John Green Quotes

We have this habit of romanticizing the lives of writers. I remember when I was a kid, I was like, ‘I want to be Kurt Vonnegut.’

I like to know the places I write about. I feel like it helps me ground the novel. My novels are ‘realistic novels,’ but they can also be fantastical, so it’s nice to have a setting that grounds them a little bit.

I am still bowled over by this great young adult novel by David Levithan called ‘Every Day,’ which is about a character with no gender or body who wakes up every day in the body of a different person. It’s a really impressive execution of a really great premise.

Whatever, bro. We both had a long day. Too much drama. I’ll TTYS.” I wanted to ridicule him for using chatspeak IRL, but I found myself lacking the energy.

Great books help you understand, and they help you feel understood.

I’m not sure if I’m depressed. I mean, I’m not exactly sad. But I’m not exactly happy either. I can laugh and joke and smile during the day, But sometimes when I’m alone at night I forget how to feel.

I don’t know a perfect person. I only know flawed people who are still worth loving.

Videogame players essentially choose whether to win the game or to die heroically. There’s a certain glory in both.

I love making YouTube videos. I love Tumblr, I love Twitter. I love talking with people I find interesting about stuff I find interesting, and the Internet is a great way to do that.

You don’t remember what happened. What you remember becomes what happened.

When you go to a great concert, you feel this arc, almost like the music of a well-chosen set takes you on this trip through emotions and through various forms of intellectual engagement.

I don’t decide where I live. My wife decides. She’s a curator of contemporary art, and she works at an art museum, so we go wherever she has a job. All basements look the same, so I can write from whatever basement I happen to be living in.

Grief doesn’t change you. It reveals you.

In the darkest days, the Lord puts the best people into your life.” (p. 28)

I figured something out. The future is unpredictable.

One day, you’re 17 and you’re planning for someday. And then quietly, without you ever really noticing, someday is today. And then someday is yesterday. And this is your life.

By saying you don’t care if the world falls apart, in some small way you’re saying you want it to stay together, on your own terms.