Quotes from Jack Gantos

School was finally out and I was standing

He's so stupid. Honestly, when he makes alphabet soup it spells out D-U-M-B.

Oh sweet cheeze-us!" I wailed, and dropped butt-first onto the table. "Ohhh! Cheeze-us-crust!" I

You'll see...Everyone foolishly goes through hating their past—when they should realize it is the one true thing you have.

The house is a bit of a monster, and slowly you belong to it and begin to function in it like living furniture that gets rearranged—you become another gear inside the machine of the house, or a hand puppet to your parents. You won't find freedom until you find yourself in a place that doesn't own you.

When it came to my heart I felt everything okay, but when I tried to express my feelings the words came out of me like invisible ink.

When I was first getting to know her we were in a viewing room at the funeral parlor looking at a new line of cigar-shaped caskets that were called "Time Capsules of the Future.

I'd slink back to my room and curl up on the bed like a fish-hook and cry until I was rusty.

About fifty yards ahead a white-tailed deer was slowly picking his way across the snow-covered rocks and roots. As soon as I saw him I knew instantly that I didn't want him to die. He was so beautiful and at ease in the woods. This was his home, not mine, and I suddenly felt like a killer who had broken into his house and was about to shoot him. I watched and held my breath.

She was always more fair to me than I was to her, and somehow this kept me from being totally honest with her.

Sometimes waiting for a question to finish is like watching someone draw an elephant starting with the tail first. As soon as you see the tail your mind wanders all over the place and you think of a million other animals that also have tails until you don't care about the elephant because it's only one thing when you've been thinking about a million others.

Someone once said anyone can be great under rosy circumstances, but the true test of character is measured by how well a person makes decisions during difficult times.

Since I was trying so hard to make books lead my life, I didn't want to read them and then just put them back on the shelf and say, "good book," as if I was patting a good dog. I wanted books to change me, and I wanted to write books that would change others.

Do you think I'm weird because I'm wired, or wired because I'm wierd?

Each time I read a book, I cataloged the parts that struck me dumb with envy and admiration for their beauty and power and truth.

who proved that you don't have to do what your parents want, or what your boyfriend wants, for you to be happy. You just have to be yourself, for there is no love greater than self love

Don't ever forget your history," she sang, "or any wicked soul can lie to you and get away with it.

It's like when you read a book and you know that the words are important, but the images blossoming in your imagination are even more important because it's your mind that allows the words to come to life.

Don't ever go to war. Even if you win, the battle is never over inside you.

You can't do anything for a person who is stuck between being happy and being miserable. All you can do is get trapped in the middle, and anyone in the middle just gets squished.' -Grandma

If you have an orderly mind, you'll be a winner no matter where you end up. If your mind is a jumble of junk, you'll be a loser. It's as simple as that.

You gotta face the hand you're dealt with and deal with it, and make your problems be the smallest part of who you are.

but every living soul is a book of their own history, which sits on the ever-growing shelf in the library of human memories.

we have to save the history we have. You never know what small bit of it might change your life--or change the whole world.