Top 450 Bonnie Garmus Quotes (2026 Update)
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301. “But as the years wore on, he began to feel like he was the prisoner permanently assigned to digging the escape tunnel. At the end of the day, as the other prisoners scrambled over him to freedom, he stayed behind with the spoon.”

— Bonnie Garmus

302. “She’d recently read about some country where both parents worked and took part in raising the children. Where was that, again? Sweden? She couldn’t remember. But the upshot was, it functioned very well. Productivity was higher; families were stronger.”

— Bonnie Garmus

303. “As soon as Mad could walk, Elizabeth encouraged her to touch, taste, toss, bounce, burn, rip, spill, shake, mix, splatter, sniff, and lick nearly everything she encountered.”

— Bonnie Garmus

304. “The other day she’d suggested they make mud pies and Mad frowned, then wrote 3.1415 with a stick in the dirt. “Done,” she’d said.”

— Bonnie Garmus

305. “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

306. “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

307. “Calvin was a brilliant man, but if he had one flaw, it was his ability to hold a grudge.”

— Bonnie Garmus

308. “I’m a specialist in human behavior,” she said. “At one point I was pursuing a PhD in psychology.” She looked at her lunch mates, hoping they’d ask her about her academic aspirations, but no one seemed even slightly interested. “Anyway, that’s why I can say with confidence: it’s she who’s using him.”

— Bonnie Garmus

309. “We’ve accomplished a lot together in the last two years. Hundreds of meals, if you can believe that. But supper isn’t all we’ve made, ladies. We’ve also made history.”

— Bonnie Garmus

310. “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 And those who purposefully close the door to others using self-serving, outdated cultural notions are not only dishonest, they’re knowingly lazy.”

— Bonnie Garmus

311. “I fell in love with Calvin,” she was saying, “because he was intelligent and kind, but also because he was the very first man to take me seriously. Imagine if all men took women seriously. Education would change. The workforce would revolutionize. Marriage counselors would go out of business.”

— Bonnie Garmus

312. “When faced with a serious problem, he’d found it helped to eat.”

— Bonnie Garmus

313. “Apparently, she tried to put in a request for The Naked and the Dead.”

— Bonnie Garmus

314. “Every last trace of Calvin had been scrubbed away. He watched as she stood in the middle of the room, her face blank with shock.”

— Bonnie Garmus

315. “Sometimes I understand why my brother left,” she admitted quietly. “After everything that’s happened, sometimes I feel like I want out, too.” “I get that,” Wakely said, thinking of how damaging the Life article was. “Believe me. But that’s not really your problem. It’s not that you want out.” She turned to look at him, confused. “It’s that you want back in.”

— Bonnie Garmus

316. “The only excitement had come at the beginning but it had worn off like cheap nail polish.”

— Bonnie Garmus

317. “I used to tell myself every day was new. That anything could happen.”

— Bonnie Garmus

318. “Because as a producer, he was part of Phil’s management team, and that meant he was responsible for pushing Phil’s agenda while ignoring those who ultimately paid the price for.”

— Bonnie Garmus

319. “He’d never really considered that a family could actually be the hard times.”

— Bonnie Garmus

320. “Not that you,” he said. “Not the ‘this is going to be really, really complicated’ you. Not the ‘far too many people do not appreciate the work and sacrifice that goes into being a wife, a mother, a woman’ you.”

— Bonnie Garmus

321. “Believe me. But that’s not really your problem. It’s not that you want out.” She turned to look at him, confused. “It’s that you want back in.”

— Bonnie Garmus

322. “Constant adaptations brought about by a series of never-ending mistakes?”

— Bonnie Garmus

323. “There was so much to do she couldn’t even make a to-do list because making a list was just one more thing to do. Plus, she still had all of her other.”

— Bonnie Garmus

324. “Mother of god,” Mrs. Sloane said as Elizabeth placed a cup of coffee in front of her. “Have you never heard of Folger’s?”

— Bonnie Garmus

325. “It was another thing Six-Thirty loved about her: her constant state of outrage.”

— Bonnie Garmus

326. “Neither of them had wanted children, and Elizabeth still fervently believed that no woman should be forced to have a baby. Yet here she was, a single mother, the lead scientist on what had to be the most unscientific experiment of all time: the raising of another human being.”

— Bonnie Garmus

327. “And even if we took all the proper legal steps to ensure my name won’t change, it will still change. Everyone will call me Mrs. Calvin Evans; I will become Mrs. Calvin Evans. Every Christmas card, every bank statement, every notice from the Bureau of Internal Revenue will all come to Mr.”

— Bonnie Garmus

328. “It was the same for Elizabeth. She sensed that Six-Thirty had also suffered beyond the usual dog-left-by-the-roadside neglect, and she, too, felt the need to protect him.”

— Bonnie Garmus

329. “I’ve already got a bunch of temp typing jobs lined up. But before I leave, I have a little present for you. Something to make up for all the grief I caused after Mr. Evans died. Why don’t you meet me on Friday at the south elevator. Four o’clock. I promise you won’t be disappointed.”

— Bonnie Garmus

330. “He’d stared at the test results, expecting to feel cheated or devastated or any of the other ways he’d guessed he was supposed to feel, but instead he’d felt completely nonplussed. The results didn’t matter at all. Amanda was his daughter and he was her father. He loved her with all his heart. Biology was overrated.”

— Bonnie Garmus

331. “Calvin smiled to himself. It was a side of Elizabeth he’d never seen before: a mothering instinct.”

— Bonnie Garmus

332. “A favorite from Lessons in Chemistry on this Tuesday – Whenever you feel afraid, just remember. Courage is the root of change – and change is what we’re chemically designed to do.”

— Bonnie Garmus

333. “But being a housewife and mother wasn’t really a job, was it? More like a role.”

— Bonnie Garmus

334. “And yet I still use the skin, not only because it’s fiber rich, but because it serves as a daily reminder that in potatoes as in life, danger is everywhere. The best strategy is not to fear the danger, but respect it.”

— Bonnie Garmus

335. “Most of the women she’d met in college claimed they were only there to get their MRS. It was disconcerting, as if they’d all drunk something that had rendered them temporarily insane.”

— Bonnie Garmus

336. “People like my father preach love but are filled with hate. Anyone who threatens their narrow beliefs cannot be tolerated.”

— Bonnie Garmus

337. “Anyway, people think they know more about themselves based on these silly branches full of names of people they’ve never met. For instance, I know someone who’s very proud to be a direct descendant of Galileo, and another who can trace her roots back to the Mayflower. They both talk about their lineage as if they have a pedigree, but they don’t. Your relatives can’t make you important or smart. They can’t make you you.”

— Bonnie Garmus

338. “The stories were short, memorable, and covered all the bases of love, pride, folly, and forgiveness. Their rules were bite-sized: Don’t be a jerk. Don’t hurt other people or animals. Share what you have with others less fortunate. In other words, be nice.”

— Bonnie Garmus

339. “I’ve always wrapped my shows by telling your children to set the table so that you might have a moment for yourself. ‘A moment for yourself’ – that was the advice Harriet Sloane gave me the first day I met her, and that is the advice that has resulted in my decision to leave Supper at Six. It was Harriet who told me to use that moment to reconnect with my own needs, to identify my true direction, to recommit.”

— Bonnie Garmus

340. “That’s just Calvin. He doesn’t like to run in place in ballet slippers.”

— Bonnie Garmus

341. “The I-hate-people gene?” Harriet said. “There is one?”

— Bonnie Garmus

342. “You have a lot of nerve,” Donatti said. “You know very well women do not continue to work when pregnant.”

— Bonnie Garmus

343. “He’d once heard someone say it was important to be reminded of one’s failures, but he didn’t know why. Failures, by their very nature, had a way of being unforgettable.”

— Bonnie Garmus

344. “I can’t believe we’re fired,” he continued. “I mean, we have a hit show on our hands and we’re fired?” Elizabeth looked at him with concern. “No, Walter,” she said slowly. “We’re not fired. We’re in charge.”

— Bonnie Garmus

345. “Still, he was a child, and as children do, he held onto his hope long after the hope should have expired.”

— Bonnie Garmus

346. “Later, in her dressing room, Rosa, the hairdresser and makeup woman, stopped by to say goodbye. “For the record, I liked the hair pencil.”

— Bonnie Garmus

347. “Look, I realize this may be hard for you to fathom given your own terrible circumstances, but while we may be born into families, it doesn’t necessarily mean we belong to them.”

— Bonnie Garmus

348. “You’ve had so many, well, so many men dropping by at the oddest hours.” She cleared her throat. “It’s work,” Elizabeth said as she coaxed Madeline to take the bottle. “Whatever you want to call it,” Mrs. Sloane said.”

— Bonnie Garmus

349. “Who wants to believe life is exactly how it seems?”

— Bonnie Garmus

350. “Calvin had believed persistence was innate; Elizabeth argued it was learned. Six-Thirty, on the other hand, thought persistence was intelligence.”

— Bonnie Garmus