Markus Zusak Quotations

I procrastinate in spades. In my defence, I also try to have all other distractions solved before I can concentrate on writing. My small theory is that to write for three hours, you need to feel like you have three days. To write for three days, you need to feel like you've got three weeks, and so on.

I think to be writer you have to enjoy being alone. I was a loner as a teenager and was always drawn to characters in books and films who were at the fringes.

When I was growing up, I wanted to be a house painter like my father, but I was always screwing up when I went to work with him. I had a talent for knocking over paint and painting myself into corners. I also realized fairly quickly that painting bored me.

Every time you find something that doesn't work, you're a step closer to what does work.

Failure has been my best friend as a writer. It tests you, to see if you have what it takes to see it through.

I had many boxing matches with my brother in the backyard when we were younger, and I guess while other people abhor boxing for its brutality, I also have to admire anyone who climbs into the ring to face up to what could be the ultimate defeat.

I'm not one of these 'the characters write themselves; the story just fell out of me' kind of writers. Wish it was like that.

I try hard and aim big. People can hate or love my books but they can never accuse me of not trying.

I'm not a writer who refuses to talk about a book until I've finished.

I like the idea that every page in every book can have a gem on it. It's probably what I love most about writing - that words can be used in a way that's like a child playing in a sandpit, rearranging things, swapping them around.

Living in Sydney, I've taken the chance to start surfing again. One of my best memories of growing up is catching my first proper wave and surfing across it and my brother cheering at me from the shore.

I find writing extremely difficult. I usually have to drag myself to my desk, mainly because I doubt myself. And it's getting harder because I want to improve with every book.

I think 'The Lord Of The Rings' is the mother of all cult books, because you can be in that cult and not even know you're in it.

I like to tell students, 'I didn't burst on to the literary scene.' I'm never good at things at the beginning. I was terrible at the start. I need to work and work.

So many teenage books say, 'This is in your voice, this is about you,' and that's great. We really need that. But we also need books that say, 'This is also for you, but you need to come up here, to step up to this.

I feel like every other book has been a small piece of me. This is every piece of me.

I am haunted by humans.

First the colours. Then the humans. That’s usually how I see things. Or at least, how I try.

I've got every Dr Seuss book there is. Everything was red, like the sky was on fire. That was a memory that I could see really clearly as a child, a very visual image.

Every time you experiment with something, every time you've tried something, you can cross that off. Every time you find something that doesn't work, you're a step closer to what does work. Just do the work every day -- and do it and do it.

The idea that he is haunted by what humans do I just loved that irony because we are all so afraid of dying. Originally, he was a very different voice. He was supercilious. He was enjoying his work too much and he would say creepy things, which is the obvious.

It's the first time I've been really worried. It's the first time I've written a book and thought, 'Can I do a better book?' I don't know if I can.

I definitely can't do the 'On the Waterfront' speech. I've had my shot and I couldn't be happier.

Like most misery, it started with apparent happiness.

I have to say that although it broke my heart, I was, and still am, glad I was there.

On many counts, taking a boy like Rudy Steiner was robbery--so much life, so much to live for--yet somehow, I'm certain he would have loved to see the frightening rubble and the swelling of the sky on the night he passed away. He'd have cried and turned and smiled if only he could have seen the book thief on her hands and knees, next to his decimated body. He'd have been glad to witness her kissing his dusty, bomb-hit lips. Yes, I know it. In the darkness of my dark-beating heart, I know. He'd have loved it all right. You see? Even death has a heart.

I certainly wasn't born with creative writing. Maybe there's a certain amount of learning and then it's up to the person. I think in the end it's your favourite books that are the best teachers. That's the way I've learned the most, by far.

Please, trust me, I most definitely can be cheerful. I can be amiable. Agreeable. Affable. And that's only the A's. Just don't ask me to be nice. Nice has nothing to do with me.

Even now, I wonder how much of my life is convinced.

I guess that’s the beauty of books. When they finish they don’t really finish.

I see Death as the part of us that knows all the time that we're going to die, reminding us to live properly.

