Top 450 Bonnie Garmus Quotes (2026 Update)
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51. “And who can blame him, because you know the invisible hand is libertarian garbage.”

— Bonnie Garmus

52. “But a chilly splash of water in the face off starboard, just before dawn? It fixes things.”

— Bonnie Garmus

53. “Obviously, she couldn’t possibly be rowing with Evans. An elite rower like Evans would never deign to get in a boat with a novice, even if they were sleeping together. Scratch that; especially if they were sleeping together. Evans probably signed her up for some beginner crew, and Zott, wanting to prove that she could hold her own – per usual – went along with it. He shuddered at the thought of a bunch of struggling rowers, their blades hitting the water like out-of-control spatulas.”

— Bonnie Garmus

54. “Cooking is serious science. In fact, it’s chemistry.”

— Bonnie Garmus

55. “Elizabeth Zott held grudges too. Except her grudges were mainly reserved for a patriarchal society founded on the idea that women were less. Less capable. Less intelligent. Less inventive. A society that believed men went to work and did important things – discovered planets, developed products, created laws – and women stayed at home and raised children.”

— Bonnie Garmus

56. “Courage is the root of change.”

— Bonnie Garmus

57. “For Elizabeth, cooking wasn’t some preordained feminine duty. As she’d told Calvin, cooking was chemistry. That’s because cooking actually is chemistry.”

— Bonnie Garmus

58. “Humans were strange, Six-Thirty thought, the way they constantly battled dirt in their aboveground world, but after death willingly entombed themselves in it.”

— Bonnie Garmus

59. “It is my experience that far too many people do not appreciate the work and sacrifice that goes into being a wife, a mother, a woman. Well, I am not one of them. At the end of our thirty minutes together, we will have done something worth doing. We will have created something that will not go unnoticed. We will have made supper. And it will matter.”

— Bonnie Garmus

60. “She looked back incredulously. “Sometimes I think,” she said slowly, “that if a man were to spend a day being a woman in America, he wouldn’t make it past noon.” The woman on the other side of him tapped his knee. “Prepare for a revolt.”

— Bonnie Garmus

61. “Every day she found parenthood like taking a test for which she had not studied. The questions were daunting and there wasn’t nearly enough multiple choice. Occasionally she woke up damp with sweat, having imagined a knock at the door and some sort of authority figure with an empty baby-sized basket saying, “We’ve just reviewed your last parental performance report and there’s really no nice way to put this. You’re fired.”

— Bonnie Garmus

62. “It was because of Six-Thirty. He was always there, sniffing out danger, blocking light sockets, positioning himself beneath the bookshelf so when she scaled it – which she did nearly every day – he would be the cushion that broke her fall. He’d failed once to protect someone he loved. He would not fail again.”

— Bonnie Garmus

63. “Chemistry is change and change is the core of your belief system. Which is good because that’s what we need more of – people who refuse to accept the status quo, who aren’t afraid to take on the unacceptable. But sometimes the unacceptable – your brother’s suicide, Calvin’s death – is, in fact, permanent, Elizabeth. Things happen. They just do.”

— Bonnie Garmus

64. “Look,” he said, “life has never been fair, and yet you continue to operate as if it is – as if once you get a few wrongs straightened out, everything else will fall into place. They won’t. You want my advice?” And before she could say no, he added, “Don’t work the system. Outsmart it.”

— Bonnie Garmus

65. “Mr. Sloane truly believed other women found him attractive. Harriet had no idea where that specific brand of self-confidence came from. Because while stupid people may not know they’re stupid because they’re stupid, surely unattractive people must know they’re unattractive because of mirrors.”

— Bonnie Garmus

66. “But weathering is called weathering for a reason: it erodes. As the months went by, her fortitude was tested again and again. The only thing that gave her any respite at all was the theater, and even that sometimes disappointed.”

— Bonnie Garmus

67. “It’s a lot easier to have faith in something you can’t see, can’t touch, can’t explain, and can’t change, rather than to have faith in something you actually can.”

— Bonnie Garmus

68. “It’s one thing to be brilliant, but to be brilliant without opportunity – that was something else. If Mozart had been born to a poor family in Bombay instead of a cultured one in Salzburg, would he have composed Symphony no. 36 in C? Not a chance.”

— Bonnie Garmus

69. “He was raised without a family, without parents he could count on, without the protection and love every child is entitled to.”

— Bonnie Garmus

70. “The point is, you and your husband are completely different and yet you still have a strong connection. That’s fine. It’s also ionic.”

— Bonnie Garmus

71. “It’s one thing to be brilliant, but to be brilliant without opportunity – that was something else.”

— Bonnie Garmus

72. “Men and women are both human beings. And as humans, we’re by-products of our upbringings, victims of our lackluster educational systems, and choosers of our behaviors.”

— Bonnie Garmus

73. “Hello, Creature, he transmitted as he pressed his ear into Elizabeth’s belly. It’s me, Six-Thirty. I’m the dog.”

— Bonnie Garmus

74. “It wasn’t that he couldn’t function without her, he told Four Seat, but rather that he didn’t see the point of functioning without her. “I don’t know what to call it,” he’d confided following a full examination. “Am I addicted to her? Am I dependent in some sick sort of way? Could I have a brain tumor?” “Jesus, Six, it’s called happiness,” Four Seat explained. “When’s the wedding?”

— Bonnie Garmus

75. “You love each other, but he’s probably not interested in hearing about the invisible hand. And who can blame him, because you know the invisible hand is libertarian garbage.”

