David Nicholls Quotes
Sometimes, when it is going badly, she wonders if what she believes to be a love of the written word is really just a fetish for stationary.
She had reached a turning point. She no longer believed that a situation could be made better by writing a poem about it.
...and once again Dexter is struck by how easy conversation can be when no-one is in their right mind
What must that be like? To be admired before you’ve even said a word, to be desired two or three hundred times a day by people who have absolutely no idea what you’re like?
But at the best of times she feels like a character in a Muriel Spark novel — independent, bookish, sharp-minded, secretly romantic.
Their friendship was like a wilted bunch of flowers that she insisted on topping up with water. Why not let it die instead?
No matter how predictable, banal and listless the rest of my life might be, you can guarantee that there'll always be something interesting going on with my skin.
Sometimes I wish that I hadn't learned how to crochet," I say, and Alice laughs. Obviously she thinks I'm joking, which is maybe for the best.
She realises that if she is to save the show she is going to have to improvise a rousing speech, one of the many Henry V moments that make up her working life.
but they had also settled into the maddening familiarity of friendship; maddening for her at least.
The problem with all these fiercely individualistic girls was that they were all exactly the same.
I think you’re amazing,’ someone says to someone else, but it doesn’t matter who, because they’re all amazing really. People are amazing.
Everything was fine, and she had the rare, new sensation of being exactly where she wanted to be.
This is me.’" He handed her the precious scrap of paper. ‘Call me or I’ll call you, but one of us will call, yes? What I mean is it’s not a competition. You don’t lose if you phone first
If she does have a failing, and it's obviously only a tiny one, it's that she doesn't seem particularly curious about other people, or me, anyway.
I am not up to this. I am not capable. I thought I would be, but I'm not. Some part of me is missing, and I cannot do this.
She used to pride herself on her refusal to see two sides of an argument, but increasingly she accepts that issues are more ambiguous and complicated than she once thought.
Well, I don't think Hollywood's a dirty word at all, I love a lot of Hollywood films.
I really was a terrible actor. I did it for years in my twenties because it was like being at university again.
This is me.’" He handed her the precious scrap of paper. ‘Call me or I’ll call you, but one of us will call, yes? What I mean is it’s not a competition. You don’t lose if you phone first.
the crucial thing about an education is the opportunity tat it brings, the doors it opens, because otherwise knowledge, in and of itself, is a blind alley
Okay, well I think the programme is like being screamed at for an hour by a drunk with a strobe-light, but like I said--
I'm just not prepared to be treated like this anymore.''Treated like what?'She sighed, and it was a moment before she spoke. 'Like you always want to be somewhere else, with someone else.
Their friendship was like a wilted bunch of flowers that she insisted on topping up with water. Why not let it die instead? It was unrealistic to expect a friendship to last forever…
Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will.' Her lips touched his cheek. 'I just don't like you anymore. I'm sorry.
Keep the change, " he smiled. Was there ever a more empowering phrase than "Keep the change"?
Self-pitying, self-righteous, self-important, all the selfs except self-confident, the quality that she always needed the most.
You can live your whole life not realising that what you're looking for is right in front of you.
He swatted at her with his book. "Shut up and read, will you?"He lay back down and closed his eyes. Emma glanced over to check that he was smiling, and smiled too.
You should visit the Palatine. It's at the top of that hill . . .""I know where the Palatine is, Dexter, I was visiting Rome before you were born.""Yes, who was emperor back then?
...grief is as much about regret for what you've never had as sadness for what you've lost.
There is a point in the future where even the worst disaster starts to settle into an anecdote.
Familiarity, globalisation, cheap travel, mere weariness had diluted our sense of foreign-ness.
It's scented! Your wedding invitations are scented?""It's meant to be lavender.""No, Dex - it's money. It smells of money.
Their lips touched now, mouths pursed tight, their eyes open, both of them stock still. The moment held, a kind of such glorious confusion.
Generally speaking, I resolve to change my life on average maybe thirty to forty times a week, usually at about two a.m, drunk, ore early the next morning, hungover.
The problem with telling people that they can do anything they want to do is that it is objectively, factually inaccurate. Otherwise the whole world would just be ballet dancers and pop stars.
