Quotes About Innocence

I went to an empty henhouse [when I was four and a half], hid in the straw at the back, and waited, and the family had no idea where I was... My mother sees this excited little girl rushing toward the house all covered in straw. Instead of getting mad at me, which would've killed the excitement, she saw my shining eyes and sat down to hear this wonderful story of how a hen lays an egg.

There is something magical about young love, when you still think that the world is your oyster and you have your whole life ahead of you.

Because I can't help loving you, your wild, inaccurate emotions, your bizarre innocence, your angry sense of responsibility, your wrong-headed wit, your cockeyed joy, your cowboy boots, your absolutely magnificent body, your incredible eyes. I can't help it. I don't know how anyone could.

Arthur said, You must know that you don't love children for being good or bad. I know you know that. Why do you love them? Because you do, said Arthur. Because they don't know what's coming and maybe you do.

When I was six years old I sprinkled sugar on my head, convinced myself it was pixie dust, wished myself invisible, and walked into the boys' bathroom at school.

It wasn't my fault.

When I was pink and clean I crawled into bed and pretended I was at Disney World.

You must find a boy your own age. Someone mild and beautiful to be your lover. Someone who will tremble for your touch, offer you a marguerite by its long stem with his eyes lowered. Someone whose fingers are a poem.

her scruffy innoscense to impregnate with his dreams. reason was seductive, it gave the appearance of truth

I felt suddenly cruel, like I'd told small children there was no tooth fairy, that it was just their Mom sneaking into their room after they went to bed.

Now it seemed unbelievable, the innocence of a girl in a fairy tale.

What makes classic children's literature so appealing (to all ages) is its undeviating loyalty to the world of the child. In the best children's books, parents never share the limelight with their children; if they are not killed off on page 1, they are cast in the pitifully minor roles that parents play in their children's imaginative lives.

Like many kids, I used to pretend all sorts of things. I would climb into a tree and imagine that I was on an island, that the grass below we was an ocean, that the leaves were the fins of sharks. Perhaps unlike many people, I never really stopped. I still have a childlike predisposition to fantasise and share my fantasies.

For me, the ages between 9 and 12 were great because it was before you wore any masks, and you had some autonomy in the world. You had some freedom, and you felt you had unlimited ambition. It's when you thought, 'I'm going to write plays. I'm going to be president. I'm going to do this; I'm going to do that.' And then it all falls apart.

I'm one of those unlucky people who had a happy childhood.

Rather leave the crime of the guilty unpunished than condemn the innocent.

Already old, the question Who shall die? Becomes unspoken Who is innocent?

Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent.

Kids are generally rotten until the age of about six, when they become people.

Artless fairy stories enchant us in our first years and retain their hold on us until our last.

Ye have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the people; and behold, I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye accuse him.

There are few things as seemingly untouched by the real world as a child asleep.

All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.

All I did as a child was pretend to be James Bond or Marlon Brando. When I was about four, I put on my dad's work boots and went up and down the street with his walking stick pretending to be Charlie Chaplin.