Markus zusak quotes

Liesel shrugged away entirely from the crowd and entered the tide of Jews, weaving through them till she grabbed hold of his arm with her left hand. His face fell on her. It reached down as she tripped, and the Jew,the nasty Jew, helped her up. It took all of his strength.

The only thing worse than a boy who hates you: a boy that loves you.

There are moments when you can only stand and stare, watching the world forget you as you remove yourself from it - when you overcome it and cease to exist as the person you were.

If they killed him tonight, at least he would die alive.

My arms are killing me. I didn't know words could be so heavy.

She wanted none of those days to end, and it was always with disappointment that she watched the darkness stride forward.

Please, trust me, I most definitely can be cheerful. I can be amiable. Agreeable. Affable. And that's only the A's. Just don't ask me to be nice. Nice has nothing to do with me.

Only in today's sick society can a man be persecuted for reading too many books.

A small but noteworthy note. I've seen so many young men over the years who think they're running at other young men. They are not. They are running at me.

Like most misery, it started with apparent happiness.

The night is alive with stars, and when I lie down and look up, I get lost up there. I feel like I’m falling, but upward, into the abyss of sky above me.

It was one of those moments of perfect tiredness, of having conquered not only the work at hand, but the night who had blocked the way.

I guess that’s the beauty of books. When they finish they don’t really finish.

Goodbye, Papa, you saved me. You taught me to read. No one can play like you. I'll never drink champagne. No one can play like you." -Liesel

***A Last note from your narrator*** I am haunted by humans.

...one opportunity leads directly to another, just as risk leads to more risk, life to more life, and death to more death.

The injury of words. Yes, the brutality of words.

She closes the door completely, and I crouch there. I allow myself to fall forward and rest my head on the door frame. My breath bleeds. My heartbeat drowns my ears.

Grimly, she realized that clocks don't make a sound that even remotely resembles ticking, tocking. It was more the sound of a hammer, upside down, hacking methodically at the earth. It was the sound of a grave.

She was saying goodbye and she didn't even know it.

When death captures me," the boy vowed, "he will feel my fist in his face." (31.26)

Liesel's blood had dried inside of her. It crumbled. She almost broke into pieces on the steps.

Rudy handed it back. "Speaking of which, I think we're both slightly in for it when we get home. You especially." "Why me?" "You know- your mama." "What about her?" Liesel was exercising the blatant right of every person who's ever belonged to a family. It's all very well for such a person to whine and moan and criticize other family members, but they won't let anyone else do it. That's when you get your back up and show loyalty.

They say that war is death's best friend, but I must offer you a different point of view on that one. To me, war is like the new boss who expects the impossible. He stands over your shoulder repeating one thin, incessantly: 'Get it done, get it done.' So you work harder. You get the job done. The boss, however, does not thank you. He asks for more.

Maybe everyone can live beyond what they're capable of.

So many humans. So many colors.

I certainly wasn't born with creative writing. Maybe there's a certain amount of learning and then it's up to the person. I think in the end it's your favourite books that are the best teachers. That's the way I've learned the most, by far.

I am hunted by humans.

It was the beginning of the greatest Christmas ever. Little food. No presents. But there was a snowman in their basement.

All my friends seem to be smart arses. Don't ask me why. Like many things, it is what it is.

You can do anything when it's not real.

That was when the world wasn't so big and I could see everywhere. It was when my father was a hero and not a human.

How do you tell if something's alive? You check for breathing.

He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It’s his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry.

It would then be brought abruptly to an end, for the brightness had shown suffering the way.

Imagine smiling after a slap in the face. Then think of doing it twenty-four hours a day.

They'd been standing like that for thirty seconds of forever.

... And the boy whose hair remained the color of lemons forever.

There are so many moments to remember and sometimes I think that maybe we're not really people at all. Maybe moments are what we are.... Sometimes I just survive. But sometimes I stand on the rooftop of my existence, arms stretched out, begging for more.

He's most likely robbing the bank as a paycheck on the world for winning the ugliness prize at his local fete three years running.

I could introduce myself properly, but it's not really necessary. You will know me well enough and soon enough, depending on a diverse range of variables. It suffices to say that at some point in time, I will be standing over you, as genially as possible. Your soul will be in my arms. A color will be perched on my shoulder. I will carry you gently away.

When her hands reached out and poured the tea, it was as if she also poured something into me while I sat there sweating in my cab. It was like she held a string and pulled on it just slightly to open me up. She got in, put a piece of herself inside me, and left again.

I have to say that although it broke my heart, I was, and still am, glad I was there.

His eyes were cold and brown - like coffee stains.

Sometimes I just survive. But sometimes I stand on the rooftop of my existence, arms stretched out, begging for more.

Very quickly, very suddenly, words fell through my mind. They landed on the floor of my thoughts, and in there, down there, I started to pick the words up. They were excerpts of truth gathered from inside me.

I had to decide what I was going to do, and what I was going to be. I was standing there, waiting for someone to do something , till I realised the person I was waiting for was myself.

