John Marsden > Quotes

“We kill all the caterpillars, then complain there are no butterflies.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“The only true test of friendship is the time your friend spends on you.”
― John Marsden, Circle of Flight

“All these words, words like 'evil' and 'vicious', they meant nothing to Nature. Yes, evil was a human invention.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“the biggest risk is to take no risk. or to take crazy risks.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“The Bible just said ‘Thou shalt not kill’, then told hundreds of stories of people killing each other and becoming heroes, like David with Goliath.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“What's the Future? It's a blank sheet of paper, and we draw lines on it, but sometimes our hand is held, and the lines we draw aren't the lines we wanted.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“Why did people call it Hell?" I wondered. [...] No place was Hell, no place could be Hell. It's the people calling it Hell, that's the only thing that made it so. People just sticking names on places, so that no one could see those places properly anymore. [...]

No, Hell wasn't anything to do with place, Hell was all to do with people. Maybe Hell was people.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“I'm a person of the mountains and the open paddocks and the big empty sky, that's me, and I knew if I spent too long away from all that I'd die; I don't know what of, I just knew I'd die.”
― John Marsden, A Killing Frost

“I live in the light,
But carry my dark with me.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“We believed we were safe. That was the big fantasy.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“There are some things that once you've lost, you never get back. Innocence is one. Love is another. I guess childhood is a third.”
― John Marsden

“People just sticking names on places, so that no one could see those places properly any more. Every time they looked at them or thought about them the the first thing they saw was a huge big sign saying 'Housing Commission' or 'private school' or 'church' or 'mosque' or 'synagogue'. They stopped looking once they saw those signs.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“Life's harder, the deeper you feel things, was all I could think as I put the books away. Feelings, who needs them? Sometimes they're like a gift, when you feel love or happiness. Sometimes they're a curse.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“Sometimes I think I'd rather be frightened than bored. At least when you're frightened you know you're alive.”
― John Marsden, A Killing Frost

“We'd thought that we were among the first humans to invade this basin, but humans had invaded everything, everywhere. They didn't have to walk into a place to invade it.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“Never cry over anything that can't cry over you”
― John Marsden, The Other Side of Dawn

“When you're scared you can either give in to the panic and let your mind fall apart, or you can take charge of your mind and think brave.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“Time spent in reconnaissance is seldom wasted.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“At that age you think boys have as much personality as coat hangers and, you don't notice their looks.
Then you grow up.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“Nothing reaches inside you and grabs you by the guts the way fear does.”
― John Marsden, A Killing Frost

“But it was my parents I longed for mostly. I wanted to be a little girl again and cuddle into them, wriggling in between them like I'd done in their bed when I was three or four, snug and warm in the safest place in the world.

Instead I had Hell.”
― John Marsden, Darkness, Be My Friend

“It's good to keep changing your mind. It shows you're thinking. I'll only stop changing my mind when I'm dead. And maybe not even then.”
― John Marsden, Darkness, Be My Friend

“Name three types of olives."

"Olives! I wouldn't know one type!"

"Well, there are three. You can get green ones, you can get black ones, or you can get stuffed.”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“My survival was up to me. I had nothing and I had no one. What I did have, I told myself, was my mind, my imagination, my memory, my feelings, my spirit. These were important and powerful things.”
― John Marsden, A Killing Frost

“It all began when... they're funny, those words. Everyone uses them, without thinking what they mean. When does anything begin? With everyone it begins when you're born. Or before that, when your parents got married. Or before that, when your parents were born. Or when your ancestors colonised the place. Or when humans came squishing out of the mud and slime, dropped off their flippers and fins, and started to walk. But all the same, all that aside, for what's happened to us there was quite a definite beginning”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“Life's harder, the deeper you feel things.”
― John Marsden, The Dead of Night

“I feel like I'm dropping such a long way down again." "I seem to be dropping into a cold dark wet place, where no one's been before and noone can every follow. There's no future there; just a past that sometimes fools you into thinking it's the future. It's the most alone place you can ever be and, when you go there, you not only cease to exist in real life, you also cease to exist in their consciousness and in their memories.”
― John Marsden, So Much to Tell You

“A few people would suffer, but a lot of people would be better off.'
'It's just not right,' said Kevin stubbornly.
'Maybe not. But neither's your way of looking at it. There doesn't have to be a right side and a wrong side. both sides can be right, or both sides can be wrong...”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“How funny are dogs?”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began

“The biggest risk, is to take no risks”
― John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began