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Jerry Spinelli

Jerry Spinelli Quotes

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Famous Jerry Spinelli Quotes

“Star people are rare. You'll be lucky to meet another." "Star people?" I said. "You're losing me here." He chuckled. "That's okay. I lose myself. It's just my odd-ball way of accounting for someone I don't really understand any more than you do." "So where do stars come in" He pointed with the pipe stem. "The perfect question. In the beginning, that's where they come in. They supplied the ingredients that became us, the primordial elements. We are star stuff, yes?" He held up the skull of Barney, the Paleocene rodent. "Barney too, hm?" "I nodded, along for the ride." "And I think every once in a while someone comes along who is a little more primitive than the rest of us, a little closer to our beginnings, a little more in touch with the stuff we're made of.”

PeopleStarsHistoryStarStargirlStar People
Book:Stargirl
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“You know, there's a place we all inhabit, but we don't much think about it, we're scarcely conscious of it, and it lasts for less than a minute a day. It's in the morning, for most of us. It's that time, those few seconds when we're coming out of sleep but we're not really awake yet. For those few seconds we're something more primitive than what we are about to become. We have just slept the sleep of our most distant ancestors, and something of them and their world still clings to us. For those few moments we are unformed, uncivilized. We are not the people we know as ourselves, but creatures more in tune with a tree than a keyboard. We are untitled, unnamed, natural, suspended between was and will be, the tadpole before the frog, the worm before the butterfly. We are, for a few brief moments, anything and everything we could be.”

Human Nature
Book:Stargirl
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“At this time in his life Zinkoff sees no difference between the stars in the sky and the stars in his mother's plastic Baggie. He believes that stars fall from the sky sometimes, and that his mother goes around collecting them like acorns. He believes she has to use heavy gloves and dark sunglasses because the fallen stars are so hot and shiny. She puts them in the freezer for forty-five minutes, and when they come out they are flat and silver and sticky on the back and ready for his shirts.”

BelieveNightStarsChildhoodNostalgia
Book:Loser
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“Sometimes I try to erase myself. And then, if I've done a good job, I'm erased. I'm nothing. And then the world is free to flow into me like water into an empty bowl. And I see. I hear. But not with eyes and ears. I'm not outside my world anymore, and I'm not really inside it either. The thing is, there's no difference between me and the universe. The boundary is gone. I am it and it is me. I am a stone, a cactus thorn. I am rain.”

Universe
Book:Stargirl
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“I’m not sure,” she said. “There’s no one answer to that. You have to find your own way. Sometimes I try to erase myself. I imagine a big pink soft soap eraser, and it’s going back and forth, back and forth, and it starts down at my toes, back and forth, back and forth, and there they go-poof!-my toes are gone. And then my feet. And then my ankles. But that’s the easy part. The hard part is erasing my senses-my eyes, my ears, my nose, my tongue. And last to go is my brain. My thoughts, memories, all the voices inside my head. That’s the hardest, erasing my thoughts.” She chuckled faintly. “My pumpkin. And then, if I’ve done a good job, I’m erased. I’m gone. I’m nothing. And then the world is free to flow into me like water into an empty bowl.”

Stargirl
Book:Stargirl
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“Their voices came in clearly from the golf course. The laughing and yelping made a raucous counterpoint to the metronomic tock-tock-tock of the bunny's never-ending hop. Once, in the light of the quarter moon, they appeared in silhouette on a domed, distant green, like figures dancing in someone's dream. And then quite suddenly they were gone, as if the dreamer had awakened. Nothing to see, nothing to hear. Someone called "Hey!" after them, but that was all.”

Stargirl
Book:Stargirl
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“Rideva senza motivo. Danzava senza musica. Non aveva amici, ma era la creatura più amichevole della scuola. In classe parlava di cavallucci marini e di stelle, ma non sapeva cosa fosse un pallone da calcio. Disse che in casa non avevano la televisione. Era elusiva. Era oggi. Era domani. Era il profumo sfuggente di un fiore di cactus, l'ombra fugace di un gufo stregato. Non sapevamo come comportarci, con lei. tentavamo di fissarla a una tavoletta di sughero come una farfalla, ma lo spillo l'attraversava e lei volava via.”

