is spoilt by a smile, it is ugly. boyhood childhood face smile tolstoy youth Leo Tolstoy
037bdd0 Young people think they never can change, but they do in the most wonderful manner, and very few die of broken hearts. louisa-may-alcott youth Louisa May Alcott
08ff59b When you're young, you think it's going to be solved by love. But it never is. Being close-as close as you can get-to another person only makes it clear the impassable distance between you. love youth Nicole Krauss
3e30849 You are young, and rich, and have friends, and at such an age I know it is hard to die! wealth youth James Fenimore Cooper
3fc97d1 Sometimes, Tiffany thought, I am so with being young. tiffany-aching youth Terry Pratchett
9ed90d8 The thought came to me that perhaps it is the loving that counts, not the being loved in return - that perhaps true loving can never know anything but happiness. love wisdom youth Dodie Smith
22c5d6a People only talk about how wonderful youth is when they have forgotten how hard it was. youth Louis L'Amour
1afff43 Buttercup dried her tears and began to smile. She took a deep breath, heaved a sigh. It was all part of growing up. You got these little quick passions, you blinked, and they were gone. You forgave faults, found perfection, fell madly; then the next day the sun came up and it was over. Chalk it up to experience, old girl, and get on with the morning. experience growing-pains passion youth William Goldman
bbbfe8c Time makes everything mean and shabby and wrinkled. The tragedy of life, Howard, is not that the beautiful things die young, but that they grow old and mean. beauty death die grow mean old shabby time tragedy wrinkled young youth Raymond Chandler
70bbab5 They had entered the thorny wilderness, and the golden gates of their childhood had for ever closed behind them. growing-up youth George Eliot
9dba995 Me--a teenager? If she suddenly stood, here, now, before me, would I need to treat her as near and dear, although she's strange to me, and distant? Shed a tear, kiss her brow for the simple reason that we share a birthdate? So many dissimilarities between us that only the bones are likely still the same, the cranial vault, the eye sockets. Since her eyes seem a little larger, her eyelashes are longer, she's taller, and the whole body is tightly sheathed in smooth, unblemished skin. Relatives and friends still link us, it is true, but in her world nearly all are living, while in mine almost no one survives from that shared circle. We differ so profoundly, talk and think about completely different things. She knows next to nothing-- but with a doggedness deserving better causes. I know much more-- but not for sure. She shows me poems, written in a clear and careful script I haven't used for years. I read the poems, read them. Well, maybe that one if it were shorter and touched up in a couple of places. The rest do not bode well. The conversation stumbles. On her pathetic watch time is still cheap and unsteady. On mine it's far more precious and precise. Nothing in parting, a fixed smile and no emotion. Only when she vanishes, leaving her scarf in her haste. A scarf of genuine wool, in colored stripes crocheted for her by our mother. I've still got it. change growth poetry self youth Wisława Szymborska
9bb0721 And I'll look back at him because I shan't be able to help it, remembering about being young, and about being made love to and making love, about pain and dancing and not being afraid of death, about all music I've ever loved, and every time I've been happy. love music nostalgia youth Jean Rhys
d5e05fa The thing about the old is that we never change so much as the young. We slip in degrees, adding rings like trees--a new wrinkle here, a shade less color there, but the young transform like caterpillars into butterflies. They become whole new people as if overnight. change youth Michael J. Sullivan
b8318fe Arrived at an age when others had already long been married and had children and held important positions, and were obliged to produce the best that was in them with all their energy, I still regarded myself as youthful, a beginner who faced immeasurable time, and I was hesitant about final decisions of any kind. time youth Stefan Zweig
0a00eb3 "The warm night claimed her. In a moment it was part of her. She walked on the grass, and her shoes were instantly soaked. She flung up her arms to the sky. Power ran to her fingertips. Excitement was communicated from the waiting trees, and the orchard, and the paddock; the intensity of their secret life caught at her and made her run. It was nothing like the excitement of ordinary looking forward, of birthday presents, of Christmas stockings, but the pull of a magnet - her grandfather had shown her once how it worked, little needles springing to the jaws - and now night and the sky above were a vast magnet, and the things that waited below were needles, caught up in the great demand. ("The Pool")" excitement excitement-of-youth night youth Daphne du Maurier
85e55cf Mrs. Hammon told me that God made my hair red on purpose and I haven't card for him since. youth L. M. Montgomery
3255d0c You know what I miss the most about my youth? My gullibility. It's nice believing in everything and everyone. It makes you feel secure, but be strong and depend more on yourself and you'll be ready for disappointments. That's the best advice I can offer you. youth V.C. Andrews
