Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes

We are not long-term beings. Not heroes of romances in many volumes. For one gesture, for one word alone, we shall make the effort. We openly admit: our creations will be temporary. We shall have this as our aim: a gesture.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Admit Effort Goal Human Open Romance Temporary Time Volume
I shook my tambourine the whole time, because it helped me remember that even though I was going through different neighborhoods, I was still me.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Different Help Myself Remember Time
Food serves two parallel purposes: it nourishes and it helps you remember. Eating and storytelling are inseparable-the saltwater is also tears; the honey not only tastes sweet, but makes us think of sweetness; the matzo is the bread of our affliction.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Food Help Honey Nourish Ourselves Purpose Remember Serve Tears
I tried the key in all the doors, even though he said he didn’t recognize it. It’s not that I didn’t trust him, becuase I did. It’s that at the end of my search I wanted to be able to say: I don’t know how I could have tried harder.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Hard Key Myself Trust Try
She was with me. She did all of those things and so many more, things I would never tell anyone, and she never even loved me. Now that’s love.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Herself Love Myself Togetherness
Memory was supposed to fill the time, but it made time a hole to be filled. Each second was two hundred yards, to be walked, crawled. You couldn’t see the next hour, it was so far in the distance. Tomorrow was over the horizon, and would take an entire day to reach.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Day Distance Fill Memories Reach Time Walk Yourself
Just to be a functioning adult in the world, we develop all of these layers of protection. When we see homeless people, we don’t cry, even though homeless people probably deserve our tears – you know, it’s a horrible thing.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Adult Cry Deserve Development Function Home Ourselves People World
I wasn’t having second thoughts, but I was having thoughts.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Myself Thinking
I imagine a line, a white line, painted on the sand and on the ocean, from me to you.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Imagination Myself Ocean Yourself
Every factory-farmed animal is, as a practice, treated in ways that would be illegal if it were a dog or a cat.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Animal Cat Dog Farm Illegal Practice Treat Way
I never confused what I had with what I was.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Confusion Myself
The world is a big place,” he said, “but so is the inside of an apartment!
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Himself Place Room World
Not responding is a response – we are equally responsible for what we don’t do.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Deep Equality Respond Silence
I was more alone than if I had been alone.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Alone Myself
I could not believe in a God that would challenge faith like this.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Believe Challenge Faith God Myself
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

Absence Hate Himself Love Presence
I dreamt four nights ago of clock hands descending from the universe like rain, of the moon as a green eye, of mirrors and insects, of a love that never withdrew. It was not the feeling of completeness that I so needed, but the feeling of not being empty.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Complete Dreams Fantasy Feeling Myself Universe
I’d rather somebody hate what I do than be indifferent to it.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Different Hate Myself
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

Book Design Fascination Myself Poem Yourself
I felt shame for living in a nation of unprecedented prosperity-a nation that spends a smaller percentage of income on food than any other civilization has in human history-but in the name of affordability treats the animals it eats with cruelty so extreme it would be illegal if inflicted on a dog.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Animal Civilization Dog Feeling Illegal Name Nation Prosperity Shame Treat
I put my hand on the doorknob because I thought maybe her hand was on the doorknob on the other side.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Hands Myself Side Thinking
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 FOER

Appearance Himself Night Sleep Steal
I woke up once in the middle of the night, and Buckminster’s paws were on my eyelids. He must have been feeling my nightmares.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Feeling Myself Night Nightmare Wake Up
I felt suddenly shy. I was not used to shy. I was used to shame. Shyness is when you turn your head away from something you want. Shame is when you turn your head away from something you do not want.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Difference Emotion Feeling Shame Shy Yourself
The hardest part of writing is not to get the ideas but to remember, why it is important to get them.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Hard Ideas Important Remember Writing
She extended a hand that I didn’t know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Break Fingers Hands Herself Silence
There are only some many times you can utter “It does not hurt” before it begins to hurt even more than the hurt.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER

Beginning Hurt Time Yourself

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