DifferenceStargirl
Book:Stargirl
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“Ci sono stagni, nel deserto di Sonora. Potresti finirci dritto in mezzo e non saperlo, perché di solito sono asciutti. Non sospetteresti mai l'esistenza di rane addormentate pochi centimetri sotto i tuoi piedi, il battito del cuore rallentato a un paio di pulsazioni al minuto. Dormono e aspettano, quelle rane del fango, perché senz'acqua la loro vita non è completa. Per lunghi mesi dormono sottoterra. Finché arriva la pioggia. E allora centinaia d'occhi sbucano dal fango, centinaia di voci risuonano ogni notte sull'acqua. Fu uno spettacolo meraviglioso assistere al risveglio di noi rane del fango, vivere quel risveglio. Piccoli gesti, parole, empatie credute ormai estinte tornarono in vita. Per anni, le facce estranee incrociate nei corridoi avevano ricevuto solo sguardi corrucciati; ora guardavamo, salutavamo, sorridevamo. Se qualcuno prendeva un bel voto, anche altri gioivano. Se qualcuno si storceva una caviglia, anche altri soffrivano. Scoprimmo quale colore avessero gli occhi degli altri. Fu Stargirl a guidare quella ribellione: una ribellione per invece che contro. Per noi stessi. Per le rane assopite che eravamo stati così a lungo. Ragazzi taciturni prendevano la parola nelle discussioni in classe. La rubrica "Lettere all'Editore" riempì un'intera pagina dell'edizione di dicembre del giornale scolastico. Un ragazzo fondò un'associazione di fotografi dilettanti. Un altro arrivò a scuola coi mocassini invece che con le scarpe da ginnastica. Una ragazza timida e insignificante si dipinse di verde fluorescente le unghie dei piedi. Un ragazzo si tinse i capelli color porpora.”

RevolutionIndividualismDifferenceStargirl
Book:Stargirl
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“It's in the morning, for most of us. It's that time, those few seconds when we're coming out of sleep but we're not really awake yet. For those few seconds we're something more primitive than what we are about to become. We have just slept the sleep of our most distant ancestors, and something of them and their world still clings to us. For those few moments we are unformed, uncivilized. We are not the people we know as ourselves, but creatures more in tune with a tree than a keyboard. We are untitled, unnamed, natural, suspended between was and will be, the tadpole before the frog, the worm before the butterfly. We are for a few brief moments, anything and everything we could be. And then...and then -- ah -- we open our eyes and the day is before us and ... we become ourselves.”

LifeSleepCivilizationNonconformity
Book:Stargirl
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“Around fourth grade something similar happens with eyes. The baby eyes don't drop out, nor are there eye fairies around to leave quarters under pillows, but new eyes do arrive nevertheless. Big-kid eyes replace little-kid eyes. Little-kid eyes are scoopers. They just scoop up everything they see and swallow it whole, no questions asked. Big-kid eyes are picky. They notice things that little-kid eyes never bothered with: the way a teacher blows her nose, the way a kid dresses or pronounces a word.”

LoserJerry SpinelliZinkoff
Author:Jerry Spinelli
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“Vowels were something else. He didn't like them, and they didn't like him. There were only five of them, but they seemed to be everywhere. Why, you could go through twenty words without bumping into some of the shyer consonants, but it seemed as if you couldn't tiptoe past a syllable without waking up a vowel. Consonants, you knew pretty much where they stood, but you could never trust a vowel. To the old pitcher, they were like his own best knuckle ball come back to haunt him. In, out, up, down - not even the pitcher, much much less the batter, knew which way it would break. He kept swinging and missing.”

BaseballLearning To ReadVowels
Author:Jerry Spinelli
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“The Clock on the Morning Lenape Building Must Clocks be circles? Time is not a circle. Suppose the Mother of All Minutes started right here, on the sidewalk in front of the Morning Lenape Building, and the parade of minutes that followed--each of them, say, one inch long-- headed out that way, down Bridge Street. Where would Now be? This minute? Out past the moon? Jupiter? The nearest star? Who came up with minutes, anyway? Who needs them? Name one good thing a minute's ever done. They shorten fun and measure misery. Get rid of them, I say. Down with minutes! And while you're at it--take hours with you too. Don't get me started on them. Clocks--that's the problem. Every clock is a nest of minutes and hours. Clocks strap us into their shape. Instead of heading for the nearest star, all we do is corkscrew. Clocks lock us into minutes, make Ferris wheel riders of us all, lug us round and round from number to number, dice the time of our lives into tiny bits until the bits are all we know and the only question we care to ask is "What time is it?" As if minutes could tell. As if Arnold could look up at this clock on the Lenape Building and read: 15 Minutes till Found. As if Charlie's time is not forever stuck on Half Past Grace. As if a swarm of stinging minutes waits for Betty Lou to step outside. As if love does not tell all the time the Huffelmeyers need to know.”

TimeClocks
Book:Love, Stargirl
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