b7a7090 Will the freshness, lightheartedness, the need for love, and strength of faith which you have in childhood ever return? What better time than when the two best virtues -- innocent joy and the boundless desire for love -- were the only motives in life? childhood youth Leo Tolstoy
41517f8 We _are_ rich,' said Anne staunchly. 'Why, we have sixteen years to our credit, and we are as happy as queens and we've all got imaginations, more or less. Look at that sea, girls - all silver and shallow and vision of things not seen. We couldn't enjoy its loveliness any more if we had millions of dollars and ropes of diamonds. l-m-montgomery wealth youth L.M. Montgomery
326df3d Neoteny is more than retaining a youthful appearance, although that is often part of it. Neoteny is the retention of all those wonderful qualities that we associate with youth: curiosity, playfulness, eagerness, fearlessness, warmth, energy. Unlike those defeated by time and age, our geezers have remained much like our geeks - open, willing to take risks, hungry for knowledge and experience, courageous, eager to see what the new day brings. Time and lost steal the zest from the unlucky, and leave them looking longingly at the past. Neoteny is a metaphor for the quality - and the gift - that keeps the fortunate of whatever age focused on all marvelous undiscovered things to come. leadership vigor youth zeal Warren G. Bennis
44fc828 Young people have many pleasures and many sorrows, because they have only themselves to think of. sorrow wisdom youth Hermann Hesse
e081e39 I reflected that it seemed to be in the nature of human beings to spend the first part of their lives mocking the cliches and conventions of their elders and the final part mocking the cliches and conventions of the young. human-nature youth Michael Chabon
b916034 ...intelligence nowadays is all about application: it is the ability 'to take in a complex system and learn its rules on the fly'. For young people, this ability is second nature. Any fool knows that, if you need a new and unfamiliar VCR programmed in a hurry, you commandeer any small passing child to do it. technology youth Lynne Truss
5a7debc ...growing pale and sober with the thought that her fate was soon to be decided; for, like all young people, she was sure that her whole life could be settled by one human creature, quite forgetting how wonderfully Providence trains us by disappointment, surprises us with unexpected success, and turns our seeming trials into blessing. louisa-may-alcott youth Louisa May Alcott
fa19562 To love and be loved, that is the miracle of youth youth Victor Hugo
bd38666 But things are so bad, I feel like I'm going to explode if I don't do something. emotions feelings problems sad youth Margaret Peterson Haddix
c2eaf23 I didn't want to be educated. It wasn't the right time of my life for concentration, it really wasn't. The spirit of the age among the people I knew manifested itself as general drift and idleness. We didn't want money. What for? We could get by, living off parents, friends or the State And if we were going to be bored, and we were usually bored, rarely being self-motivated, we could at least be bored on our own terms, lying smashed on mattresses in ruined houses rather than working in the machine. I didn't want to work in a place where I couldn't wear my fur coat. work youth Hanif Kureishi
6669d73 It's hard not to be impatient with the absurdity of the young; they tell us that two and two make four as though it had never occurred to us, and they're disappointed if we can't share their surprise when they have discovered that a hen lays an egg. There's a lot of nonsense in their ranting and raving, but it's not all nonsense. One ought to sympathize with them; one ought to do one's best to understand. One has to remember how much has to be forgotten and how much has to be learnt when for the first time one faces life. It's not very easy to give up one's ideals, and the brute facts of every day are bitter pills to swallow. The spiritual conflicts of adolescence can be very severe and one can do little to resolve them. youth W. Somerset Maugham
1826994 Yes, you're right. It's part of growing up, I suppose. You always have to leave something behind you.u growing-up growth leaving left-behind youth Neil Gaiman
c13e756 Galinda didn't see the verdant world through the glass of the carriage; she saw her own reflection instead. She had the nearsightedness of youth. She reasoned that because she was beautiful she was significant, though what she signified, and to whom, was not clear yet...She was, after all, on her way to Shiz because she was smart. But there was more than one way to be smart. fiction maguire selfishness smart wicked young youth Gregory Maguire
a2bd562 Before and after the funeral I never ceased to cry and be miserable, but it makes me ashamed when I think back on that sadness of mine, seeing that always in it was an element of self-love - now a desire to show that I prayed more than any one else, now concern about the impression I was producing on others, now an aimless curiosity which caused me to observe Mimi's cap or the faces of those around me. I despised myself for not experiencing sorrow to the exclusion of everything else, and I tried to conceal all other feelings: this made my grief insincere and unnatural. Moreover, I felt a kind of enjoyment in knowing that I was unhappy and I tried to stimulate my sense of unhappiness, and this interest in myself did more than anything else to stifle real sorrow in me. childhood death funeral grief self-love sorrow tolstoy unhappiness youth Leo Tolstoy
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