Every night before putting her to sleep, Yankel counts her ribs, as if one might have disappeared in the course of the day and become the seed and soil for some new companion to steal her away from him.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI didn’t feel empty. I wished I’d felt empty. … I wanted to be empty like an overturned pitcher. But I was full like a stone.
More Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes
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We talked about nothing in particular, but it felt like we were talking about the most important things.
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There were things I wanted to tell him. But I knew they would hurt him. So I buried them, and let them hurt me.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
The hardest part of writing is not to get the ideas but to remember, why it is important to get them.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
Ironically, the utterly unselective omnivore — “I’m easy; I’ll eat anything” — can appear more socially sensitive than the individual who tries to eat in a way that is good for society.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
With writing, we have second chances.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
I can forgive you for leaving, but not for coming back.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
I want an infinitely blank book and the rest of time.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
I wasn’t trying to invent better and better homes, but to show her that homes didn’t matter, we could live in any home, in any city, in any country, in any century, and be happy, as if the world were just what we lived in.
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This is love, she thought, isn’t it? When you notice someone’s absence and hate that absence more than anything? More, even, than you love his presence?
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
Also, I designed a pretty fascinating bracelet, where you put a rubber band around your favorite book of poems for a year, and then you take it off and wear it.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
Tomorrow was over the horizon, and would take an entire day to reach.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
Choosing leaf or flesh, factory farm or family farm, does not in itself change the world, but teaching ourselves, our children, our local communities, and our nation to choose conscience over ease can.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
It’s so beautiful at this hour. The sun is low, the shadows are long, the air is cold and clean. You won’t be awake for another five hours, but I can’t help feeling that we’re sharing this clear and beautiful morning.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER -
He couldn’t bear to live, but he couldn’t bear to die. He couldn’t bear the thought of he making love to someone else, but neither could he bear the absence of the thought. And as for the note, he couldn’t bear to keep it, but he couldn’t bear to destroy it either.
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We live in a world made up more of story than stuff. We are creatures of memory more than reminders, of love more than likes.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER