Top 450 Daniel Handler Quotes (2025 Update)
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301. “Love makes the world go round, the hit songs collectively tell us, and the world is full of people you don’t know and might as well be nice to because they won’t leave.”

— Daniel Handler

302. “There is no worse sound in the world than someone who cannot play the violin but insists on doing so anyway.”

— Daniel Handler

303. “But just suddenly I really, really needed to see you again right that minute, that night.”

— Daniel Handler

304. “To hear the phrase “our only hope” always makes one anxious, because it means that if the only hope doesn’t work, there is nothing left.”

— Daniel Handler

305. “One of the world’s most popular entertainments is a deck of cards, which contains thirteen each of four suits, highlighted by kings, queens and jacks, who are possibly the queen’s younger, more attractive boyfriends.”

— Daniel Handler

306. “I was not a particularly brave child, I think, because I had a narrative mind, because my mind automatically went to any terrible thing that could happen.”

— Daniel Handler

307. “One cannot spend forever sitting and solving the mysteries of oone’s history.”

— Daniel Handler

308. “December 5 is what I saw as we walked together on October 5, let’s go, let’s go together toward something extraordinary and I started making plans, thinking we would get that far.”

— Daniel Handler

309. “A good library will never be too neat, or too dusty, because somebody will always be in it, taking books off the shelves and staying up late reading them.”

— Daniel Handler

310. “Strange as it may seem, I still hope for the best, even though the best, like an interesting piece of mail, so rarely arrives, and even when it does it can be lost so easily.”

— Daniel Handler

311. “Miracles are like pimples, because once you start looking for them you find more than you ever dreamed you’d see.”

— Daniel Handler

312. “There are almost as many kinds of libraries as there are kinds of readers.”

— Daniel Handler

313. “I am so tired, I can hardly type these worfs.”

— Daniel Handler

314. “No matter who you are, no matter where you live, and no matter how many people are chasing you, what you don’t read is often as important as what you do read.”

— Daniel Handler

315. “When you start reading nonfiction books about piracy, you realize that it’s actually just a history of desperate people.”

— Daniel Handler

316. “Members of your family might say they are working hard all day long, while you are off at school or clarinet lessons, but the only way to know this for sure is to follow them at a discreet distance.”

— Daniel Handler

317. “It is often said that reading is a gift, but to my mind that is an insufficient description, for the size of the gift of reading is so vast that it is difficult to see what is outside its wrapping.”

— Daniel Handler

318. “Shyness is a curious thing, because, like quicksand, it can strike people at any time, and also, like quicksand, it usually makes its victims look down.”

— Daniel Handler

319. “A good thing to do when one is sitting, eating, and resting is to have a conversation.”

— Daniel Handler

320. “She didn’t look like a girl who would ruin the whole thing at all.”

— Daniel Handler

321. “Everyone tells you it’s all right to cry, but not enough people say it’s all right if you don’t want people to know.”

— Daniel Handler

322. “Forever and ever, world without end.”

— Daniel Handler

323. “If you enjoy books with happy endings than you are better off reading some other book.”

— Daniel Handler

324. “The movie was kickass, which was appropriate, because tonight it was called Kickass: The Movie.”

— Daniel Handler

325. “Are you who I think you are?”

— Daniel Handler

326. “It is always cruel to laugh at people, of course, although sometimes if they are wearing an ugly hat it is hard to control yourself.”

— Daniel Handler

327. “I have a dream of what would have happened if what happened instead hadn’t.”

— Daniel Handler

328. “And then like a song we’d forgotten was even on the mix, you stepped into the house and my whole life.”

— Daniel Handler

329. “I find reading screenplays difficult, as they’re only a roadmap for what a movie might end up being.”

— Daniel Handler

330. “This world is suchier than we are, and the best thing to do is keep moving and find your keys.”

— Daniel Handler

331. “They say that when you’re really in love, the world becomes gossamer and gorgeous, but in my experience the world gets grimy, and the love object is in stark relief from the surroundings. This is love, a pretty thing on an ugly street.”

— Daniel Handler

332. “I think one of the reasons it ended was that his eyes never lit up for me the way they did for classical music. I realize that in the long run I may not be as wonderful as a Brahms symphony but I think I’m good for a Haydn quintet.”

— Daniel Handler

333. “All the secrets of the world are contained in books. Read at your own risk.”

— Daniel Handler

334. “I like writing for movies. It’s nice to be alone working on fiction in your room, and then it’s nice to be in a room with a bunch of people working on a movie.”

— Daniel Handler

335. “The hallway was lined with numbered doors, odd numbers on one side and even numbers on the other, and large ornamental vases, too large to hold flowers and too small to hold spies.”

— Daniel Handler

336. “I’ve never had a musical career. So I think it’s been unaffected. I play the accordion. In terms of thinking of it as a musical career, I think it’s sort of like calling yourself an astronaut because you have a shiny suit.”

— Daniel Handler

337. “I thought it was one thing but it was the other, it was zero zero zero alone on the bus while you slept in the room I had to leave, and that’s why we broke up.”

— Daniel Handler

338. “I was never a fan of anything, and yet some people are fans of my books. That’s a bit odd. But I like meeting them.”

— Daniel Handler

339. “The library was one enormous room, with long, high metal shelves and the perfect quiet that libraries provide for anyone looking for an answer.”

— Daniel Handler

340. “You know, despite all my world-weariness and cynicism, I think I’ve always believed that there is one person in the universe for whom you are truly meant – and the fact that sometimes there are two or even more people on the earth you can fall in love with really bothers me. It suggests that if you work hard you can be meant for anyone.”

— Daniel Handler

341. “Wherever there’s a conductor, you’re sure to find a dead composer!”

— Daniel Handler

342. “Treat reluctance like seasickness,” Errol said, picking something off his sleeve. “If you feel it, focus on the horizon.”

— Daniel Handler

343. “We steal the happiness of others in order to be happy ourselves, and when it is stolen from us we voyage desperately to steal it back.”

— Daniel Handler

344. “Troublesome things tend to remain troublesome no matter how many times you do them.”

— Daniel Handler

345. “Any playlist without Prince is no friend of mine.”

— Daniel Handler

346. “So you’re reluctant, I said to myself. Many, many people are reluctant. It’s like having feet. It’s nothing to brag about.”

— Daniel Handler

347. “This is love if it’s not with you, a terrible fiery something that makes people look away, and it feels like a punch in the throat.”

— Daniel Handler

348. “I was so angry I knew it would boomerang someplace sometime soon.”

— Daniel Handler

349. “It is often difficult to admit that someone you love is not perfect, or to consider aspects of a person that are less than admirable.”

— Daniel Handler

350. “Take it back, Ed. Take it all back.”

— Daniel Handler