Highlights

"We both have giveaway last names, names that mean some people will never consider us real Americans."

"Well, who wants to be?" [21]

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Let yourself be loved. For all you know, there's a long line of people wanting you to let them in. [67]

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You get used to not talking. You get used to the silence. It's hard, you know, to break a silence that becomes a part of how you see yourself. Silence becomes a way of living. [79]

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It's not such a good thing to feel if you don't know how to think. [112]

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If we're lucky. If we're very lucky, the universe will send us the people we need to survive. [189]

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We have to be honest about our own limitations. [248]

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When you know you've made a mistake, don't live in it. [248]

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One of these days the world is going to be very surprised by the things we accomplish. But we won't be. We won't be surprised at all. Because we will have learned by then what we have in us. [269]

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Sometimes it was so unnecessary to whisper the words "I love you." [296]

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Sometimes we have to be able to speak for those who can't. That takes a lot of courage. I'm not sure I have that kind of courage in me. But you do. I envy your courage. [319]

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[H]e had become nothing more than a memory. But he was more than that. Of course, he was much more than that. People aren't memories. [330]

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Dad said that the only thing you leave on this earth after you die that's worth anything at all is your name. I wanted my father to live forever. But that wasn't going to happen. And every time I entered a library, I was going to grab a book and write his name in it. So I could keep his name in this world. [336]

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Ari, people love. Who they love and why they love, who knows how that happens? And people hate. Who and why they hate, who knows how that happens? I found the meaning of my life when.

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I met your mother. That doesn't mean that there weren't a thousand questions left unanswered. I've tried to come up with my own answers. And very often, I have failed. I've learned not to punish myself for my failures. And I try — but do not always succeed — to greet the day with gratitude. [338]

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Don't ever let anybody tell you that war is something beautiful or heroic. When people say war is hell, war is hell. Cowards start wars, and the brave fight them. [349]

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Never do anything to prove to anyone else, or even to prove to yourself, that you're a man. Because you are a man. [370]

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My father hated a few things; racism was one of them. He said he worked hard to rid himself of his own racism. And that is what made my father a great man. He didn't blame other people for the problems of the world. He pointed to the problems of the world within himself and fought a battle to rid himself of them. [385-386]

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I find it a tragedy that such an inventive people cannot bring themselves to invent peace. [386]

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You don't get extra credit for doing what you're supposed to do. [388]

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The earth does not know the word "exile." Violence begins in the dark and stubborn riots of the human heart. The human heart is the source of all our hate — and all our love. We must tame our wild hearts — or we will never understand the spark of the universe that lives within us all.

To live and never to understand the strange and beautiful mysteries of the human heart is to make a tragedy of our lives. [401]

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But the pain is mine, Dante. And you can't have it. If you took it away, I would miss it. [403]

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Maybe one day, instead of always having to prove they were real men, guys would study women's behavior and start acting a little more like them. [420]

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Maybe all we were meant to do on this earth was to keep on telling stories. Our stories —and the stories of the people we loved. [422]

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Teachers mattered. They could make you feel like you belonged in school, like you could learn, like you could succeed in life or they could make you feel like you were wasting your time. [438]

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"In America we're all messed up about sex," Susie said. "If you're having premarital sex, just don't tell anyone. They won't ask. And, really, they don't want to know. And everything will be fine. Just.

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[D]on't talk about it. Every time I see a pregnant woman, I want to walk up to her and say, 'I see you've been having sex. Good for you.'" [446]

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I learned from you that you can't be a good teacher if you aren't a good human being. [457]

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Sometimes, Ari Mendoza, when you write the story of who you are, you have a tendency to edit out a lot of the scenes that make you look good. I have a suggestion for you. Stop doing that. [464]

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It's easy to hate someone when we don't see them as being real people. But ignoring our differences isn't the answer, either. I don't think women are treated equally in this country, but in order to be treated equally, I don't want men to ignore the fact that I'm a woman. I like being a woman. And men like being men far too much. [474]

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Sometimes confusion is better than certainty. [495]

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"Because we cling to ways of thinking that don't even qualify as thinking. We don't know how to be free because we don't know how to free those we enslave. We don't even know we're doing anything of the sort. Maybe we think that the value of our own freedom is worth less if everybody else has it. And we're afraid. We're afraid that, if someone wants what we have, they're taking something away that belongs to us — and only to us. But who does a country belong to? Tell me. Who does the earth belong to? I'd like to think that someday we'll realize that the earth belongs to us all. But I won't live to see that day. [511]