Top 30 Menna van Praag Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “The only way to stop hurting other people is to stop hurting yourself.”

— Menna van Praag

2. “One proton of faith, three electrons of humility, a neutron of compassion and a bond of honesty,” Robert said, winking at his daughter. “What’s that?” Cora frowned, confused. Maggie laughed. “That, according to your father, is the molecular structure of love.”

— Menna van Praag

3. “And some people don’t have what it takes to be happy. It’s not an easy thing, you know. It takes great courage and determination, to keep looking for light in all the darkness of life.”

— Menna van Praag

4. “And when people stop focusing on their dreams they become lost in the maze of their minds, wandering around in endlessly repeating circles. Then the colours of life start to dull, and excitement starts to die. Until you’re trapped in a prison of your own making, looking out at life instead of living it.”

— Menna van Praag

5. “I can’t trust anyone who won’t take real cream, or real sugar.”

— Menna van Praag

6. “Listen to that voice that tells you not to trust someone, even though he’s deliciously charming, remember Wickham and Willoughby and all those cads. And give another man a chance, even though he’s not your usual type – remember Mr Knightly and Colonel Brandon and all those quiet heroes.”

— Menna van Praag

7. “Too much analysis kills a thing. Art is created from passion and inspires passion. And passion is beyond reason. Don’t you think?”

— Menna van Praag

8. “It takes great courage and determination, to keep looking for light in all the darkness of life.”

— Menna van Praag

9. “If two hearts truly love each other then they always will, even when they are apart. Unless they both let go. But if one holds on then it’s because the other one hasn’t yet let it go either.”

— Menna van Praag

10. “I can say this: don’t give up. Not on love but, more important still, not on you. Never let yourself believe that you are unlovable or flawed in any way. You deserve to be loved. You deserve kind words and an unwavering eye.”

— Menna van Praag

11. “I don’t think tea will quite do, we need something a little more fortifying on such an auspicious occasion. Hot chocolate with fresh cream, that’s the thing.”

— Menna van Praag

12. “Most people think this world we live in is mundane, but you remind us that it’s magical. You wrap reality in the wonder and joy of fiction, until it infuses us and becomes true.”

— Menna van Praag

13. “It’s always best to feel fulfilled first, before finding a man. Then you’ll know the value of yourself, and you’ll hold the key to your own happiness. So you won’t turn into a vulnerable, needy, emotional mess the minute you fall in love.”

— Menna van Praag

14. “If you get a chance you should marry an archaeologist. I don’t suppose there are too many to go around, but it’s the best sort of husband to have. The older a woman gets, the more he’s interested in her.”

— Menna van Praag

15. “If you wait until you’re ready, you’ll be dead,” Stella says. “And, as a life strategy, I don’t really recommend it.”

— Menna van Praag

16. “Scarlet often wondered about how it might feel to be loved for no special reason at all. Without trying to twist yourself into agreeable knots, without having to give what you might not want to give, safe in the knowledge that you were loved for just being your simple self.”

— Menna van Praag

17. “I love chocolate cake for breakfast,” Peggy stalls, “it sets me up for the day. A little decadence is good for the soul.” She’s been eating more cake than usual, lately. Impending death does have compensations after all, then, if only chocolate-covered ones.”

— Menna van Praag

18. “I know that a heart can hold on for a lifetime, hoping for the impossible, loving, wanting what it will never have.”

— Menna van Praag

19. “When is cake ever for hunger? It’s for flavor and, in this case, comfort.”

— Menna van Praag

20. “In my experience even inanimate objects have a will of their own, and they won’t be found until they want to be, until they’re good and ready, she says.”

— Menna van Praag

21. “We all have to make choices,” Joan said. “Since we can’t have two lives, only one. But, most of those choices we make fresh every day, not just once. So, if you regret something, if you want to change your mind, you usually can.”

— Menna van Praag

22. “When you follow your heart you allow miraculous possibilities to unfold.”

— Menna van Praag

23. “That is the first, and most important, reason you don’t yet have the life you want,’ Rose explained. ‘Because truly, deep down, you don’t believe you deserve it. You think you’re not good enough.’ Maya swallowed back her tears. ‘Try saying it,’ Rose suggested. ‘Try saying that you deserve to have everything you want.’ Maya opened her mouth. Words formed and hovered on her tongue, waiting for her to speak. But she couldn’t.”

— Menna van Praag

24. “You’re one of life’s magicians. You simply haven’t realized it yet.”

— Menna van Praag

25. “It’s a great shame, she thinks, that the heart cannot feel joy without also feeling pain, that it cannot know love without also knowing loss.”

— Menna van Praag

Featured in: Romance Quotes

26. “She still hasn’t cried because to stay in shock feels safer, it keeps a distance between her and the thing she’s trying to pretend hasn’t happened.”

— Menna van Praag

27. “There’s as much chance of me leaving this kitchen,” Stella says, “as you putting down a book.”

— Menna van Praag

28. “When a woman needs courage, for example, life might throw a few things at her to draw it out. When a woman needs to love herself, she might be lonely while life leaves her without external hearts to hide in.”

— Menna van Praag

29. “You can’t say you’ve failed to achieve something until you die,’ Bill said. ‘Or until you’ve tried absolutely everything; and you haven’t really tried everything until you’re dead. So you might have given up, but you certainly haven’t failed.”

— Menna van Praag

30. “Now you’re discovering the great secret of great writing: one line of true feeling is worth a thousand pages of clever thinking.”

— Menna van Praag

31. “And, like most people, you’re too scared, stubborn or stupid to give yourself what you need until you’re shaken awake by something.”

— Menna van Praag

32. “But do you really want to spend your life like this, as if you’re locked in a library?” “Of course.” Alba grins. “I can’t think of anything better.”

— Menna van Praag

33. “Literature is strewn with the wreckage of writers who have minded the opinions of others.”

— Menna van Praag