David Nicholls Quotes

He wanted to live life in such a way that if a photograph were taken at random, it would be a cool photograph.

As soon as she'd met him at the arrivals gate on his return from Thailand, lithe and brown and shaven-headed, she knew that there was no chance of a relationship between them. Too much had happened to him, too little had happened to her.

I worry sometimes that I'm a bit moralistic; always writing about men who are learning to grow up, not be so self-absorbed, selfish or badly behaved. I wonder if that's dull and liberal and wimpy? I should probably write something that celebrates wickedness.

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?

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.

Be good. Do something good.

It's the face itself that I love, not that face at twenty-eight or thirty-four or forty-three. It's that face.

you feel a little bit lost right now about what to do with your life, a bit rudderless and oarless and aimless but that's okay that's alright because we're all meant to be like that at twenty-four.

You start out wanting to change the world through language, and end up thinking it's enough to tell a few good jokes.

Do you miss her?' 'Who? Emma? Of course. Every day. She was my best friend.

These days grief seems like walking on a frozen river; most of the time he feels safe enough, but there is always that danger that he will plunge through. Now he hears the ice creak beneath him, and so intense and panicking is the sensation that he has to stand for a moment, press his hands to his face and catch his breath.

I know that for every reader who has lost the habit or can't find the time, there are people who've never enjoyed reading and question the value of literature, either as entertainment or education, or believe that a love of books, and of fiction in particular, is sentimental or frivolous.

Cuddling was for great aunts and teddy bears. Cuddling gave him cramp.

Being a decent human being will require effort and energy.

Letters, like compilation tapes, were really vehicles for unexpressed emotions and she was clearly putting far too much time and energy into them.

I'm trying to be inspiring! I'm trying to lift your grubby soul for the great adventure that lies ahead of you!

Today. This bright new day that awaits us

There's no shortage of orphans in 19th-century literature, but it's hard to find a single happy, communicative, functional parental relationship in the whole of 'Great Expectations,' even among the minor characters.

Failure and unhappiness is easier because you can make a joke out of it.

I had always been led to believe that ageing was a slow and gradual process, the creep of a glacier. Now I realise that it happens in a rush, like snow falling off a roof.

She glanced at the other diners, all of them going into their act, and thought is this what it all boils down to? Romantic love, is this all it is, a talent show?

I tell you what it is. It's...when I didn't see you, I thought about you every day, I mean every day in some way or another -" "Same here -" "- even if it was just 'I wish Dexter could see this' or 'where's Dexter now?' or 'Christ, that Dexter, what an idiot', you know what I mean, and seeing you today, well, I thought I'd got you back - my best friend. And now all this, the wedding, the baby - I'm so happy for you, Dex. But it feels like I've lost you again.

…and Emma felt another small portion of her soul fall away.

From an evolutionary point of view, most emotions - fear, desire, anger - serve some practical purpose, but nostalgia is a useless, futile thing because it is a longing for something that is permanently lost . . . .

He put one hand lightly on the back of her neck and simultaneously she placed one hand lightly on his hip, and they kissed in the street as all around them people hurried home in the summer light, and it was the sweetest kiss that either of them would ever know. This is where it all begins. Everything starts here, today. And then it was over.

My 20s was a sea of worry. I worried about benefit forms, about being thrown out of my flat. I never went on holiday because I thought: 'What if an audition comes up?' I was a nervous wreck.

A screenplay is really an instruction manual, and it can be interpreted in any number of ways. The casting, the choice of location, the costumes and make-up, the actors' reading of a line or emphasis of a word, the choice of lens and the pace of the cutting - these are all part of the translation.

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.

Once you decide not to worry about that stuff anymore, dating and relationships and love and all that, it's like you're free to get on with real life.

This is where it all begins. Everything starts here, today.

A moment passed, perhaps half a second when their faces said what they felt, and then Emma was smiling, laughing, her arms around his neck.

She wondered if she was doomed to be one of those people who spend their lives trying things.

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.

Call me sentimental, but there's no-one in the world that I'd like to see get dysentery more than you

She glanced across to where Tilly and her brand new husband were posing for photographs, Tilly fluttering a fan coquettishly in front of her face. 'Unfortunately I didn't realise there was a French Revolutionary theme.' 'The Marie-Antoinette thing?' said Dexter. 'Well at least we know there'll be cake.

I applied for the University of Life. Didn't get the grades.

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

For the best part of my childhood I visited the local library three or four times a week, hunching in the stacks on a foam rubber stool and devouring children's fiction, classics, salacious thrillers, horror and sci-fi, books about cinema and origami and natural history, to the point where my parents encouraged me to read a little less.

If you have to keep a secret it's because you shouldn't be doing it in the first place

This isn't a letter, it's a gift.

I've been a compulsive reader for as long as I can remember.

No, friends were like clothes: fine while they lasted but eventually they wore thin or you grew out of them.

I still find it absurdly difficult to concentrate on a novel if there's a phone or computer to hand; I have taken to locking them outside the room like noisy pets.

Who do you think you are, Jane Eyre? Grow up. Be sensible. Don't get carried away.

I suppose the important thing is to make some sort of difference,’ she siad. ‘You know, actually change something.’ ‘What, like “change the world”, you mean?’ ‘Not the whole entire world. Just the little bit around you.

There's something unnatural about a woman finding babies or, more specifically, conversation about babies, boring. They'll think she's bitter, jealous, lonely. But she's also bored of everybody telling her how lucky she is, what with all that sleep and all that freedom and spare time, the ability to go on dates or head off to Paris at a moments notice. It sounds like they're consoling her, and she resents this and feels patronized by it.

Find the thing you love, and do it with all your heart, to the absolute best of your ability, no matter what people say.

I work three days at home, and two days in the British Library or the London Library, just to get out of the house and hide from the children.