Five Quotes From Books That Changed My Life

A wise, slightly manipulative, and possibly Slytherin, Albus Dumbledore once said,” Words are our most inexhaustible source of magic.” As a bookworm, this has been proven to me time and time again. Often, authors have managed to give me chills, goosebumps, wet eyes or a sense of enlightenment, with just a few words on a page. It’s why I like to read. The right book can change your life.

The Five People You Meet in Heaven- by Mitch Albom

“Learn this from me. Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves.”

The Five People You Meet in Heaven, is my favorite book to date. In this book, it is explained that when you die, you are given the gift of understanding your life. Five people, who have affected your life, or yours theirs, in some way that was significant, come to you after you die and explain lessons from your life. The main character Eddie, learns these five lessons, one of which being the above quote. He learns that oftentimes we do not have all the information to every story, and that holding anger towards someone, ultimately will do more harm than good.

The Great Gatsby- by F. Scott Fitzgerald

“And I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy.”

The Great Gatsby is full of amazing quotes, but this one will always be my favorite. I’ve always compared it to the idea of living in a big city as opposed to a small town. In a small town, everyone knows your name and your business, but in a big city you are just another face. Being unknown can give you the freedom to become who you want to be without the scrutiny of onlookers.

The Kite Runner- by Khaled Hosseini

“It may be unfair, but what happens in a few days, sometimes even a single day, can change the course of a whole lifetime...”

My most recommended book will always be The Kite Runner since it has an undisputable rawness to it that you just don’t find in most books. The book follows the author through his childhood after he makes a choice that soon becomes the biggest regret of his life. The story starts with the narrator as a child and follows him in his journey from Afghanistan to America, then back to Afghanistan. I would go more into detail but I really want you to read this book for yourself.

The Sun Also Rises- by Ernest Hemingway

“You can't get away from yourself by moving from one place to another.”

I have always been a restless soul type and the idea of moving from place to place has always been appealing. When I was younger, I thought of it as a way of escaping, but now that I am more at peace with myself, I think of it as a way to learn more about yourself and the world. I don’t know if this is something I would have ever been able to come to terms with, if not for those simple words.

Slaughterhouse Five- by Kurt Vonnegut

“Poo-tee-weet.”

The above, is the final word in the classic novel, Slaughterhouse Five. This is a uniquely written book above world war two, ending with the word from a bird. The word ‘poo-tee-weet’ is said to be the only reasonable thing one can say about a war. So it goes…

The Fault In Our Stars- by John Green

"You are going to live a good and long life filled with great and terrible moments that you cannot even imagine yet!”

Some books just find you at the right time, and this is one of them. If you haven't heard of the book, it follows two main characters who have had/ or have cancer. I could go in depth about the plot and what I love about this book, but I doubt I could say it in under 5,000 words. What I can say is that this quote above, is said to a teenager, after having surgery to remove his eyes, due to his cancer. Imagine the emotional turmoil one must go through after having a surgery like that. While he is deep in a depression, his best friend says the above quote to him. It is blunt and real; you will experience joy and you will experience hardship, but you will be alive.

Fahrenheit 451- by Ray Bradbury

“There must be something in books, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing.”

451 degrees Fahrenheit is the temperature in which books burn. In this dystopian novel, it suggests a reality where books are banned due to their ability to inspire freethought and radical ideas. An uninformed society is an enslaved society. The main character is a fireman, which means if someone is found with books in their house, he goes and sets the house on fire. He witnesses an old woman decide to stay in her house and burn with her books, which prompts him to think maybe there is something important inside a novel.

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