Create Yours

Top 120 Lily King Quotes (2025 Update)
Page 2 of 3

Lily King Quote: “She claimed that conformity created maladjustment and tradition could turn psychopathic.”

51. “She claimed that conformity created maladjustment and tradition could turn psychopathic.”

Lily King Quote: “Because death is not tragic to them, not in the way it is to us,’ I said. ‘They mourn.’ ‘They feel sorrow, great sorrow. But it isn’t tragic.’ ‘No, it isn’t. They know their ancestors have a plan for them. There’s no sense that it was wrong. Tragedy is based on this sense that there’s been a terrible mistake, isn’t it?”

52. “Because death is not tragic to them, not in the way it is to us,’ I said. ‘They mourn.’ ‘They feel sorrow, great sorrow. But it isn’t tragic.’ ‘No, it isn’t. They know their ancestors have a plan for them. There’s no sense that it was wrong. Tragedy is based on this sense that there’s been a terrible mistake, isn’t it?”

Lily King Quote: “When only one person is the expert on a particular people, do we learn more about the people or the anthropologist when we read the analysis?”

53. “When only one person is the expert on a particular people, do we learn more about the people or the anthropologist when we read the analysis?”

Lily King Quote: “Halfway across the river I hoist myself on the wide parapet, swing my legs over the edge, and look down in the water for Quentin’s body. How does a man in Mississippi in the 1920s create a character who feels more alive to a waitress in 1997, remembered with more tenderness, than most of the boys she’s ever known? How do you create a character like that?”

54. “Halfway across the river I hoist myself on the wide parapet, swing my legs over the edge, and look down in the water for Quentin’s body. How does a man in Mississippi in the 1920s create a character who feels more alive to a waitress in 1997, remembered with more tenderness, than most of the boys she’s ever known? How do you create a character like that?”

Lily King Quote: “It was strong, whatever was between us, thick, like the wet air and the smell of every green thing ready to bloom. Maybe it was just spring. Maybe that’s all it was.”

55. “It was strong, whatever was between us, thick, like the wet air and the smell of every green thing ready to bloom. Maybe it was just spring. Maybe that’s all it was.”

Lily King Quote: “That night at Gertie’s when she asked me if I preferred to be the one who loved slightly more or loved slightly less. More, I said. Not this time, she said in my ear. I am the one who will always love more. I didn’t say, But I love without needing to own. Because I didn’t know the difference then.”

56. “That night at Gertie’s when she asked me if I preferred to be the one who loved slightly more or loved slightly less. More, I said. Not this time, she said in my ear. I am the one who will always love more. I didn’t say, But I love without needing to own. Because I didn’t know the difference then.”

Lily King Quote: “Wine is sort of thrilling and sensual, and bread is familiar and essential.”

57. “Wine is sort of thrilling and sensual, and bread is familiar and essential.”

Lily King Quote: “She stared at me and nodded into the silence between us, as if I were still talking and making perfect sense.”

58. “She stared at me and nodded into the silence between us, as if I were still talking and making perfect sense.”

Lily King Quote: “It’s good to see art, to remember what a natural human impulse it has always been.”

59. “It’s good to see art, to remember what a natural human impulse it has always been.”

Lily King Quote: “It’s strange, to not be the youngest kind of adult anymore.”

60. “It’s strange, to not be the youngest kind of adult anymore.”

Lily King Quote: “Three mornings later, after the dog walk but before my cereal and cup of tea, in the middle of my writing morning, in what I believe is the middle of a paragraph, I finish a sentence. I lift my pencil a few inches from the page and read it. It’s the last sentence of the book. I can’t think of another. That’s it. I have my underpainting.”

61. “Three mornings later, after the dog walk but before my cereal and cup of tea, in the middle of my writing morning, in what I believe is the middle of a paragraph, I finish a sentence. I lift my pencil a few inches from the page and read it. It’s the last sentence of the book. I can’t think of another. That’s it. I have my underpainting.”

Lily King Quote: “He seems genuinely happy for me. You can’t always count on a guy for that.”

62. “He seems genuinely happy for me. You can’t always count on a guy for that.”

Lily King Quote: “Most women like to fuss around a wound of your past, pick at the thin scab, comfort you after they’d made it sting. Not Nell.”

63. “Most women like to fuss around a wound of your past, pick at the thin scab, comfort you after they’d made it sting. Not Nell.”

Lily King Quote: “He didn’t answer, but I wasn’t bothered. I was flattered that we’d gotten to this stage already, that our minds could wander without apology. We passed through a long swath of fireflies, thousands of them flashing all round us, and it felt like soaring through stars.”

