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You have to know what you stand for, not just what you stand against.

Laurie Halse Anderson

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Laurie Halse Anderson
Age: 62
Born: 1961
Born: October 23
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Laurie Beth Halse
Stand
Speak

More quotes by Laurie Halse Anderson

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I wanted to pull down a book, open it proper, and gobble up page after page
Laurie Halse Anderson
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A breath of steam trickles out, filled with the sobs of a grown woman breaking into girl-sized pieces.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid of this, these thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my head, too?
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Picasso.” He whispers like a priest. “Picasso. Who saw the truth. Who painted the truth, molded it, ripped from the earth with two angry hands.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I want to tell him that it's just a stupid car, but bits of me are scattered all over town the graveyard, school, Cassie's room, the motel, and standing in from of the sink in my mother's kitchen. It takes too much energy to gather all the bits together, so I just sit there and watch him implode.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Oppressive bastards, think they own the place. I told them that karma's going to kick their asses.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I lift my arm out of the water. It's a log. Put it back under and it blows up even bigger. People see the log and call it a twig. They yell at me because I can't see what they see. Nobody can explain to me why my eyes work different than theirs. Nobody can make it stop.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Mr. Freeman sighs. No imagination. What are you thirteen? Fourteen? You've already let them beat your creativity out of you!
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I look at my homely sketch. It doesn't need anything. Even through the river in my eyes I can see that. It isn't perfect and that makes it just right.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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We're good at taking care of little kids, and spend a lot of energy teaching them things like how to read. But when kids get as tall as their parents and can look them in the eyes, we tend to drop the ball - at a time they most need a loving consistent community of adults, be it parents, aunts, uncles, or others.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Why not draw naked guys, just to be fair? Naked women is art, naked guys a no-no, I bet. Probably because most painters are men.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Death is funny, when you think about it. Everybody does it, but nobody knows how, exactly how.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I watch some kids ask the cafeteria ladies to sign their books. What do they write: Hope your chicken patties never bleed? Or, maybe, May your Jell-O always wiggle?
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Mr. Freeman: You are getting better at this, but it's not good enough. This looks like a tree,but it is an average, ordinary, everyday, boring tree. Breathe life into it. Make it bend - trees are flexible, so they don't snap. Scar it, give it a twisted branch - perfect trees don't exist. Nothing is perfect. Flaws are interesting. Be the tree.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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It is easier not to say anything. Shut your trap, button your lip, can it. All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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The stars whirled above us and the firecrackers blazed. The moon stood watch as drops of blood fell, careless seeds that sizzled in the snow.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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I don't say anything and I feel awful. I tell somebody and I feel worse. I'm having trouble finding a middle ground.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Too much sun after a Syracuse winter does strange things to your head, makes you feel strong, even if you aren't.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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For one moment we are not failed tests and broken condoms and cheating on essays we are crayons and lunch boxes and swinging so high our sneakers punch holes in the clouds.
Laurie Halse Anderson
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Dead girl walking” the boys say in the halls. “Tell us your secrets” the girls whisper, one toilet to another. I am that girl. I am the spaces between my thighs, daylight shinning through. I am the bones they want, wired on a porcelain frame.
Laurie Halse Anderson