Banana Yoshimoto Quotes - Page 3

Quotes about:

Children Dreams Emotions Eyes Feelings Giving Heart

Why is it that everything I eat when I’m with you is so delicious?’ I laughed. ‘Could it be that you’re satisfying hunger and lust at the same time?

Banana Yoshimoto

Lust, Hunger, Laughed

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.100, Grove Press

9 Copy quote
There are many, many difficult times, god knows. If a person wants to stand on her own two feet, I recommend undertaking the care and feeding of something. It could be children, or it could be house plants, you know? By doing that you come to understand your own limitations. That's where it starts.

Banana Yoshimoto

Children, Feet, Two

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.41, Grove Press

7 Copy quote
In the uncertain ebb and flow of time and emotions, much of one’s life history is etched in the senses. And things of no particular importance, or irreplaceable things, can suddenly resurface in a café one winter night.

Banana Yoshimoto

Winter, Night, Ebb And Flow

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.75, Grove Press

13 Copy quote
Every time I look into his eyes I just want to take the ice cream or whatever I've got in my hand and rub it into his face. That's how much I like him.

Banana Yoshimoto

Eye, Ice Cream, Hands

Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (2002). “Goodbye Tsugumi”, p.110, Grove Press

14 Copy quote
She was still there inside me now, just as she always was: a life put on hold, a memory I didn't know how to handle.

Banana Yoshimoto

Memories, Handle, Stills

Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (2006). “Hardboiled: & Hard Luck”, p.8, Grove Press

4 Copy quote
The way we think may be completely different, but you and I are an ancient, archetypal couple, the original man and woman. We are the model for Adam and Eve. For all couples in love, there comes a moment when a man gazes at a woman with the very same kind of realization. It is an infinite helix, the dance of two souls resonating, like the twist of DNA, like the vast universe.

Banana Yoshimoto

Couple, Men, Thinking

Banana Yoshimoto, Ann Sherif (1996). “Lizard”, p.66, Simon and Schuster

16 Copy quote
Inching one's way along a steep cliff in the dark: on reaching the highway, one breathes a sigh of relief. Just when one can't take any more, one sees the moonlight. Beauty that seems to infuse itself into the heart: I know about that

Banana Yoshimoto

Heart, Dark, Sigh Of Relief

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.60, Grove Press

7 Copy quote
I never tell my boyfriend that I'm busy when I'm not. No matter how effective they are, cheap techniques like that just don't agree with me. So it's always okay, it's always all right. In my opinion the surest way to hook a man is to be as open with him as possible.

Banana Yoshimoto

Men, My Boyfriend, Technique

9 Copy quote
I saw the sky and sea and sand and the flickering flames of the bonfire through my tears. All at once, it rushed into my head with tremendous speed, and made me feel dizzy. It was beautiful. Everything that happened was shockingly beautiful, enough to make you crazy.

Banana Yoshimoto

Beautiful, Crazy, Flames

8 Copy quote
I held the feeling in my heart; the urge to discuss it died out. There was all the time in the world. In the endless repetition of other nights, other mornings, this moment, too, might become a dream.

Banana Yoshimoto

Dream, Morning, Heart

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.41, Grove Press

8 Copy quote
Chilled-looking people walking along the riverside, the snow beginning, faintly, to pile up on the roofs of cars, the bare trees shaking their heads left and right, dry leaves tossing in the wind. The silver of the metal window sash sparkling coldly. Soon after, I heard sensei call, "Mikage! Are you awake? It's snowing, look! It's snowing!" "I'm coming!" I called out, standing up. I got dressed to begin another day. Over and over, we begin again.

Banana Yoshimoto

Wind, People, Snow

Banana Yoshimoto (1993). “Kitchen”

10 Copy quote
Ultimately, though, it's living people that frighten me the most. It's always seemed to me that nothing could be scarier than a person, because as dreadful places can be, they're still just places; and no matter how awful ghosts might seem, they're just dead people. I always thought that the most terrifying things anyone could ever think up were the things living people came up with.

Banana Yoshimoto

Thinking, People, Might

Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (2006). “Hardboiled: & Hard Luck”, p.10, Grove Press

12 Copy quote
I wonder what it felt to move to a country where you didn't grow up. I had thought about that often since my sister got married. Do you become a character in a story native to that land, or do you, somewhere in your heart, want to return to your homeland.