64. “He didn’t answer, but I wasn’t bothered. I was flattered that we’d gotten to this stage already, that our minds could wander without apology. We passed through a long swath of fireflies, thousands of them flashing all round us, and it felt like soaring through stars.”

Lily King Quote: “My mind has circled back again to that conversation with Helen on the steps of Schermerhorn about how each culture has a flavor. What she said that night comes back to me at least once a day. Have I ever said anything to anyone that has come back once a day for 8 years?”

65. “My mind has circled back again to that conversation with Helen on the steps of Schermerhorn about how each culture has a flavor. What she said that night comes back to me at least once a day. Have I ever said anything to anyone that has come back once a day for 8 years?”

Lily King Quote: “When my mother died, I sort of felt her inside me sometimes,’ I say. ‘Like I’d swallowed her.’ He laughs. ‘Swallowed her.’ ‘I still have moments when I feel that, when it feels like she’s inside me, and there’s no difference between us or that the difference doesn’t matter.”

66. “When my mother died, I sort of felt her inside me sometimes,’ I say. ‘Like I’d swallowed her.’ He laughs. ‘Swallowed her.’ ‘I still have moments when I feel that, when it feels like she’s inside me, and there’s no difference between us or that the difference doesn’t matter.”

Lily King Quote: “The stale cerebral self-conscious wit that bubbled like a frothy mold in every corner of Cambridge.”

67. “The stale cerebral self-conscious wit that bubbled like a frothy mold in every corner of Cambridge.”

Lily King Quote: “Sometimes you just find a culture that breaks your heart,” she said finally.”

68. “Sometimes you just find a culture that breaks your heart,” she said finally.”

Lily King Quote: “She rested her head against his and felt, for the first time, what she would often feel with him: a self-affection. He made her like herself. With him, she was at ease: her skin felt as though it was her right size.”

69. “She rested her head against his and felt, for the first time, what she would often feel with him: a self-affection. He made her like herself. With him, she was at ease: her skin felt as though it was her right size.”

Lily King Quote: “We’re always, in everything we do in this world, she said, limited by subjectivity.”

70. “We’re always, in everything we do in this world, she said, limited by subjectivity.”

Lily King Quote: “I know you are drunk on youth and immortality, but this is how you die.”

71. “I know you are drunk on youth and immortality, but this is how you die.”

Lily King Quote: “The geese are all asleep. A few tip their heads out from under their wings as we approach. I open the cookie tin and a few more sway slowly over to us. It’s cold, and Silas has wrapped the green blanket around me so I feel like I have wings, too.”

72. “The geese are all asleep. A few tip their heads out from under their wings as we approach. I open the cookie tin and a few more sway slowly over to us. It’s cold, and Silas has wrapped the green blanket around me so I feel like I have wings, too.”

Lily King Quote: “My mother was a real person. I am not a real person.”

73. “My mother was a real person. I am not a real person.”

Lily King Quote: “I had never seen more clearly how streets like these were made for and by amoral cowards, men who made money in rubber or sugar or copper or steel in remote places then returned here where no one questioned their practices, their treatment of others, their greed.”

74. “I had never seen more clearly how streets like these were made for and by amoral cowards, men who made money in rubber or sugar or copper or steel in remote places then returned here where no one questioned their practices, their treatment of others, their greed.”

Lily King Quote: “But I can’t go out with a guy who’s written eleven and half pages in three years. That kind of thing is contagious.”

75. “But I can’t go out with a guy who’s written eleven and half pages in three years. That kind of thing is contagious.”

Lily King Quote: “The Irish essayist has us close our eyes and listen to the words she says without trying to control our thoughts. I keep mine open a crack, to scan the packed room. He’s not here. ‘A rainy day,’ she says. My mother and me running from the Mustang to the house. ‘The sound of a musical instrument.’ Caleb playing the guitar. ‘An act of love.’ My father cleaning my golf clubs in the kitchen sink. She has us write about one of these moments that come up unbidden, unforced.”

76. “The Irish essayist has us close our eyes and listen to the words she says without trying to control our thoughts. I keep mine open a crack, to scan the packed room. He’s not here. ‘A rainy day,’ she says. My mother and me running from the Mustang to the house. ‘The sound of a musical instrument.’ Caleb playing the guitar. ‘An act of love.’ My father cleaning my golf clubs in the kitchen sink. She has us write about one of these moments that come up unbidden, unforced.”

Lily King Quote: “Nell and Fen had chased away my thoughts of suicide. But what had they left me with? Fierce desires, a great tide of feeling of which I could make little sense, an ache that seemed to have no name but want. I want. Intransitive. No object. It was the opposite of wanting to die. But it was scarcely more bearable.”

