Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" My favorite was 'The Secret Garden'. I loved it, and I think it's had a big influence on all of my characters. 'The Secret Garden' is about transgressions and imperfect people. "
Judith Viorst
Garden
Influence
Loved
Related Quotes:
" Starting after 60, I thought, 'I'm not going to be able to write a book of poems on the 70s. It's going to be all moans and groans and complaints, and what is there to laugh about?' But I found plenty to laugh about. "
Judith Viorst
Going
Book
Laugh
" Most of the characters I have in my children's books are grouchy or annoyed about something or are calling each other unfriendly names. Like my own kids, they're not honeys and sweetie pies and little angels. They're kids. Sloppy, dirty, stinky. "
Judith Viorst
Children
Angels
My Own
" I actually sat down and started three Alexanders at the same time. Two of them went in the trash and got stomped on because I hated the idea so much. And the one I came up with, I got very excited by. And that's 'Alexander, Who's Trying His Best to Be the Best Boy Ever'. "
Judith Viorst
Boy
Three
Down
" I not only wanted to write when I was 7 and 8, but I sent stuff out when I was 7 and 8. I sent it out... and I couldn't believe that they would turn down my poems about faithful dogs. "
Judith Viorst
Faithful
Out
Turn
" All along, I've been writing about our fears, our longings, our fantasies, our ambivalences. When I decided to study psychoanalysis, I did it because I wanted to understand the psychodynamics of it all. Though far from perfect, psychoanalysis offered me a huge, wonderful window on all that. "
Judith Viorst
Perfect
Understand
Writing
" Everyone has bad days, and when you're having a bad day, you think, 'Here I am being singled out by a hostile, malicious universe that is picking exclusively on me.' And then you read a book about bad days and realize they happen to everyone, not just tormented, persecuted you. "
Judith Viorst
Book
Me
I Am
" 'Alexander, Who's Trying His Best to Be the Best Boy Ever' was inspired by a combination of my grandson, my son, and myself - all those times when each of us has decided that we're just not going to get into trouble anymore. But it's so hard to be good all of the time! "
Judith Viorst
Myself
Best
Good
" Kids need to encounter kids like themselves - kids who can sometimes be crabby and fresh and rebellious, kids who talk back and disobey, tell fibs and get into trouble, and are nonetheless still likable and redeemable. "
Judith Viorst
Need
Back
Trouble
" A rebel. That was me when I was younger. What was a rebel from New Jersey? A rebel was moving to the Village, not sleeping with top sheets, not eating a hot breakfast in the morning, not having 20 rolls of toilet paper and 10 boxes of Kleenex. "
Judith Viorst
Morning
Moving
Breakfast
" The best I can do is, it's like a 'ding!' You're writing, and then something starts falling into place, and you hear or feel a ding. And it just feels - it's going to be okay. "
Judith Viorst
Best
Falling
Feel
" I thought that the 40s was a tough decade, because it's when you finally figure out that you're not immortal, when you really start seeing that certain options are closed to you forever: You're not going to be a brain surgeon; you're not going to be a ballerina. "
Judith Viorst
You
Start
Thought
" One advantage of marriage is that, when you fall out of love with him or he falls out of love with you, it keeps you together until you fall in again. "
Judith Viorst
Him
Fall
You
" We will have to give up the hope that, if we try hard, we somehow will always do right by our children. The connection is imperfect. We will sometimes do wrong. "
Judith Viorst
Hope
Children
Sometimes
" I could be such a wonderful wife to another wife's husband. "
Judith Viorst
Could
Husband
Wife
" Strength is the capacity to break a chocolate bar into four pieces with your bare hands - and then eat just one of the pieces. "
Judith Viorst
Hands
Eat
Chocolate
" My Girl Scout leader. She told me if I listened more and talked less, I could grow up to be a good writer. I thought that was interesting advice at age 12. "
Judith Viorst
Age
Thought
Me
" I didn't get one word published until I was well into my 30s. But I always tried. "
Judith Viorst
Word
Always
Get
" Don't let anything sneak past you. Don't say, 'Well, oh, I'll take a picture and put it in my photograph album.' I notice it now. I love it now. And I am grateful for it now. "
Judith Viorst
Picture
I Am
Love
" Superstition is foolish, childish, primitive and irrational - but how much does it cost you to knock on wood? "
Judith Viorst
Foolish
Much
Cost
" I always credited my mother with inspiring me to be a writer because she was such a passionate reader. She read poetry to me as a child. But rather late in life, I've come to appreciate my father, the accountant. He was a solid, organized, get-the-job-done kind of person-and you need that piece of it to be a writer, too. "
Judith Viorst
Mother
Child
Father
" Close friends contribute to our personal growth. They also contribute to our personal pleasure, making the music sound sweeter, the wine taste richer, the laughter ring louder because they are there. "
Judith Viorst
Laughter
Growth
Wine
" I like to take all my feelings and thoughts and put them down in different ways on paper. "
Judith Viorst
Feelings
Down
Like
" If I could pick one reason why I want to be a writer, it would be connection. In all kinds of ways, I like to be individual and distinct; but when I write, I want to be writing about things that connect me to the people for whom I write. "
Judith Viorst
Writing
Connection
Me
" What kind of grandmother am I? I'm a 'three-dessert' grandmother. I'm a 'let's just skip the bath tonight, honey, watch another video' grandmother. "
Judith Viorst
Honey
Bath
Grandmother
" My mother was born in June and later, feeling a vacancy, chose her birth month for her middle name. Marry to marry, had kids because that's what was done. Liked crossword puzzles, liked lilac trees, liked baking in the sun, and liked Bing Crosby. "
Judith Viorst
Trees
Baking
Done
" Love is much nicer to be in than an automobile accident, a tight girdle, a higher tax bracket or a holding pattern over Philadelphia. "
Judith Viorst
Tax
Over
Love Is
" My mother would have been so crazy about my grandchildren. She was a fabulous grandmother, and she would have been absolutely crazed as a great-grandmother. I miss that part of her. "
Judith Viorst
Crazy
Mother
She
" You could never plan your life in a million years. "
Judith Viorst
Never
Your
You
" In history class, I wrote a poem, 'The Royalists and the Roundheads.' I would write poems about driftwood in art class and little stories about the sun, moon, and stars in science class. Since not many kids were writing in class, I got away with it. "
Judith Viorst
Moon
Science
History
" Lust is what keeps you wanting to do it even when you have no desire to be with each other. Love is what makes you want to be with each other even when you have no desire to do it. "
Judith Viorst
Want
Desire
Love