Banana Yoshimoto

Country, Growing Up, Moving

Banana Yoshimoto (1995). “N.P.: A Novel”, p.87, Simon and Schuster

4 Copy quote
Living like that utterly convinced me of the extreme limitations of language. I was just a chlld then,so I have only an intuitive understanding of the degree to which one losses control of words once they are spoken or written. It was then that I first felt a deep curiosity about language, and understood it as a tool that encompasses both a single moment and eternity

Banana Yoshimoto

Single Mom, Loss, Understanding

11 Copy quote
When someone tells you something big, it's like you're taking money from them, and there's no way it will ever go back to being the way it was. You have to take responsibility for listening.

Banana Yoshimoto

Responsibility, Listening, Way

Banana Yoshimoto (2011). “The Lake”, p.41, Melville House

5 Copy quote
In the uncertain ebb and flow of time and emotions much of one's life history is etched in the senses.

Banana Yoshimoto

Ebb And Flow, Emotion, Uncertain

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.75, Grove Press

6 Copy quote
I was happy. I loved the night, I loved t so much it almost hurt. In the night everything seemed possible. I wasn't sleepy at all.

Banana Yoshimoto

Hurt, Night, Sleepy

7 Copy quote
There are many days when all the awful things that happen make you sick at heart, when the path before you is so steep you can’t bear to look. Not even love can rescue a person from that. Still, enveloped in the twilight coming from the west, there she was, watering the plants with her slender, graceful hands, in the midst of a light so sweet it seemed to form a rainbow in the transparent water she poured.

Banana Yoshimoto

Sweet, Twilight, Heart

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.42, Grove Press

10 Copy quote
I realized that the world did not exist for my benefit. It followed that the ratio of pleasant and unpleasant things around me would not change. It wasn't up to me. It was clear that the best thing to do was to adopt a sort of muddled cheerfulness.

Banana Yoshimoto

Benefits, World, Ratios

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.81, Grove Press

6 Copy quote
Everything in life has some good in it. And when something awful happens, the goodness stands out even more--it's sad, but that's the truth.

Banana Yoshimoto

Awful, Standing Out, Goodness

Banana Yoshimoto (2011). “The Lake”, p.16, Melville House

7 Copy quote
No matter what, I want to continue living with the awareness that I will die. Without that, I am not alive.

Banana Yoshimoto

Alive, Want, Matter

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.59, Grove Press

6 Copy quote
Even when I try to stir myself up, I just get irritated because I can't make anything come out. And in the middle of the night I lie here thinking about all this. If I don't get back on track somehow, I'm dead, that's the sense I get. There isn't a single strong emotion inside me.

Banana Yoshimoto

Depression, Strong, Lying

Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (2002). “Goodbye Tsugumi”, p.163, Grove Press

7 Copy quote
To the extent that I had come to understand that despair does not necessarily result in annihilation, that one can go on as usual in spite of it, I had become hardened. Was this what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities? I didn't like it, but it made it easier to go on.

Banana Yoshimoto

Mean, Despair, Adults

Banana Yoshimoto, Megan Backus (1979). “Three Plays”, p.56, Grove Press

9 Copy quote
Why were we so far apart, even when we were together? It was a nice loneliness, like the sensation of washing your face in cold water.

Banana Yoshimoto

Nice, Loneliness, Water

Banana Yoshimoto (2011). “The Lake”, p.187, Melville House

4 Copy quote
With a cold"--she spoke evenly, lowering her eyes a little--"now is the hardest time. Maybe even harder than dying. But this is probably as bad as it can get. You might come to fear the next time you get a cold; it will be as bad as this, but if you just hold steady, it won't be. For the rest of your life. That's how it works. You could take the negative view and live in fear: Will it happen again? But it won't hurt so much if you just accept it as a part of life." With that she looked up at me, smiling.

Banana Yoshimoto

Hurt, Eye, Views

Banana Yoshimoto (2006). “Kitchen”, p.139, Grove Press

4 Copy quote

You May Also Like:

Haruki Murakami

Yasunari Kawabata

Junichiro Tanizaki

Banana Yoshimoto

Follow

Born: July 24, 1964
Occupation: Writer
Cite this Page: Citation

Popular Topics