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From that time on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again, never miss the lack of intimate friends. Books became her friends and there was one for every mood.
Betty Smith
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Betty Smith
Age: 75 †
Born: 1896
Born: December 15
Died: 1972
Died: January 17
Author
Novelist
Playwright
Screenwriter
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Elisabeth Lillian Wehner
Book
Lack
Every
Lonely
Never
Became
Would
Missing
Time
Books
World
Literature
Intimate
Reading
Mood
Friends
Miss
More quotes by Betty Smith
This could be a whole life, she thought. You work eight hours a day covering wires to earn money to buy food and to pay for a place to sleep so that you can keep living to come back to cover more wires. Some people are born and kept living just to come to this.
Betty Smith
Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn New York. Especially in the summer of 1912. Somber as a word was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg Brooklyn. Prairie was lovely and Shenandoah had a beautiful sound but you couldn't fit those words into Brooklyn. Serene was the only word for it especially on a Saturday afternoon in summer.
Betty Smith
But she needs me more than she needs him and I guess being needed is almost as good as being loved. Maybe better.
Betty Smith
As she read, at peace with the world and happy as only a little girl could be with a fine book and a little bowl of candy, and all alone in the house, the leaf shadows shifted and the afternoon passed.
Betty Smith
There's a tree that grows in Brooklyn. Some people call it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed falls, it makes a tree which struggles to reach the sky.
Betty Smith
Francie was ten years old when she first found an outlet in writing. What she wrote was of little consequence. What was important was that the attempt to write stories kept her straight on the dividing line between truth and fiction. If she had not found this outlet in writing, she might have grown up to be a tremendous liar.
Betty Smith
Oh, I wish I was young again when everything seemed so wonderful!
Betty Smith
But the penciled sheets did not seem like nor smell like the library book so she had given it up, consoling herself with the vow that when she grew up, she would work hard, save money and buy every single book that she liked.
Betty Smith
Occasionally there is a moment in a person's life when he takes a great stride forward in wisdom, humility, or disillusionment. For a split second he comes into a kind of cosmic understanding. For a trembling breath of time he knows all there is to know. He is loaned the gift the poet yearned for - seeing himself as others see him.
Betty Smith
Look at everything always as though you were seeing it either for the first or last time: Thus is your time on earth filled with glory.
Betty Smith
In the future, when something comes up, you tell exactly how it happened but write down for yourself the way you think it should have happened. Tell the truth and write the story. Then you won't get mixed up. It was the best advice Francie every got.
Betty Smith
She was surprised at how tiny it seemed now. She supposed the school was just as big as it had ever been only her eyes had grown used to looking at bigger things.
Betty Smith
Katie had a fierce desire for survival which made her a fighter. Johnny had a hankering after immortality which made him a useless dreamer. And that was the great difference between these two who loved each other so well.
Betty Smith
In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too. It makes a person rich in character.
Betty Smith
It takes a lot of doing to die.
Betty Smith
If there was only one tree like that in the world, you would think it was beautiful. But because there are so many, you just can't see how beautiful it really is.
Betty Smith
Well, there's a little bit of man in every woman and a little bit of woman in every man.
Betty Smith
Bad quarrels come when two people are wrong. Worse quarrels come when two people are right.
Betty Smith
Oh, magic hour, when a child first knows she can read printed words.
Betty Smith
I came to a clear conclusion, and it is a universal one: To live, to struggle, to be in love with life--in love with all life holds, joyful or sorrowful--is fulfillment. The fullness of life is open to all of us.
Betty Smith