77. “Nell and Fen had chased away my thoughts of suicide. But what had they left me with? Fierce desires, a great tide of feeling of which I could make little sense, an ache that seemed to have no name but want. I want. Intransitive. No object. It was the opposite of wanting to die. But it was scarcely more bearable.”

Lily King Quote: “There is something about finding the balance to one’s nature – perhaps a culture that flourishes is a culture that has found a similar balance among its people.”

78. “There is something about finding the balance to one’s nature – perhaps a culture that flourishes is a culture that has found a similar balance among its people.”

Lily King Quote: “I was raised on science as other people are raised on God, or Gods, or the crocodile.”

79. “I was raised on science as other people are raised on God, or Gods, or the crocodile.”

Lily King Quote: “I held her as she wept. I stroked her hair, loose and slightly matted. ‘Stay here with me. Or let me come with you.’ She pulled me down to kiss her. Warm. Briny. ‘I love you,’ she said, her lips still against mine. But it meant no.”

80. “I held her as she wept. I stroked her hair, loose and slightly matted. ‘Stay here with me. Or let me come with you.’ She pulled me down to kiss her. Warm. Briny. ‘I love you,’ she said, her lips still against mine. But it meant no.”

Lily King Quote: “That reverberation for me is what is most important about literature.”

81. “That reverberation for me is what is most important about literature.”

Lily King Quote: “He kissed where I was touching, just below my collarbone, in that place where all my feelings got caught. I believed she’d sent him to me as a gift to help me through.”

82. “He kissed where I was touching, just below my collarbone, in that place where all my feelings got caught. I believed she’d sent him to me as a gift to help me through.”

Lily King Quote: “But he did not believe ordinary citizens created art. True art was anomalous; it was a rare mutation. It didn’t happen simply because one willed it so. He thought it an utter and exasperating waste of an ordinary man’s time.”

83. “But he did not believe ordinary citizens created art. True art was anomalous; it was a rare mutation. It didn’t happen simply because one willed it so. He thought it an utter and exasperating waste of an ordinary man’s time.”

Lily King Quote: “They say women have intuition, but men can smell a competitor across state lines.”

84. “They say women have intuition, but men can smell a competitor across state lines.”

Lily King Quote: “My voice is nothing special, but when your mother tells you something about yourself, even if you’ve coaxed it out of her, it’s hard not to always believe it. I sing to the geese. And I feel her. It’s different from remembering her or yearning for her. I feel her near me. I don’t know if she is the geese or the river or the sky or the moon. I don’t know if she is outside of me or inside of me, but she is here. I feel her love for me. I feel my love reach her. A brief, easy exchange.”

85. “My voice is nothing special, but when your mother tells you something about yourself, even if you’ve coaxed it out of her, it’s hard not to always believe it. I sing to the geese. And I feel her. It’s different from remembering her or yearning for her. I feel her near me. I don’t know if she is the geese or the river or the sky or the moon. I don’t know if she is outside of me or inside of me, but she is here. I feel her love for me. I feel my love reach her. A brief, easy exchange.”

Lily King Quote: “He has called to ask you out on a date. Do not mention a dead mother.”

86. “He has called to ask you out on a date. Do not mention a dead mother.”

Lily King Quote: “Nearly every guy I’ve dated believed they should already be famous, believed that greatness was their destiny and they were already behind schedule.”

87. “Nearly every guy I’ve dated believed they should already be famous, believed that greatness was their destiny and they were already behind schedule.”

Lily King Quote: “I sat next to a woman called Tadi and I asked her what she would do with the shells she earned and she said her husband would use them to buy another wife. ‘I cannot make this bag fast enough,’ she said. We all fell over laughing.”

88. “I sat next to a woman called Tadi and I asked her what she would do with the shells she earned and she said her husband would use them to buy another wife. ‘I cannot make this bag fast enough,’ she said. We all fell over laughing.”

Lily King Quote: “For a moment all my bees have turned to honey.”

89. “For a moment all my bees have turned to honey.”

Lily King Quote: “I stopped having expectations about achieving anything long ago.”

90. “I stopped having expectations about achieving anything long ago.”

Lily King Quote: “When I was visiting her a few years ago she hugged me and said, ‘Tomorrow after you leave I will stand here at this window and remember that yesterday you were right here with me.”

91. “When I was visiting her a few years ago she hugged me and said, ‘Tomorrow after you leave I will stand here at this window and remember that yesterday you were right here with me.”

Lily King Quote: “All I want is to write fiction. I am a drain on the system, dragging around my debts and dreams.”

92. “All I want is to write fiction. I am a drain on the system, dragging around my debts and dreams.”