I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that's where they begin. Their great skills is their capacity to escalate.

I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.

As always, one of her books was next to her.

I think, as the writer, you're always going to mourn something [left out of a film]. But you also just want to know there's a good reason for it being left out. On the whole, you want to give something to somebody creative. The worst thing you can do is say, "Here, be creative, but do it like I want you to do it." I was always very mindful of that.

Even death has a heart.

Imagine smiling after a slap in the face. Then think of doing it twenty-four hours a day.

I'd rather chase the sun than wait for it.

I've been a writer since I was 16. I didn't get published until I was 24. I know that sounds crazy.

Maybe one morning I’ll wake up and step outside of myself to look back at the old me lying dead among the sheets.

Sometimes you read a book so special that you want to carry it around with you for months after you've finished just to stay near it.

Very suddenly. Yes, quite suddenly, I didn't feel like I could handle my feeling of aloneness.

When I was a teenager I decided I was going to be a writer and that nothing was going to stop me. It sounds almost villainous. But I knew that was what I wanted.

As we walk back, it feels like the city is engulfing us. Adrenalin still pours through our veins. Sparks flow through to our fingers. We've still been running in the mornings, but the city's different then. It's filled with hope and with bristles of winter sunshine. In the evening, it's like it dies, waiting to be born again the next morning.

Just be patient, she told herself, and with the mounting pages, the strength of her writing fist grew.

She took a step and didn't want to take any more, but she did.

It is early, early morning. It's that time when it's still dark but you know the day is coming. Blue is bleeding through black. Stars are dying.

You should give it to Max, Liesel. See if you can leave it on the bedside table, like all the other things." Liesel watched him as if he'd gone insane. "How, though?" Lightly, he tapped her skull with his knuckles. "Memorize it. Then write it down for him.

She wanted none of those days to end, and it was always with disappointment that she watched the darkness stride forward.

It was a Monday and they walked on a tightrope to the sun.

I have hated words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right.

When I find research really rewarding is when one piece of information gives you an idea for a story. That's when it's great.

It was the beginning of the greatest Christmas ever. Little food. No presents. But there was a snowman in their basement.

I am hunted by humans

I had to decide what I was going to do, and what I was going to be. I was standing there, waiting for someone to do something , till I realised the person I was waiting for was myself.

It's insane to be a writer and not be a reader. When I'm writing I'm more likely to be reading four or five books at once, just in bits and pieces rather than subjecting myself to a really brilliant book and thinking, "Well what's the point of me writing anything?" I'm more likely to read a book through when I take a break from writing.

A fighter can be a winner, but that doesn't make a winner a fighter.

It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on, coughing and searching, and finding.

... And the boy whose hair remained the color of lemons forever.

There are two magic acts I want to pull off when I write. One is creating a feeling that when you're inside a book, you believe everything you're reading even when you know it's not true. And the second is an extension of that, which is you know it's not true, you know it's not real, but you believe it anyway. And it's that believing of the story that isn't real that attracted me to writing and storytelling in general.

Make no mistake, the woman had a heart. She had a bigger one that people would think. There was a lot in it, stored up, high in miles of hidden shelving. Remember that she was the woman with the instrument strapped to her body in the long, moon-slit night.

He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It’s his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry.

Summer came. For the book thief, everything was going nicely. For me, the sky was the color of Jews. When their bodies had finished scouring for gaps in the door, their souls rose up. When their fingernails had scratched at the wood and in some cases were nailed into it by the sheer force of desperation, their spirits came toward me, into my arms, and we climbed out of those shower facilities, onto the roof and up, into eternity's certain breadth. They just kept feeding me. Minute after minute. Shower after shower.

I read some books that were the right books for me. I read them and I didn't even notice turning the pages anymore. I thought, "That's what I want to do with my life."

A happening was looming. It was out there somewhere beyond the regular enclosed life that I had been living. It was out there, not waiting, but existing. Being. Perhaps it was only slightly wondering if I would come to it.

It's not a big thing, but I guess it's true--big things are often just small things that are noticed.

If you ever write a book, I can only give you one piece of advice. Don't let your parents get involved.

