Quotessence
Home / Authors / Nick Hornby
Nick Hornby

Nick Hornby Quotes

Novelist

Filter quotes by topic

AllPeopleIfsKnowsBookFeelsWantReadingWayKindThinking

Famous Nick Hornby Quotes

“Is it wrong, wanting to be at home with your record collection? It's not like collecting records is like collecting stamps, or beermats, or antique thimbles. There's a whole world in here, a nicer, dirtier, more violent, more peaceful, more colorful, sleazier, more dangerous, more loving world than the world I live in; there is history, and geography, and poetry, and countless other things I should have studied at school, including music.”

WorldShouldWholeHomeSchoolRecordsDangerousShould HaveIncludingViolentWhole WorldPeacefulCollectionsStampsGeographyCollectingColorfulAntiques
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“Look at all the things that can go wrong for men. There’s the nothing-happening-at-all problem, the too-much-happening-too-soon problem, the dismal-droop-after-a-promising-beginning problem; there’s the size-doesn’t-matter-except-in-my-case problem, the failing-to-deliver-the-goods problem…and what do women have to worry about? A handful of cellulite? Join the club. A spot of I-wonder-how-I-rank? Ditto.”

MenLooksMatterProblemWonderCasesWorryToo MuchFailingHappeningsSizeClubsSpotsGoodsHandfulCelluliteSize Doesn't Matter
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“But all three of them had had to lose things in order to gain other things. Will had lost his shell and his cool and his distance, and he felt scared and vulnerable, but he got to be with Rachel; and Fiona had lost a big chunk of Marcus, and she got to stay away from the casualty ward; and Marcus had lost himself, and got to walk home from school with his shoes on.”

HomeBigsSchoolOrderThreeLostFeltLosesWalksGainsDistanceShoesScaredVulnerableShellsCasualtiesChunks
Book:About a Boy
Create image

“(About Love)The most important thing in life, and you can't tell whether people have it or not. Surely this is wrong? Surely people who are happy should look happy, at all times, no matter how much money they have or how uncomfortable their shoes are or how little their child is sleeping; and people who are doing OK but have still not found their soul-mate should look, I don't know, anxious, like Billy Crystal in When Harry Met Sally; and people who are desperate should wear something, a yellow ribbon maybe, which would allow them to be identified by similar desperate people.”

PeopleKnowsShouldLooksChildrenLittlesStillsImportantSoulMatterFoundSleepMetsImportant ThingsShoesAll TimeUncomfortableDesperateAnxiousMatesYellowThings In LifeCrystalsSoul MateRibbonsMost Important Things In Life
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“He loved Nirvana, but at his age they were kind of a guilty pleasure. All that rage and pain and self-hatred! Will got a bit...fed up sometimes, but he couldn't pretend it was anything stronger than that. So now he used loud angry rock music as a replacement for real feelings, rather than as an expression of them, and he didn't even mind very much. What good were real feelings anyway?”

MindKindRealSelfSometimesFeelingsAgePainUsedBitsPleasureRocksExpressionHatredStrongerAngryRageGuiltyLoudFedsRock MusicFed UpReplacementsSelf HatredGuilty PleasureReal Feelings
Book:About a Boy
Create image

“Anyway, who lives a rich and beautiful life that I know? It's no longer possible, surely, for anyone who works for a living, or lives in a city, or shops in a supermarket, or watches TV, or reads a newspaper, or drives a car, or eats frozen pizzas. A nice life, possibly, with a huge slice of luck and a little spare cash. And maybe even a good life if... Well, let's not go into all that. But rich and beautiful lives seem to be a discontinued line.”

IfsKnowsWellsLittlesSeemsBeautifulLinesCitiesWatchesRichNiceCarTvsHugeLuckNewspapersShopsGood LifeCashSparesFrozenPizzaBeautiful LifeSupermarketsNice Life
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“You need as much ballast as possible to stop you from floating away; you need people around you, things going on, otherwise life is like some film where the money ran out, and there are no sets, or locations, or supporting actors, and it's just one bloke on his own staring into the camera with nothing to do and nobody to speak to, and who'd believe in this character then?”

PeopleNeedsBelieveCharacterFilmLife IsActorsSpeakCamerasStaringRanJust OneLocationFloatingLife Is LikeBlokesBallastSupporting ActorsFloating Away
Book:High Fidelity
Create image

“Over the last couple of years, the photos of me when I was a kid... well, they've started to give me a little pang or something - not unhappiness, exactly, but some kind of quiet, deep regret... I keep wanting to apologize to the little guy: "I'm sorry, I've let you down. I was the person who was supposed to look after you, but I blew it: I made wrong decisions at bad times, and I turned you into me.”

GivingYearsWellsLooksKindLittlesPersonsMadeKidsLastsGuyDecisionRegretCoupleQuietGive MeSorryUnhappinessApologizingI'm SorryBad TimesWrong DecisionPhoto Of MeDeep Regret
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“So this is supposed to be about the how, and when, and why, and what of reading -- about the way that, when reading is going well, one book leads to another and to another, a paper trail of theme and meaning; and how, when it's going badly, when books don't stick or take, when your mood and the mood of the book are fighting like cats, you'd rather do anything but attempt the next paragraph, or reread the last one for the tenth time.”

WayWellsBookLastsFightingReadingNextPaperCatSticksMoodSupposed To BeThemeTrailsParagraph
Book:The complete polysyllabic spree
Create image

“[about suicide] And why is it the biggest sin of all? All your life you're told that you'll be going to this marvellous place when you pass on. And the one thing you can do to get you there a bit quicker is something that stops you getting there at all. Oh, I can see that it's a kind of queue­jumping. But if someone jumps the queue at the Post Office, people tut. Or sometimes they say, “Excuse me, I was here first.” They don't say, “You will be consumed by hellfire for all eternity.” That would be a bit strong.”

PeopleIfsFirstsKindI CanSometimesWould BeStrongBitsCan DoSinOne ThingOfficeEternitySuicideExcusePostsJumpingConsumedExcuse MeMarvellousPost OfficeQueues
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“I used to believe, although I don't now, that growing and growing up are analogous, that both are inevitable and uncontrollable processes. Now it seems to me that growing up is governed by the will, that one can choose to become an adult, but only at given moments. These moments come along fairly infrequently -during crises in relationships, for example, or when one has been given the chance to start afresh somewhere- and one can ignore them or seize them.”

BelieveHas BeensMomentsSeemsUsedGivenProcessChanceGrowing UpGrowingExampleAdultsCrisisInevitableUncontrollable
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image

“You spend Christmas at somebody's house, you worry about their operations, you give them hugs and kisses and flowers, you see them in their dressing gown...and then bang, that's it. Gone forever. And sooner or later there will be another mum, another Christmas, more varicose veins. They're all the same. Only the addresses, and the colors of the dressing gown, change.”

GivingHouseWorryGoneForeverColorFlowerKissingOperationsAddressesHugMumSooner Or LaterVeinsDressingsBangsGowns
Book:High Fidelity
Create image

“I may not know the weight of those things, but I could feel the weight of that one, so I kept it to myself. You know that things aren't going well for you when you can't even tell people the simplest fact about your life, just because they'll presume you're asking them to feel sorry for you. I suppose it's why you feel so far away from everyone, in the end; anything you can think of to tell them just ends up making them feel terrible.”

PeopleThinkingKnowsFeelsWellsMayEndsFactsTerribleWeightAskingSorryFar AwaySimplestFeel Sorry For You
Author:Nick Hornby
Create image