Katherine Paterson quotes

Katherine Paterson is an acclaimed American author of children's and young adult literature. Her novels, such as "Bridge to Terabithia" and "Jacob Have I Loved," have won prestigious awards and touched generations of readers. She continues to inspire with her profound stories about friendship, loss, and resilience. Here are 58 of her quotes:

That was the rule that you never mixed up troubles at home with life at school. When parents were poor or ignorant or mean, or even just didn't believe in having a TV set, it was up to their kids to protect them.

Katherine Paterson

He was angry, too, because it would soon be Christmas and he had nothing to give Leslie. It was not that she would expect something expensive; it was that he needed to give her something as much as he needed to eat when he was hungry. [...] She wouldn't laugh at him no matter what he gave her. But for his own sake he had to give her something he could be proud of.

Katherine Paterson

He felt there in the teachers' room that it was the beginning of a new season in his life, and he chose deliberately to make it so. He did not have to make any announcement to Leslie that he had changed his mind about her. She already knew it.

Katherine Paterson

So as the water nibbled away at our land, the war nibbled away at our souls.

Katherine Paterson

To fear is one thing. To let fear grab you by the tail and swing you around is another.

Katherine Paterson

Reading can be a road to freedom or a key to a secret garden, which, if tended, will transform all of life.

Katherine Paterson

When my husband died, people kept telling me not to cry. People kept trying to help me to forget. But I didn't want to forget... So I realize, that if it's hard for me, how much harder it must be for you.

Katherine Paterson

I love revision. Where else can spilled milk be turned into ice cream?

Katherine Paterson

I guess real maturity, which most of us never achieve, is when you realize that you're not the center of the universe.

Katherine Paterson

Even a prince may be a fool.

Katherine Paterson

The movie does, I think, show very well the depth of the friendship and the power of imagination. Which were things I hoped that it would show.

Katherine Paterson

My admittedly limited experience on the internet and with computer "information”, has revealed that this is a rather shallow sort of knowledge and impersonal sort of human connection. I think great books and real live human beings do a better job of making us wise, compassionate people.

Katherine Paterson

If you start [in book] with telling people what they are supposed to feel and what they are supposed to experience it simply doesn't work. Because it really has to come from the reader...

Katherine Paterson

If there was anything her short life had taught her, it was that a person must be tough. Otherwise, you were had.

Katherine Paterson

Lord, it would be better to be born without an arm than to go through life with no guts.

Katherine Paterson

Sometimes it seemed to him that his life was delicate as a dandelion. One little puff from any direction, and it was blown to bits.

Katherine Paterson

You never know ahead of time what something's really going to be like.

Katherine Paterson

She had tricked him. She had made him leave his old self behind and come into her world, and then before he was really at home in it but too late to go back, she had left him stranded there--like an astronaut wandering about on the moon. Alone.

Katherine Paterson

It's like the smarter you are, the more things can scare you.

Katherine Paterson

Shh," he said. "Look." "Where?" "Can't you see'um?" he whispered. "All the Terabithians standing on tiptoe to see you." "Me?" "Shh, yes. There's a rumor going around that the beautiful girl arrving today might be the queen they've been waiting for.

Katherine Paterson

You gotta know someone cares about you, or you just give up.

Katherine Paterson

If you could hold your nose to avoid a stink, or close your eyes to cut out a sight, why not shut off your brain to avoid a thought?

Katherine Paterson