She could smell the pages. She could almost taste the words as they stacked up around her.

I want words at my funeral. But I guess that means you need life in your life.

Believe it or not--it takes a lot of love to hate you like this.

No matter how many times she was told that she was loved, there was no recognition that the proof was in the abandonment.

Papa sat with me tonight. He brought the accordion down and sat close to where Max used to sit. I often look at his fingers and face when he plays. the accordion breathes. There are lines on his cheeks. They look drawn on, and for some reason, when I see them, I want to cry. It is not for any sadness or pride. I just like the way they move and change. Sometimes I think my papa is an accordion. When he looks at me and smiles and breathes, I hear the notes.

...there would be punishment and pain, and there would be happiness, too. That was writing.

...one opportunity leads directly to another, just as risk leads to more risk, life to more life, and death to more death.

You'll have days of complete lack of faith in your abilities. But you have to keep coming back. That's when you know you're a writer - when you take the failures and appear at the desk again, over and over again.

I guess if editing doesn't hurt, you're probably not doing it properly. I find it quite difficult. The hardest part is believing that it's actually working and getting rid of the doubt that always creeps in.

How do you tell if something's alive? You check for breathing.

The only thing worse than a boy who hates you: a boy that loves you.

Maybe everyone can live beyond what they're capable of.

Nothing comes naturally to me...I have to work and rework and that's where the ideas come from - from years of working on it and thinking about it.

The point is, it didn’t really matter what the book was about. It was what it meant that was important.

Together, they would watch everything that was so carefully planned collapse, and they would smile at the beauty of destruction.

Sometimes I think my papa is an accordion. When he looks at me and smiles and breathes, I hear the notes.

The beauty of my work is that my sets cost nothing. That's what I love about being a writer of novels.

I could introduce myself properly, but it's not really necessary. You will know me well enough and soon enough, depending on a diverse range of variables. It suffices to say that at some point in time, I will be standing over you, as genially as possible. Your soul will be in my arms. A color will be perched on my shoulder. I will carry you gently away.

One was a book thief. The other stole the sky.

I like that every page in every book can have a gem on it. It's probably what I love most about writing--that words can be used in a way that's like a child playing in a sandpit, rearranging things, swapping them around. They're the best moments in a day of writing -- when an image appears that you didn't know would be there when you started work in the morning.

As a child in Sydney, my German Mum and my Austrian Dad would spontaneously tell me stories about what they saw and what they did as children. It was like a piece of Europe coming into our house... Those stories led me to my writing.

That was when the world wasn't so big and I could see everywhere. It was when my father was a hero and not a human.

She said it out loud, the words distributed into a room that was full of cold air and books. Books everywhere! Each wall was armed with overcrowded yet immaculate shelving. It was barely possible to see paintwork. There were all different styles and sizes of lettering on the spines of the black, the red, the gray, the every-colored books. It was one of the most beautiful things Liesel Meminger had ever seen. With wonder, she smiled. That such a room existed!

I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race - that rarely do I ever simply estimate it.

A snowball in the face is surely the perfect beginning to a lasting friendship.

So much good, so much evil. Just add water.

They'd been standing like that for thirty seconds of forever.

She looks at the swings, and I can see she’s imagining what they’d look like if the kids weren’t there. The guilt of this holds her down momentarily. It appears to be there constantly. Never far away, despite her love for them. I realize that nothing belongs to her anymore and she belongs to everything.

I see how complicated it is to make a film and how many people are involved and I love the fact that I get to sit in a room on my own and the set costs nothing and the actors cost nothing and I'm the director and it's so simple. You just need a pen and paper to make a book. You don't need a huge budget or a gaffer or a best boy.

The flyscreen door slammed behind me. My feet dragged. I reached each arm into the jacket. Warm sleeves. Crumpled collar. Hands in pockets. Okay. I walked.

The thrill of being ignored!

The water crumbles on it's way down as my hands and feet push me forward. The world is lightening, taking shape, and turning to color. It feels like it's being painted around me.

Only hearts... They're in the inside of the inside of me.