David Levithan Quotes

Every day I am someone else. I am myself-I know I am myself-but I am also someone else. It has always been like this.

There comes a time when the body takes over the life. There comes a time when the body’s urges, the body’s needs, dictate the life. You have no idea you are giving the body the key. But you hand it over. And then it’s in control. You mess with the wiring and the wiring takes charge.

simon: that's disgusting! me: what's disgusting? simon: you know. you put your thing in the place where he, um, defecates.

When it comes to true dance, it's not about how you look, it's all about the joy you feel.

When distractions are manifold, it's best to remember what you are supposed to be doing.

me giving my mom romantic advice is kind of like a goldfish giving a snail advice on how to fly.” -Will Grayson (pg. 66)

But whether or not you are here, you are here—because these words are for you, and they wouldn't exist if you weren't here in some way.

Tell me a way you think this can work." "We'll find a way," I tell her. "That's not an answer. It's a hope." "Hope's gotten us this far. Not answers.

There is certainty in a ring. The non-ending, the non-beginning. The ongoing. The way it holds on to you not because it's fastened or stretched or adhered. It holds on because it fits.

We love and we feel and we try and we hope.

The words that matter always stay.

She stays in the same spot, anchored by the profound, desperate loneliness of a bad relationship.

Holden Caulfield is the embodiment of what we mean by the phrase “young adult” – too young to be a grown-up, but too wise to the world to be completely innocent. He’s caught in the in-between, and that in-between is what all young adult authors write about.

There are times I think of us all and I wish we were back in second grade. Not really that young. But I wish it felt like second grade. I’m not saying everyone was friends back then. But we all got along. There were groups, but they didn’t really divide. At the end of the day, your class was your class, and you felt like you were a part of it. You had your friends and you had the other kids, but you didn’t really hate anyone longer than a couple of hours. Everybody got a birthday card. In second grade, we were all in it together. Now we’re all apart.

In school, the year was the marker. Fifth grade. Senior year of high school. Sophomore year of college. Then after, the jobs were the marker. That office. This desk. But now that school is over and I've been working at the same place in the same office at the same desk for longer than I can truly believe, I realize: You have become the marker. This is your era. And it's only if it goes on and on that will have to look for other ways to identify the time.

I find I very rarely live up to my words. And since you know me primarily through my words, there are oh so many ways I can disappoint.

I never felt the urge to jump off a bridge, but there are times I have wanted to jump out of my life, out of my skin.

When first love ends, most people eventually know there will be more to come. They are not through with love. Love is not through with them. It will never be the same as the first, but it will be better in different ways.

People read vampire novels and say, Oh I want to read another vampire novel. People read fantasy, and theyre like, Oh I love fantasy. I dont know that people are necessarily finishing Hunger Games and immediately wanting to read another dystopian tale.

I hope that George doesn't internalize her scare tactics. I want to argue with her, tell her that "sins of the flesh" is just a control mechanism -- if you demonize a person's pleasure, then you can control his or her life. I can't say how many times this tool has been wielded against me, in a variety of forms. But I see no sin in a kiss. I only see sin in the condemnation.

...because if you can make yourself happy in the rain then you're doing pretty alright in life.

You can't know what it is like for us now--you will always be one step behind. Be thankful for that. You can't know what it was like for us then--you will always be one step ahead. Be thankful for that, too.

there was a time before you but I can't remember it now a time before your beauty and I were formally introduced I'm sure I lived without you but I don't remember how can't imagine living without these feelings you've produced just one glance and my life was redrawn just one word and my vocabulary changed I asked the time and you said 'what's the hurry?' you asked my name and I almost forgot

Ted is smart and good-looking, but he doesn't use it to good effect, like a rich person that never gives to charity.

It's as if when you love someone, they become your reason. And maybe I've gotten it backward, maybe it's just because I need a reason that I find myself falling in love with her. But I don't think that's it. I think I would have continued along, oblivious, if I hadn't happened to meet her.

That's the question, isn't it?" you said one night. "Does death bring freedom, or is it the end of freedom?

I had made it somewhere special, and I'd gotten there all on my own. Nobody had given it to me. Nobody had told me to do it. I'd climbed and climbed and climbed, and this was my reward. To watch over the world, and to be alone with myself. That, I found, was what I needed.

We switch to another language-- not our invented language or the language we've learned from our lives. As we walk further up the mountain, we speak the language of silence. This language gives us time to think and move. We can be here and elsewhere at the same time.

There are things I miss," you said. "But if I didn't have you, I'd miss more.

You have to believe there are kisses and laughs and risks worth taking.

I say good-bye to the part of myself that misses him so much.

I could point out that it isn't always easy knowing who you are and what you want, because then you have no excuse for not trying to get it.

The terrorists-those nineteen people, with hundreds or maybe thousands behind them-did the worst thing you can possibly imagine. But tens of millions people did the right thing...On 9/11, all the hatred and murder could not compare with the weight of love, of bravery, of caring.

I have no more idea now of who I am than I did before. But at least I know that. And I'm starting to figure out who I want to be.

Every you, every me. Fractals. Fractures.

You make it a production. Slam doors. Knock things over. Scream. But I just leave. Even if I'm still standing there, I leave. I am refusing you. I am denying you. I am an adjective that is quickly turning into a noun.

Some days are like this. And the only way to get through them is to remember that they are only one day, and that every day ends.

Remember that at any given moment there are a thousand things you can love.

No, really,' I said. 'I think she's great. And I honestly like her about twenty more times now than I did when we were dating. But love needs to have a future. And Sofia and I don't have a future. We've just had a good time sharing the present, that's all.

I've worn black today, because I've heard so often that it's supposed to be slimming. But instead I am this sphere of darkness submarining through the halls.

It’s up to you, not fate. True. But it was also up to Lily. That was the trickiest part.

I immediately suspected there was much more to it than was being said.

Music is everywhere. It’s in the air between us, waiting to be sung.

I still felt fondness for her - fondness, that pleasant, detached mix of admiration and sentiment, appreciation and nostalgia.

The assumption of the word reunion is that, once you're together again, you are united. Two as one. Pulling close to someone is only a temporary symbol. It's the way you breathe with each other that's the telltale sign.

But we comforted ourselves with what we really meant to say, which was: "I don't normally feel this good about what I'm doing." Measure the hope of that moment, that feeling. Everything else will be measured against it.

After tiny has tried ballerina pose, swing-batter-batter pose, pump-up-the-jam pose, and top-of-the-mountain-sound-of-music pose in the reflection of the bean, he walks us to a bench overlooking lake shore drive.

It was the most amazing feeling in the world. to know that something right happened, and to know that it had happened not through luck or command but simply because it was right.