Top Christina Baker Kline Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Christina Baker Kline Biography

Christina Baker Kline (born 1964) is an American novelist. She is the author of seven novels, including Orphan Train, and has co-authored or edited five non-fiction books. Kline is a Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation Fellowship recipient.[citation needed]

Read about Christina Baker Kline in Wikipedia

Random Authors

Christina Baker Kline Quotes

It's human nature to want to think the best of others, but if you listen carefully, people will always tell you who they are.

Thinking, People, Want, Nature, Tell

You got to learn to take what people are willing to give.

Giving, Learn, People, Willing

I like the assumption that everyone is trying his best, and we should all just be kind to each other.

Trying, Be Kind, Assumption, Kind, Like

So is it just human nature to believe that things happen for a reason - to find some shred of meaning even in the worst experiences?

Believe, Experiences, Happen, Human Nature, Reason, Shred

Time constricts and flattens, you know. It's not evenly weighted. Certain moments linger in the mind and others disappear.

Disappear, Mind, Moments, Time, Weighted

One of the wonderful things about being a writer is that you're constantly dredging up some arcane knowledge or long-forgotten experience, rediscovering old passions and interests.

Constantly, Long, Passion, Passions, Wonderful, Writer

When something terrible happens, a lifetime of small events and unremarkable decisions, of unresolved anger, and unexplored fears begins to play itself out in ways you least expect. You've been going along from one day to the next, not realizing that all those disparate words and gestures were adding up to something, a conclusion, you didn't anticipate. And later, when you begin to retrace your steps you see that you will need to reach back further than you could have imagined, beyond words and thoughts and even dreams, perhaps to make sense of what happened.

Decision, Decisions, Dream, Play, Terrible

I know too much; I've seen people at their worst, at their most desperate and selfish, and this knowledge makes me wary. So I am learning to pretend, to smile, to nod, to display empathy I do not feel. I am learning to pass, to look like everyone else, even though I feel broken inside.

Broken Inside, Knowledge, Nod, People, Selfish, Smile

I never want to feel constrained by writing a novel for a specific audience.

Audience, Novel, Specific, Writing

Do you believe in spirits? Or ghosts?. . . Yes, I do. I believe in ghosts. . . . They're the ones who haunt us. The ones who have left us behind. " "Vivian has come back to the idea that the people who matter in our lives stay with us, haunting our ordinary moments. They're with us in the grocery store, as we turn the corner, chat with a friend. They rise up through the pavement; we absorb them through our soles. " "The things that matter stay with you, seep into your skin.

Believe, Come, Ideas, People, Spirits, Yes

In my teens I fancied myself an artist; I hung out with the eccentric art teacher at my high school, painted still lifes and portraits and landscapes in watercolor and acrylics, took private lessons, won some blue ribbons for my earnest renderings. My lack of talent did little to dampen my enthusiasm. In college I thought I'd continue, but, like Salieri, I quickly realized that while I had the ability to appreciate art, I wasn't actually very good.

Art, College, Dampen, School, Teacher

I have a lot of empathy for women who fit their writing into the crevices of their too-busy lives, as I once did.

Busy, Crevices, Empathy, Fit, Lives, Writing

I've come to think that's what heaven is- a place in the memory of others where our best selves live on.

Heaven, Live, Memories, Self, Selves, Thinking

She knows too well what it's like to tamp down your natural inclinations, to force a smile when you feel numb. . . . The expression of emotion does not come naturally, so yo learn to fake it. To pretend. To display an empathy you don't really feel. And so it is that you learn to pass, if you're lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you're broken inside.

Broken Inside, Expression, Fake, Inclinations, Smile

I love you," he writes again and again. "I can't bear to live without you. I'm counting the minutes until I see you. " The words he uses are the idioms of popular songs and poems in the newspaper. And mine to him are no less cliched. I puzzle over the onionskin, trying to spill my heart onto the page. But I can only come up with the same words, in the same order, and hope the depth of feeling beneath them gives them weight and substance. I love you. I miss you. Be careful. Be safe.

Come, Depth, Love You, Poems, Song, Writing

And so it is that you learn how to pass, if you're lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you're broken inside.

Broken, Broken Inside, Like, Look, Looks, Lucky

I learned long ago that loss is not only probable but inevitable. I know what it means to lose everything, to let go of one life and find another. And now I feel, with a strange, deep certainty, that it must be my lot in life to be taught that lesson over and over again.

Change, Deep, Let, Letting Go, Life