A DEFINITION NOT FOUND IN THE DICTIONARY Not leaving: an act of trust and love, often deciphered by children

How'd it feel?" Rube asked himself. "I don't know exactly, but it made me want to howl.

She took a step and didn't want to take any more, but she did.

She was like a lone angel floating above the surface of the earth, laughing with delight because she could fly but crying out of loneliness.

As she watched all of this, Liesel was certain that these were the poorest souls alive. That's what she wrote about them . . . Some looked appealingly at those who had come to observe their humiliation, this prelude to their deaths. Others pleaded for someone, anyone to step forward and catch them in their arms. No one did.

He killed himself for wanting to live.

It's not a big thing, but I guess it's true--big things are often just small things that are noticed.

I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that's where they begin. Their great skills is their capacity to escalate.

Only hearts... They're in the inside of the inside of me.

I think that as a writer your responsibility is to search for and stir up the things that are in this world. There is violence in all of us, and beauty, and strength, and weakness. What's my job? To only write about the good and the beauty, or is it to write about all of it? That's my greater responsibility, to write about them as I see them and as they are.

The commitment had disappeared, and although he still watched the imagined glory of stealing, she could see now he was not believing. He was trying to believe it, and that’s never a good sign.

I always marvel at the humans' ability to keep going. They always manage to stagger on even with tears streaming down their faces.

A SMALL PIECE OF TRUTH I do not carry a sickle or scythe. I only wear a hooded black robe when it's cold. And I don't have those skull-like facial features you seem to enjoy pinning on me from a distance. You want to know what I truly look like? I'll help you out. Find yourself a mirror while I continue.

Sometimes you read a book so special that you want to carry it around with you for months after you've finished just to stay near it.

When she faced the noise, she found the mayor’s wife in a brand-new bathrobe and slippers. On the breast pocket of the robe sat an embroidered swastika. Propaganda even reached the bathroom.

No matter how many times she was told that she was loved, there was no recognition that the proof was in the abandonment.

I feel the fear, but I walk fast toward it.

There were people everywhere on the city street, but the stranger could not have been more alone if it were empty.

I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race - that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.

Around us I can sniff out a savagery in the noisy southern air. It knifes it's way into my nose, but I do not bleed blood. It's fear I bleed, and it gushes out over my lip. I wipe it away, in a hurry.

I walked home, seeing all my doubt from the other side. Have you ever seen that? Like when you go on holiday. On the way back, everything is the same but it looks a little different than it did on the way. It's because you're seeing it backwards.

A snowball in the face is surely the perfect beginning to a lasting friendship.

It's hard to not like a man who not only notices the colors, but speaks them

She was battered and beaten up, and not smiling this time. Liesel could see it on her face. Blood leaked from her nose and licked at her lips. Her eyes had blackened. Cuts had opened up and a series of wounds were rising to the surface of her skin. All from the words. From Liesel's words.

I'd rather chase the sun than wait for it.

Even death has a heart.

The sky is blue today, Max, and there is a big long cloud, and it's stretched out, like a rope. At the end of it, the sun is like a yellow hole. . .

At first, she could not talk. Perhaps it was the sudden bumpiness of love she felt for him. Or had she always loved him?

Just be patient, she told herself, and with the mounting pages, the strength of her writing fist grew.

But then, is there cowardice in the acknowledgment of fear? Is there cowardice in being glad that you lived?

I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.

I love and hate this place because it is full of words.

The water crumbles on it's way down as my hands and feet push me forward. The world is lightening, taking shape, and turning to color. It feels like it's being painted around me.

So much good, so much evil. Just add water.

You'll have days of complete lack of faith in your abilities. But you have to keep coming back. That's when you know you're a writer - when you take the failures and appear at the desk again, over and over again.

For a moment, I panic. It's that feeling of falling when you know without question, that you've lost control of your car, or made a mistake that's beyond repair. 'What do I do now?' I ask desperately. 'Tell me! What do I do now?' He remains calm. He looks at me closely and says, 'Keep living, Ed... It's only the pages that stop here.

The bittersweetness of uncertainty: To win or to lose.

Do we spend most of our days trying to remember or to forget? Do we spend most of our time running towards or away from our lives?

Things always seem to glide away. They come to you, stay a moment, then leave again.

I want words at my funeral. But I guess that means you need life in your life.

When he moves, a streetlight stabs him, and the words flow out like blood.

It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on, coughing and searching, and finding.

The orange flames waved at the crowd as paper and print dissolved inside them. Burning words were torn from their sentences.

You’re a human, you should understand self-obsession.

Summer came. For the book thief, everything was going nicely. For me, the sky was the color of Jews. When their bodies had finished scouring for gaps in the door, their souls rose up. When their fingernails had scratched at the wood and in some cases were nailed into it by the sheer force of desperation, their spirits came toward me, into my arms, and we climbed out of those shower facilities, onto the roof and up, into eternity's certain breadth. They just kept feeding me. Minute after minute. Shower after shower.

