Top 350 Laurie Halse Anderson Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Be careful what you wish for. There’s always a catch.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

2. “Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

3. “Rumors are spread by jealous people.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

4. “You have to know what you stand for, not just what you stand against.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

5. “Don’t expect to make a difference unless you speak up for yourself.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

6. “Nothing is perfect. Flaws are interesting. Be the tree.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

7. “You must walk alone to find your soul.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

8. “I wonder how long it would take for anyone to notice if I just stopped talking.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

9. “I am beginning to measure myself in strength, not pounds. Sometimes in smiles.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

10. “Sometimes being an adult means doing the right thing, even if it’s not what you want.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

11. “There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn’t matter anymore.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

12. “This camp is a forge for the army; it’s testing our mettle. Instead of heat and hammer, our trials are cold and hunger. Question is, what are we made of?”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

13. “When people don’t express themselves, they die one piece at a time.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

14. “I want to go to sleep and not wake up, but I don’t want to die.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

15. “Can’t escape pain, kiddo. Battle through it and you get stronger.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

16. “Gym should be illegal. It’s humiliating.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

17. “School libraries are the foundations of our culture – not luxuries.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

18. “Revision means throwing out the boring crap and making what’s left sound natural.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

19. “I wanted to pull down a book, open it proper, and gobble up page after page.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

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20. “Art without emotion its like chocolate cake without sugar. It makes you gag.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

21. “First thought: It was a dream Second thought: No it wasn’t Third thought: Crap.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

22. “I am angry that I starved my brain and that I sat shivering in my bed at night instead of dancing or reading poetry or eating ice cream or kissing a boy...”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

Featured in: Reading Quotes

23. “I have survived. I am here. Confused, screwed up, but here. So, how can I find my way? Is there a chain saw of the soul, an ax I can take to my memories or fears?”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

24. “Cold and silence. Nothing quieter than snow. The sky screams to deliver it, a hundred banshees flying on the edge of the blizzard. But once the snow covers the ground, it hushes as still as my heart.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

25. “Life is for the living. Don’t let the fear of striking out let you from keep you from playing the game.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

26. “When life sucks, read. They can’t yell at you for that. And if they do, then you can ignore them.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

27. “To keep up appearances, I stomp my room and slam the door.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

28. “They yell at me because I can’t see what they see. Nobody can explain to me why my eyes work different than theirs.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

29. “He says a million things without saying a word. I have never heard a more eloquent silence.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

30. “I want to go to sleep and not wake up, but I don’t want to die. I want to eat like a normal person eats, but I need to see my bones or I will hate myself even more and I might cut my heart out or take every pill that was ever made.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

31. “Melancholy held me hostage, and the bees built a hive of sadness in my soul.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

32. “Gossip is the foul smell from the Devil’s backside.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

33. “I am getting better at smiling when people expect it.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

34. “Didn’t help to ponder things that were forever gone. It only made a body restless and fill up with bees, all wanting to sting something.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

35. “In one aspect, yes, I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

36. “Do they choose to be so dense? Were they born that way? I have no friends. I have nothing. I say nothing. I am nothing.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

37. “IT happened. There is no avoiding it, no forgetting. No running away, or flying, or burying, or hiding.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

38. “It doesn’t hurt. Nothing hurts except the small smiles and blushes that flash across the room like tiny sparrows.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

39. “This is wonderful, wonderful! Be the bird. You are the bird. Sacrifice yourself to abandoned family values...”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

40. “Why not draw naked guys, just to be fair? Naked women is art, naked guys a no-no, I bet. Probably because most painters are men.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

41. “Censorship is the child of fear the father of ignorance and the desperate weapon of fascists everywhere.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

42. “My face becomes a Picasso sketch, my body slicing into pieces.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

43. “I open a paperclip and scratch it across the inside of my left wrist. Pitiful. If a suicide attempt is a cry for help, then what is this. A whimper, a peep? I draw little window cracks of blood, etching line after line until it stops hurting.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

44. “Precalculus was taught in dog whistle, a pitch too high to hear.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

45. “Think about love, or hate, or joy, or pain- whatever makes you feel something, makes your palms sweat, or your toes curl. Focus on that feeling. When people don’t express themselves, they die on piece at a time.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

46. “This is where you can find your soul if you dare. Where you can touch that part of you that you’ve never dared look at before. Do not come here and ask me to show you how to draw a face. Ask me to help you find the wind.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

47. “Life was a battle, and Mother a tired and bitter captain.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

48. “It was like looking at a knot, knowing it was a knot, but not knowing how to untie it. I had no map for this life.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

49. “I watch the Eruptions. Mount Dad, long dormant, now considered armed and dangerous. Mount Saint Mom, oozing lava, spitting flame. Warn the villagers to run into the sea.”

— Laurie Halse Anderson

50. “I pushed my ragged mouth against the mirror. A thousand crushed bleeding lips pushed back at me...”

— Laurie Halse Anderson