Lily King Quote: “But right on the heels of that feeling, that suspicion that all is not yet lost, comes the urge to tell my mother, tell her that I am okay today, that I have felt something close to happiness, that I might still be capable of feeling happy. She will want to know that. But I can’t tell her. That’s the wall I always slam into on a good morning like this. My mother will be worrying about me, and I can’t tell her that I’m okay.”

93. “But right on the heels of that feeling, that suspicion that all is not yet lost, comes the urge to tell my mother, tell her that I am okay today, that I have felt something close to happiness, that I might still be capable of feeling happy. She will want to know that. But I can’t tell her. That’s the wall I always slam into on a good morning like this. My mother will be worrying about me, and I can’t tell her that I’m okay.”

Lily King Quote: “Certain people bring out certain traits in each other. Don’t you think? If I had a husband, for example, who said, ‘Your typing makes my brain work batter,’ I would not be so ashamed of my impulse to work.”

94. “Certain people bring out certain traits in each other. Don’t you think? If I had a husband, for example, who said, ‘Your typing makes my brain work batter,’ I would not be so ashamed of my impulse to work.”

Lily King Quote: “She was the type who could not take a compliment. If he told her she looked nice, she’d give the reason instead of saying thank you. But he was the type who could not give a compliment, so he just said hello and let her in.”

95. “She was the type who could not take a compliment. If he told her she looked nice, she’d give the reason instead of saying thank you. But he was the type who could not give a compliment, so he just said hello and let her in.”

Lily King Quote: “But you can’t have Nell like you can have other girls. She says she’s Southern but she’s not on the Grid. She’s a different type altogether. Trust me on that one.”

96. “But you can’t have Nell like you can have other girls. She says she’s Southern but she’s not on the Grid. She’s a different type altogether. Trust me on that one.”

Lily King Quote: “I spend the night that way, passing through layers of anxiety, humiliation, and despair. Somewhere close to dawn I lose some consciousness. It isn’t sleep exactly, but I have to think of it as sleep because it’s all I ever get anymore.”

97. “I spend the night that way, passing through layers of anxiety, humiliation, and despair. Somewhere close to dawn I lose some consciousness. It isn’t sleep exactly, but I have to think of it as sleep because it’s all I ever get anymore.”

Lily King Quote: “Becca, though, I married. I don’t know how other people do it, not stay with the girl whose ankle socks made your stomach flip at age fourteen, whose wet hair smells like your past – the girl who was with you the very moment you were introduced to happiness.”

98. “Becca, though, I married. I don’t know how other people do it, not stay with the girl whose ankle socks made your stomach flip at age fourteen, whose wet hair smells like your past – the girl who was with you the very moment you were introduced to happiness.”

Lily King Quote: “That’s the wall I always slam into on a good morning like this. My mother will be worrying about me, and I can’t tell her that I’m okay.”

99. “That’s the wall I always slam into on a good morning like this. My mother will be worrying about me, and I can’t tell her that I’m okay.”

Lily King Quote: “When you die, she thought now, you can no longer give love. You can’t give love anymore. She wouldn’t be able to love her children. It struck her suddenly as the very worst thing about death, worse than not being able to breathe or laugh or kiss. A kind of existential suffocation, to not be able to give her children her love anymore.”

100. “When you die, she thought now, you can no longer give love. You can’t give love anymore. She wouldn’t be able to love her children. It struck her suddenly as the very worst thing about death, worse than not being able to breathe or laugh or kiss. A kind of existential suffocation, to not be able to give her children her love anymore.”

Motivational Quotes

Motivational Quotes

Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes

Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes

Positive Quotes

Positive Quotes

Albert Einstein Quotes

Albert Einstein Quotes

PREV 1 2 3 NEXT

Motivational Quotes

Motivational Quotes

INSPIRATIONAL SUCCESS MOTIVATIONAL

Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes

Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes

ENTREPRENEURSHIP BUSINESS INSPIRATIONAL

Positive Quotes

Positive Quotes

Albert Einstein Quotes

Albert Einstein Quotes

ENTREPRENEURSHIP BUSINESS INSPIRATIONAL

Steve Jobs Quotes

Steve Jobs Quotes

ENTREPRENEURSHIP BUSINESS APPLE

Inspirational Quotes

Inspirational Quotes

COURAGE MOTIVATIONAL STRENGTH

INSPIRATIONAL SUCCESS MOTIVATIONAL

Swami Vivekananda Quotes

Swami Vivekananda Quotes

LIFE SPIRITUALITY

Save image...
Permalink
Open in new tab
Copy quote text

Beautiful Wallpapers and Images

We hope you enjoyed our collection of 120 Lily King Quotes.

All the images on this page were created with QuoteFancy Studio.

Use QuoteFancy Studio to create high-quality images for your desktop backgrounds, blog posts, presentations, social media, videos, posters, and more.

Thank you!

Please check your email.