Authors — Quotes

Lemony Snicket Quotes: 54

Never trust anyone who has not brought a book with them.
Horseradish
Fate is like a strange, unpopular restaurant filled with odd little waiters who bring you things you never asked for and don't always like.
Wicked people never have time for reading. It's one of the reasons for their wickedness.
Reading is one form of escape. Running for your life is another.
People aren't either wicked or noble. They're like chef's salads, with good things and bad things chopped and mixed together in a vinaigrette of confusion and conflict.
The Grim Grotto
Everyone should be able to do one card trick, tell two jokes, and recite three poems, in case they are ever trapped in an elevator.
Horseradish
I suppose I'll have to add the force of gravity to my list of enemies.
The Penultimate Peril
If writers wrote as carelessly as some people talk, then adhasdh asdglaseuyt[bn[ pasdlgkhasdfasdf.
Horseradish
A good library will never be too neat, or too dusty, because somebody will always be in it, taking books off the shelves and staying up late reading them.
Horseradish
If you are allergic to a thing, it is best not to put that thing in your mouth, particularly if the thing is cats.
The Wide Window
When someone is crying, of course, the noble thing to do is to comfort them. But if someone is trying to hide their tears, it may also be noble to pretend you do not notice them.
Horseradish
All the secrets of the world are contained in books. Read at your own risk.
Love can change a person the way a parent can change a baby- awkwardly, and often with a great deal of mess.
Horseradish
It is one of life's bitterest truths that bedtime so often arrives just when things are really getting interesting.
The Grim Grotto
Strange as it may seem, I still hope for the best, even though the best, like an interesting piece of mail, so rarely arrives, and even when it does it can be lost so easily.
The Beatrice Letters
...you know that a good, long session of weeping can often make you feel better, even if your circumstances have not changed one bit.
The Bad Beginning
Well-read people are less likely to be evil.
The Slippery Slope
It is always sad when someone leaves home, unless they are simply going around the corner and will return in a few minutes with ice-cream sandwiches.
Horseradish
If you are a student you should always get a good nights sleep unless you have come to the good part of your book, and then you should stay up all night and let your schoolwork fall by the wayside, a phrase which means 'flunk'.
The sad truth is the truth is sad.
The Hostile Hospital
It is difficult, when faced with a situation you cannot control, to admit you can do nothing.
Horseradish
There are times to stay put, and what you want will come to you, and there are times to go out into the world and find such a thing for yourself.
Horseradish
If an optimist had his left arm chewed off by an alligator, he might say in a pleasant and hopeful voice, "Well this isn't too bad, I don't have a left arm anymore but at least nobody will ever ask me if I'm left-handed or right-handed,"but most of us would say something more along the lines of, "Aaaaaa! My arm! My arm!
Horseradish
Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it isn't so.
The Blank Book
This is my knife. It is very sharp and very eager to hurt you.
The Reptile Room
A passport, as I'm sure you know, is a document that one shows to government officials whenever one reaches a border between two countries, so that the official can learn who you are, where you were born, and how you look when photographed unflatteringly.
For some stories, it's easy. The moral of 'The Three Bears,' for instance, is "Never break into someone else's house.' The moral of 'Snow White' is 'Never eat apples.' The moral of World War I is 'Never assassinate Archduke Ferdinand.
The Wide Window
To hear the phrase "our only hope"always makes one anxious, because it means that if the only hope doesn't work, there is nothing left.
The Blank Book
It is useless for me to describe to you how terrible Violet, Klaus, and even Sunny felt in the time that followed. If you have ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it feels, and if you haven't, you cannot possibly imagine it.
The Bad Beginning
Sometimes, just saying that you hate something, and having someone agree with you, can make you feel better about a terrible situation.
The Bad Beginning
As I am sure you know, when people say 'It's my pleasure,' they usually mean something along the lines of, 'There's nothing on Earth I would rather do less.' [...]
The Penultimate Peril
They're book addicts.
The Miserable Mill
Siblings that say they never fight are most definitely hiding something
Horseradish
One of the world's most tiresome questions is what object one would bring to a desert island,because people always answer "a deck of cards"or "Anna Karenina"when the obvious answer is "a well equipped boat and a crew to sail me off the island and back home where I can play all the card games and read all the Russian novels I want.
Just because something is traditional is no reason to do it, of course. Piracy, for example, is a tradition that has been carried on for hundreds of years, but that doesn't mean we should all attack ships and steal their gold.
Horseradish
There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something different.
The Bad Beginning
Those unable to catalog the past are doomed to repeat it.
The End
Neither were you [born yesterday], unless of course I am wrong, in which case welcome to the world, little baby, and congratulations on learning to read so early in life.
The Penultimate Peril
Pietrisycamollaviadelrechiotemexity.
Just about everything in this world is easier said than done, with the exception of "systematically assisting Sisyphus's stealthy, cyst-susceptible sister,"which is easier done than said.
The Hostile Hospital
There are few sights sadder than a ruined book.
The Wide Window
Deciding whether or not to trust a person is like deciding whether or not to climb a tree because you might get a wonderful view from the highest branch or you might simply get covered in sap and for this reason many people choose to spend their time alone and indoors where it is harder to get a splinter.
The Penultimate Peril
There is nothing particularly wrong with salmon, of course, but like caramel candy, strawberry yogurt, or liquid carpet cleaner, if you eat too much of it you are not going to enjoy your meal.
In love, as in life, one misheard word can be tremendously important. If you tell someone you love them, for instance, you must be absolutely certain that they have replied "I love you back"and not "I love your back"before you continue the conversation.
Of course, it is boring to read about boring thing, but it is better to read something that makes you yawn with boredom than something that will make you weep uncontrollably, pound your fists against the floor, and leave tearstains all over your pillowcase, sheets, and boomerang collection.
The Grim Grotto
It is almost as if happiness is an acquired taste, like coconut cordial or ceviche, to which you can eventually become accustomed, but despair is something surprising each time you encounter it.
The End
Friends can make you feel that the world is smaller and less sneaky than it really is, because you know people who have similar experiences.
The Austere Academy
Literature doesn’t exactly have a strong mental-health track record.
All cannot be lost when there is still so much being found
I am heartbroken, but I have been heartbroken before, and this might be the best for which I can hope.
The End