He watched them grow, until eventually, great forests of words had risen throughout Germany.... It was a nation of farmed thoughts.

...there would be punishment and pain, and there would be happiness, too. That was writing.

She said it out loud, the words distributed into a room that was full of cold air and books. Books everywhere! Each wall was armed with overcrowded yet immaculate shelving. It was barely possible to see paintwork. There were all different styles and sizes of lettering on the spines of the black, the red, the gray, the every-colored books. It was one of the most beautiful things Liesel Meminger had ever seen. With wonder, she smiled. That such a room existed!

I like to tell students, 'I didn't burst on to the literary scene.' I'm never good at things at the beginning. I was terrible at the start. I need to work and work.

The pages and the words are my world, spread out before your eyes and for your hand to touch. Vaguely, I can see you face looking down into me, as I look back. Do you see my eyes?

The consequence of this is that I'm always finding humans at their best and worst. I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both.

Sometimes I think my papa is an accordion. When he looks at me and smiles and breathes, I hear the notes.

You should give it to Max, Liesel. See if you can leave it on the bedside table, like all the other things." Liesel watched him as if he'd gone insane. "How, though?" Lightly, he tapped her skull with his knuckles. "Memorize it. Then write it down for him.

Papa sat with me tonight. He brought the accordion down and sat close to where Max used to sit. I often look at his fingers and face when he plays. the accordion breathes. There are lines on his cheeks. They look drawn on, and for some reason, when I see them, I want to cry. It is not for any sadness or pride. I just like the way they move and change. Sometimes I think my papa is an accordion. When he looks at me and smiles and breathes, I hear the notes.

It is early, early morning. It's that time when it's still dark but you know the day is coming. Blue is bleeding through black. Stars are dying.

I like that every page in every book can have a gem on it. It's probably what I love most about writing--that words can be used in a way that's like a child playing in a sandpit, rearranging things, swapping them around. They're the best moments in a day of writing -- when an image appears that you didn't know would be there when you started work in the morning.

I have hated words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right.

A REASSURING ANNOUNCEMENT Please, be calm, despite that previous threat. I am all bluster - I am not violent. I am not malicious. I am a result.

When she came to write her story, she would wonder when the books and the words started to mean not just something, but everything.

People have defining moments, i suppose, especially when they're children.

A fighter can be a winner, but that doesn't make a winner a fighter.

And they would all smile at the beauty of destruction.

As always, one of her books was next to her.

Mistakes, mistakes, it's all I seem capable of at times.

The impoverished always try to keep moving, as if relocating might help. They ignore the reality that a new version of the same old problem will be waiting at the end of the trip- the relative you cringe to kiss.

I want to talk to him. I want to ask him about that girl and if he loved her and still misses her. Nothing, however, exits my mouth. How well do we really let ourselves know each other? There's a long quietness until I finally break it open. It reminds me of someone breaking bread and handing it out. In my case, I hand out a question to my friend.

Somewhere, far down, there was an itch in his heart, but he made it a point not to scratch it. He was afraid of what might come leaking out.

What do you want to kiss me for? I'm filthy.'- Liesel So am I.'- Rudy

Make no mistake, the woman had a heart. She had a bigger one that people would think. There was a lot in it, stored up, high in miles of hidden shelving. Remember that she was the woman with the instrument strapped to her body in the long, moon-slit night.

It felt as though the whole globe was dressed in snow. Like it has pulled it on, the way you pull on a sweater. Next to the train line, footprints were sunken to their shins. Trees wore blankets of ice. As you may expect, someone has died.

Maybe one morning I’ll wake up and step outside of myself to look back at the old me lying dead among the sheets.

It's funny, don't you think, how time seems to do a lot of things? It flies, it tells, and worst of all, it runs out.

Usually we walk around constantly believing ourselves. "I'm okay" we say. "I'm alright". But sometimes the truth arrives on you and you can't get it off. That's when you realize that sometimes it isn't even an answer--it's a question. Even now, I wonder how much of my life is convinced.

She could smell the pages. She could almost taste the words as they stacked up around her.

Very suddenly. Yes, quite suddenly, I didn't feel like I could handle my feeling of aloneness.

She leaned down and looked at his lifeless face and Leisel kissed her best friend, Rudy Steiner, soft and true on his lips. He tasted dusty and sweet. He tasted like regret in the shadows of trees and in the glow of the anarchist's suit collection. She kissed him long and soft, and when she pulled herself away, she touched his mouth with her fingers...She did not say goodbye. She was incapable, and after a few more minutes at his side, she was able to tear herself from the ground. It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on.

The book thief has struck for the first time – the beginning of an illustrious career.

As we walk back, it feels like the city is engulfing us. Adrenalin still pours through our veins. Sparks flow through to our fingers. We've still been running in the mornings, but the city's different then. It's filled with hope and with bristles of winter sunshine. In the evening, it's like it dies, waiting to be born again the next morning.