Jonathan Carroll Quotes

If you are a success in life, there are places you must go and pay to be humiliated. It is an unwritten law that human beings must be tormented throughout their lives in one way or another. If you are fortunate enough to have risen to a social level where no one does it to you for free, then you must pay for the service.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Time talks behind our back. To our face it's friendly and logical, never hesitating to give more of itself. But when we're not looking, it steals our lives and says bad things about us to the parts of us it's stolen

~ Jonathan Carroll

The only two important things in life are real love and being at peace with yourself.

~ Jonathan Carroll

One of the reasons why I liked living in Manhattan was that the city would share your mood the moment you walked out the door. If you were in a hurry, everything else was too, even the pigeons. You shared the same speed and sense of urgency to get wherever you were going.When you had time to kill, it was happy to give you things to look at and do that easily took up whole days. I didn't agree with people who said Manhattan was a cold, indifferent town. Sure it was gruff, but it was also playful and sometimes very funny.

~ Jonathan Carroll

The angel said, I like black-and-white films more than color because they're more artificial. You have to work harder to overcome your disbelief. It's sort of like prayer.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Patience never wants Wonder to enter the house: because Wonder is a wretched guest. It uses all of you but is not careful with what is most fragile or irreplaceable. If it breaks you, it shrugs and moves on. Without asking, Wonder often brings along dubious friends: doubt, jealousy, greed. Together they take over; rearrange the furniture in every one of your rooms for their own comfort. They speak odd languages but make no attempt to translate for you. They cook strange meals in your heart that leave odd tastes and smells. When they finally go are you happy or miserable? Patience is always left holding the broom.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Animals are on earth to protect mankind. When you gather a bunch of them together like this, you create a safe haven. Nothing can touch you here.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Here's something you must know and don't forget it - animals never lie. They don't like, they don't put on disguises, and they are always true to what they are. That's why you can trust them.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Yo can always take back the lost parts of yourself if you can find and recognize them.

~ Jonathan Carroll

A short story is a sprint, a novel is a marathon. Sprinters have seconds to get from here to there and then they are finished. Marathoners have to carefully pace themselves so that they don't run out of energy (or in the case of the novelist-- ideas) because they have so far to run. To mix the metaphor, writing a short story is like having a short intense affair, whereas writing a novel is like a long rich marriage.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Only the guilty and the lovers really fear. The first because of what they are, the second for what they might lose.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Real love is always chaotic. You lose control; you lose perspective. You lose the ability to protect yourself. The greater the love, the greater the chaos. It’s a given and that’s the secret.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Reading a book, for me at least, is like traveling in someone else's world. If it's a good book, then you feel comfortable and yet anxious to see what's going to happen to you there, what'll be around the next corner. But if it's a lousy book, then it's like going through Secaucus, New Jersey -- it smells and you wish you weren't there, but since you've started the trip, you roll up the windows and breathe through your mouth until you're done.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Both young children and old people have a lot of time on their hands. That's probably why they get along so well.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Women are always complaining about men's fascination with breasts. But what if men were absolutely indifferent to breasts? What would women do then with these things that serve one function once or twice in a lifetime, and the rest of the time are just in the way?

~ Jonathan Carroll

The Viennese wash everything. Where else in the world does the government hire public servants to wash public telephone booths and the glass over traffic lights? Every time I see someone doing these things, I smile like a child.

~ Jonathan Carroll

Even the handsomest men do not have the same momentary effect on the world as a truly beautiful woman does.

~ Jonathan Carroll