““I wouldn’t want that to get around, Annie.” “You don’t mean that, Carl.” “Ah, we might as well call them beanies, Annie.” “Why?” “When in Rome do as the Romans do.” “Do they call them beanies in Rome?” she asked artlessly. “This is the silliest conversation.”

Let me be something every minute of every hour of my life…And when I sleep, let me dream all the time so that not one little piece of living is ever lost.

Books became her friends, and there was one for every mood.

She was surprised at how tiny it seemed now. She supposed the school was just as big as it had ever been only her eyes had grown used to looking at bigger things.

Brooklyn was a dream. All the things that happened there just couldn’t happen. It was all dream stuff. Or was it all real and true and was it that she, Francie, was the dreamer?

Look at everything always as though you were seeing it either for the first or last time: Thus is your time on earth filled with glory.

She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library past and freshly inked stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.

I’ll have a desk like this in my parlor and white walls and a clean green blotter every Saturday night and a row of shining yellow pencils always sharpened for writing and a golden-brown bowl with a flower or some leaves or berries always in it and books . . . books . . . books. . . .

I tried my best to kill that man in the hallway. Then one sunny day, they walk out in all innocence and they walk right into the grief that you’d give your life to spare them from.

She must start out believing in things not of this world. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination.

She told Papa about it. He made her stick out her tongue and he felt her wrist. He shook his head sadly and said, “You have a bad case, a very bad case.” “Of what?” “Growing up.

Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’

New York! I’ve always wanted to see it and now I’ve see it. It’s true what they say– it’s the most wonderful city in the world.

The world was hers for the reading.

I can never give a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’ I don’t believe everything in life can be settled by a monosyllable.

From that moment on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again.

I hate all those flirty-birty games that women make up. Life’s too short. If you ever find a man you love, don’t waste time hanging your head and simpering. Go right up to him and say, ‘I love you. How about getting married?

Did they look like anyone we know? For example a cross between pippi longstocking and the wicked witch of the west would obviously give us marcie millar

Anyone who knows me well must understand and be sympathetic to my genuine need to be my own greatest hero. It is not a flaw of character; it is a catastrophe.

You have a right to have a feather duster. If anyone breaks in, you can make sure they’re really clean as they’re robbing your house.

No matter what anybody says, we can’t have it all. Not if you are a woman. Not yet.

The point is not to convert anyone to our view, but rather to help people wake to their own view, their own sanity.

Anyone who reaches for great expression has to be careful of the ridiculous.

If anyone wants to know why three kids in one family made it to the big leagues they just had to know how we helped each other and how much we practiced back then. We did it every minute we could.

We cannot demand that anyone try to attain justice and freedom who has not had a chance to imagine them as attainable.