— Bonnie Garmus

76. “But that was before Elizabeth – before he realized that making her happy made him happy. Which, he thought, as he grabbed his tennis shoes, had to be the very definition of love. To actually want to change for someone else.”

— Bonnie Garmus

77. “In short, the reduction of women to something less than men, and the elevation of men to something more than women, is not biological: it’s cultural. And it starts with two words: pink and blue. Everything skyrockets out of control from there.”

— Bonnie Garmus

78. “Humans naturally want to belong – it’s part of our biology. But our society makes us feel that we’re never good enough to belong.”

— Bonnie Garmus

79. “She’d felt this way her entire life. She’d been defined not by what she did, but by what others had done. In the past she was either the offspring of an arsonist, the daughter of a serial wife, the sister of a hanged homosexual, or the graduate student of a renowned lecher. Now she was the girlfriend of a famous chemist. But she was never just Elizabeth Zott.”

— Bonnie Garmus

80. “Life’s a mystery, isn’t it? People who try and plan it inevitably end up disappointed.”

— Bonnie Garmus

81. “Because while she was stuck forever being Mrs. Sloane – she was a Catholic – she never wanted to turn into a Mr. Sloane.”

— Bonnie Garmus

82. “Actually, when you think about it, rowing is almost exactly like raising kids. Both require patience, endurance, strength, and commitment. And neither allow us to see where we’re going – only where we’ve been. I find that very reassuring, don’t you? Except for the flip-outs – of course. I could really do with fewer flip-outs.” “You mean flips.” “Flip-outs,” he insisted, getting in his car. “Yesterday one of my kids hit the other with a shovel.”

— Bonnie Garmus

83. “Too many brilliant minds are kept from scientific research thanks to ignorant biases like gender and race. It infuriates me and it should infuriate you. Science has big problems to solve: famine, disease, extinction. And those who purposefully close the door to others using self-serving, outdated cultural notions are not only dishonest, they’re knowingly lazy. Hastings Research Institute is full of them.”

— Bonnie Garmus

84. “In the past she was either the offspring of an arsonist, the daughter of a serial wife, the sister of a hanged homosexual, or the graduate student of a renowned lecher.”

— Bonnie Garmus

85. “The tombstone was supposed to have read, “Your days are numbered. Use them to throw open the windows of your soul to the sun,” a quote from Marcus Aurelius, but the tombstone was small and the engraver had made the first part too big and had run out of room.”

— Bonnie Garmus

86. “Discrimination based on skin color is not only scientifically ludicrous, it’s also a sign of profound ignorance.”

— Bonnie Garmus

87. “Whatever you need, whatever you want, whatever you seek, reconnect with it in that moment.”

— Bonnie Garmus

88. “From below, Six-Thirty exhaled. Lies, lies, and more lies.”

— Bonnie Garmus

89. “In the case of our chicken pot pie, notice how your carrots, peas, onions, and celery are mixed yet remain separate entities. Think about that. A successful chicken pot pie is like a society that functions at a highly efficient level. Call it Sweden.”

— Bonnie Garmus

90. “Holding an egg in the palm of her hand, she turned to him. “Here’s a tip, Six-Thirty: never crack eggs on the side of a bowl – it increases the chance of shell fragments. Better to bring a sharp, thin knife down on the egg as if you’re cracking a whip. See?” she said, as the egg’s contents slipped into the bowl.”

— Bonnie Garmus

91. “He’d not had much experience with families, but he’d always assumed that being part of one was important: a prerequisite for stability, what one relied on to get through the hard times. He’d never really considered that a family could actually be the hard times.”

— Bonnie Garmus

92. “I believe in a few things,” he corrected. “Mostly the things about not giving up hope, not giving in to darkness. As for the word ‘preach,’ I prefer ‘relate.’ Anyway, what I believe is irrelevant.”

— Bonnie Garmus

93. “One would think the ignorant would die off sooner,” Elizabeth continued. “But Darwin overlooked the fact that the ignorant rarely forget to eat.”

— Bonnie Garmus

94. “Elizabeth once read that 98 percent of the things people worry about never come true.”

— Bonnie Garmus

95. “Sure, grit was critical, but it also took luck, and if luck wasn’t available, then help. Everyone needed help.”

— Bonnie Garmus

96. “I don’t have hopes,” Mad explained, studying the address. “I have faith.” He looked at her in surprise. “Well, that’s a funny word to hear coming from you.” “How come?” “Because,” he said, “well, you know. Religion is based on faith.” “But you realize,” she said carefully, as if not to embarrass him further, “that faith isn’t based on religion. Right?”

— Bonnie Garmus

97. “Afternoon Depression Zone.”

— Bonnie Garmus

98. “You make a fair point, Evans,” Wakely wrote back. “But people need to believe in something bigger than themselves.” “Why?” Calvin pressed. “What’s wrong with believing in ourselves? Anyway, if stories must be used, why not rely on a fable or fairy tale? Aren’t they just as valid a vehicle for teaching morality? Except maybe better? Because no one has to pretend to believe that the fables and tales are true?”

— Bonnie Garmus

99. “I don’t have hopes,” Mad explained, studying the address. “I have faith.” He looked at her in surprise. “Well, that’s a funny word to hear coming from you.” “How come?” “Because,” he said, “well, you know. Religion is based on faith.”

— Bonnie Garmus

100. “Losing a loved one has a way of revealing a too-simple truth: that time, as people often claimed but never heeded, really was precious.”

— Bonnie Garmus