Markus Zusak Quotes

When finally she finished and stood herself up, he put his arm around her, best-buddy style, and they walked on. There was no request for a kiss. Nothing like that. You can love Rudy for that, if you like.

~ Markus Zusak

So I saw that there was only me. There was only me who could worry about what was happening here, inside these walls of my life. Other people had their own worlds to worry about, and in the end, they had to fend for themselves, just like us.

~ Markus Zusak

I looked at myself in that window, oblivious to all the people around me and I stared and smiled that particular smile. You know that smile that seems to knock you and tell you how pathetic you are? That's the smile I was smiling.

~ Markus Zusak

July 24, 6:03 A.M.The laundry was warm and the rafters were firm, and Michael Holzapfel jumped from the chair as if it were a cliff...Michael Holzapfel knew what he was doing. He killed himself for wanting to live.

~ Markus Zusak

The Hubbermanns had two of their own (children), but they were older and had moved out...Soon they would be both in the war. One would be making bullets. The other would be shooting them.

~ Markus Zusak

On the ration cards of Nazi Germany, there was no listing for punishment, but everyone had to take their turn. For some it was death in a foreign country during the war. For others it was poverty and guilt when the war was over, when six million discoveries were made throughout Europe.

~ Markus Zusak

One eye open. One still in a dream

~ Markus Zusak

I kept walking. Have you ever done that? Just walk. Just walk and have no idea where you're going? It wasn't a good feeling, but not a bad one either. I felt caged and free at the same time, like it was only myself that wouldn't allow me to feel either great or miserable.

~ Markus Zusak

It's much easier . . . to be on the verge of something than to actually be it. This would still take time.

~ Markus Zusak

And when we finally stood up and turned to face the world, I could feel something climbing through me. I could feel it on its hands and knees inside me, rising up, rising up - and I smiled.I smiled, thinking, The hunger, because I knew it all too well.The hunger.The desire.Then, slowly, as we walked on, I felt the beauty of it, and I could taste it, like words inside my mouth.

~ Markus Zusak

A couple of them were school beauty-queen pretty while a few were that more real-looking type. A realer kind of pretty.

~ Markus Zusak

If her soul ever leaks, I want it to land on me.

~ Markus Zusak

... none of them had it. They had no qualms about stealing, but they needed to be told. They liked to be told, and Viktor Chemmel liked to be the teller. It was a nice microcosm.

~ Markus Zusak

Son, you can't go around painting yourself black, you hear? Why not, Papa? Because they'll take you away. Why? Because you shouldn't want to be like black people or Jewish people or anyone who is...not us. Who are Jewish people? You know my oldest customer, Mr. Kaufmann? Where we bought your shoes? Yes. Well, he's Jewish. I didn't know that. Do you have to pay to be Jewish? Do you need a license? ..... ...you've got beautiful blond hair and big safe blue eyes. You should be happy with that; is that clear?

~ Markus Zusak

I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that's where they begin. Their great skills is their capacity to escalate.

~ Markus Zusak

I'm just another stupid human.

~ Markus Zusak

I don't have much interest in building mystery. Mystery bores me. It chores me. I know what happens and so do you. It's the machinations that wheel us there that aggravate, perplex, interest, and astound me.

~ Markus Zusak

Imagine smiling after a slap in the face. Then think of doing it twenty-four hours a day.

~ Markus Zusak

She was battered and beaten up, and not smiling this time. Liesel could see it on her face. Blood leaked from her nose and licked at her lips. Her eyes had blackened. Cuts had opened up and a series of wounds were rising to the surface of her skin. All from the words. From Liesel's words.

~ Markus Zusak

Rosa Hubermann was sitting on the edge of the bed with her husband's accordion tied to her chest. Her fingers hovered above the keys. She did not move. She didn't ever appear to be breathing.

~ Markus Zusak

Humans, if nothing else, have the good sense to die.

~ Markus Zusak

Somewhere, far down, there was an itch in his heart, but he made it a point not to scratch it. He was afraid of what might come leaking out.

~ Markus Zusak

Disbelief held me down inside my footsteps, making my body heavy but my heart wild.

~ Markus Zusak

Because you don't learn anything unless you can find the patience to read. TV takes that away from you. It robs you from your mind.

~ Markus Zusak

It feels like spoken words, this bridge. I want it but fear it. God, I want so desperately to reach the other side - just like I want the words. I want my words to build bridges strong enough to walk on. I want them to tower over the world so I can stand up on them and walk to the other side.

~ Markus Zusak

... I felt something and vowed that if I ever got a girl I would treat her right and never be bad or dirty to her or hurt her, ever. I vowed it and had all the confidence in the world that I would keep the vow.

~ Markus Zusak

Well, have you even tried again? You can’t just sit around waiting for the new world to take it with you. You have to go out and be part of it - despite your past mistakes.

~ Markus Zusak

I told her I loved the howling sound of her harmonica. That seemed to be the limit of my courage that night, and even those spoken words had to struggle their way out of my mouth. It's all very well for words to build bridges, but sometimes I think it's a matter of knowing when to do it. Knowing when the time's right.

~ Markus Zusak

Ed? Ritchie says later. We're still standing in the water. There's only one thing I want.What's that, Ritchie?His answer is simple.To want.

~ Markus Zusak

the threat of Jewish competition was taken away, but so were the Jewish customers

~ Markus Zusak

It could be worse. I could be you.

~ Markus Zusak

a young man is still a boy, and a boy sometimes has the right to be stubborn.

~ Markus Zusak

They sat a few meters apart, speaking very rarely, and there was really only the noise of turning pages (…) Where Hans Hubermann and Erik Vandenburg were ultimately united by music, Max and Liesel were held together by the quiet gathering of words.Hi, Max.Hi, Liesel.They would sit and read.

~ Markus Zusak

The words. Why did they have to exist? Without them, there wouldn't be any of this.

~ Markus Zusak

She kept watching the words.

~ Markus Zusak

The orange flames waved at the crowd as paper and print dissolved inside them. Burning words were torn from their sentences.

~ Markus Zusak

The pages and the words are my world, spread out before your eyes and for your hand to touch. Vaguely, I can see you face looking down into me, as I look back. Do you see my eyes?

~ Markus Zusak

Our own place is mall perhaps, but when your old man is eaten by his own shadow, you realise that maybe in every house, something so savage and sad and brilliant is standing up, without the world even seeing it.Maybe that's what these pages of words are about:Bringing the world to the window.

~ Markus Zusak

At first, all is black and white.Black on white.That's where I'm walking, through pages.These pages.Sometimes it gets so that I have one foot in the pages and the words, and the other in what they speak of.

~ Markus Zusak

They're brainless girls, otherwise they wouldn't be seen dead here. They're pretty, with ugly, appealing smiles and conversations we can't hear. They breathe smoke and blow it out, and words drop from their mouths and get crushed to the floor. Or they get discarded, just to glow with warmth for a moment, for someone else to tread on later.

~ Markus Zusak