Quotes from Natalie Babbitt

These are strange and breathless days, the dog days, when people are led to do things they are sure to be sorry for after.

Fixed points they are, and best left undisturbed, for without them, nothing holds together. But sometimes people find this out too late.

The people would have noticed the giant ash tree at the center of the wood, and then, in time, they'd have noticed the little spring bubbling up among its roots in spite of the pebbles piled there to conceal it. And that would have been a disaster so immense that this weary old earth, owned or not to its fiery core, would have trembled on its axis like a beetle on a pin.

NÄ—ra gyvenimo be mirties. Taigi mes negalime sakyti, kad gyvename. Mes tiesiog 'esame'...

She had wanted to cough as soon as it occurred to her that she mustn't, and she passed a long hour trying to swallow away the tickle that perversely constricted her throat.

And then his throat closed. For it was there. He had wanted it to be there, but now that he saw it, he was overcome with sadness.

another thought, far more revolutionary: "Maybe they just don't care!

Always moving around and never having any friends or anything.

People got to do something useful if they're going to take up space in the world.

Life's got to be lived, no matter how long or short, she said calmly. You got to take what comes. We just go along, like everybody else, one day at a time.

Do not fear death, but rather the unlived life.

Belong to yourself, then, like me, said Big Tom. That way, when changes come, you'll always be ready to hold your tail high and move along.

The shriek cut thinly though the drizzling dimness, holding for a long moment. At last it broadened and dropped to the old.

The house was so proud of itself that you wanted to make a lot of noise as you passed, and maybe even throw a rock or two.

Now, remember Winifred, don't bite your fingernails. Don't interrupt when someone else is speaking, and don't go down to the jailhouse at midnight to change places with Prisoners

The first house only is important; the first house, the road, and the wood.

For Mae Tuck, and her husband, and Miles and Jesse, too, had all looked exactly the same for eighty-seven years.

red and pink and orange

Into it all came Winnie, eyes wide, and very much amazed. It was a whole new idea to her that people could live in such disarray, but at the same time she was charmed. It was…comfortable. Climbing behind Mae up the stairs to see the loft, she thought to herself: "Maybe it's because they think they have forever to clean it up." And this was followed by

Life's got to be lived, no matter how long or short," she said calmly. "You got to take what comes. We just go along, like everybody else, one day at a time.

He bent and put his lips to the spurt, drinking noiselessly, and then he sat up again and drew his shirt sleeve across his mouth. As he did this, he turned his face in her direction—and their eyes met. For a long moment they looked at each other in silence, the boy with his arm still raised to his mouth. Neither of them moved. At last his arm fell to his side. "You may as well come out," he said, with a frown.

The first week of August was long over. And now, though autumn was still some weeks away, there was a feeling that the year had begun its downward arc, that the wheel was turning again, slowly now, but soon to go faster, turning once more in its changeless sweep of change.

Like all magnificent things, it's very simple.

A guilty conscience can be very troublesome, I've heard.