George Eliot

"What we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope."

- George Eliot, "Middlemarch"

Khalil Gibran

"And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter and the sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed."

- 'The Prophet' by Khalil Gibran

Jules Renard

"Literature is an occupation in which you have to keep proving your talent to people who have none."

- Jules Renard, author

Lois McMaster Bujold

"If you can't do what you want, do what you can."

- "Memory" by Lois McMaster Bujold

Kathryn L. Nelson

"I have made plenty of enemies in my lifetime, but none has ever done me as much injury as I do myself."

- 'Pemberley Manor' by Kathryn L. Nelson

David Nicholls

"If you have to keep something secret it's because you shouldn't be doing it in the first place!"

- "One Day" by David Nicholls

Hilary Thayer Hamann

"I don't want to live forever. I'm having trouble with the idea of Tuesday."

- "Anthropology of an American Girl" by Hilary Thayer Hamann

Lois McMaster Bujold

"But pain... seems to me an insufficient reason not to embrace life. Being dead is quite painless. Pain, like time, is going to come on regardless. Question is, what glorious moments can you win from life in addition to the pain?"

- "Barrayar" by Lois McMaster Bujold

Ann Radcliffe

"Poverty cannot deprive us of many consolations. It cannot rob us of the affection we have for each other, or degrade us in our own opinion, of in that of any person, whose opinion we ought to value."

- "The Mysteries of Udolpho" by Ann Radcliffe

J. K. Rowling

"There are some things you can't share without ending up liking each other."

- J. K. Rowling, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone"

Chuck Palahniuk

"Nothing of me is original. I am the combined effort of everybody I've ever known."

- "Invisible Monsters" by Chuck Palahniuk

Hilary Thayer Hamann

"Boys will be boys, that's what people say, No one ever mentions how girls have to be something other than themselves altogether."

- "Anthropology of an American Girl" by Hilary Thayer Hamann

Black Elk

"Behold this day, for it is yours to make."

- Black Elk, 'Black Elk Speaks'

Black Elk

"Sometimes dreams are wiser than waking."

- Black Elk, 'Black Elk Speaks'

J. K. Rowling

"To the well-organised mind, death is but the next great adventure."

- J. K. Rowling, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone"

Black Elk

"It is in the darkness of their eyes, that men get lost."

- Black Elk, 'Black Elk Speaks'

Charlotte Bronte

"It is not violence that best overcomes hate — nor vengeance that most certainly heals injury."

- Charlotte Bronte, "Jane Eyre"

J. K. Rowling

"Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it."

- J. K. Rowling, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"

Ayn Rand

"I need no warrant for being, and no word of sanction upon my being. I am the warrant and the sanction."

- "Anthem" by Ayn Rand 

Charles Dickens

"We need never be ashamed of our tears."

- "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens