Quotes by John Green

“Im in love with you, and Im not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things.”

“Keeping the box closed just keeps you in the dark, not the universe... but failing to open the box doesnt kill the cat.”

“If you want the rainbow, you have to deal with the rain.”

“NO. No no no. I dont want to screw you. I just love you. When did who you want to screw become the whole game? Since when is the person you want to screw the only person you get to love? Its so stupid, Tiny! I mean, Jesus, who even gives a fuck about sex?! People act like its the most important thing humans do, but come on. How can our sentient fucking lives revolve around something slugs can do. I mean, who you want to screw and whether you screw them? Those are important questions, I guess. But theyre not that important. You know whats important? Who would you die for? Who do you wake up at five forty-five in the morning for even though you dont even know why he needs you? Whose drunken nose would you pick?!”

“No, I don’t think you’re gonna be single forever, and also I don’t understand your obsession with romantic love. There are other ways to have fulfilling relationships that can sustain you and make your life great and fun other than having a sexualized relationship. It’s not the only kind of fulfilling human interaction. So, even if you are single forever, that doesn’t mean that you’ve had some kind of failed life.”

“Ill fight it. Ill fight it for you. Dont you worry about me, Hazel Grace. Im okay. Ill find a way to hang around and annoy you for a long time.”

“Right, well, hed been sick for a while and his nurse said to him, You seem to be feeling better this morning, and Isben looked at her and said, On the contrary, and then he died.”

“I found myself thinking about President William McKinley, the third American president to be assassinated. He lived for several days after he was shot, and towards the end, his wife started crying and screaming, I want to go too! I want to go too! And with his last measure of strength, McKinley turned to her and spoke his last words: We are all going.”

“She cannot possibly be dead, people do not just die”

“...facts still don’t slow down conspiracy theories.”

“Poetry is just so emo. he said. Oh, the pain. The pain. It always rains. In my soul.”

“Hazel has to realize that her mom was wrong when she said, “I won’t be a mother anymore.” The truth is, after Hazel dies (assuming she dies), her mom will still be her mom, just as my grandmother is still my grandmother even though she has died. As long as either person is still alive, that relationship survives. (It changes, but it survives.)”

“Nineteenth-century preacher Henry Ward Beechers last words were Now comes the mystery. The poet Dylan Thomas, who liked a good drink at least as much as Alaska, said, Ive had eighteen straight whiskeys. I do believe thats a record, before dying. Alaskas favorite was playwright Eugene ONeill: Born in a hotel room, and--God damn it--died in a hotel room. Even car-accident victims sometimes have time for last words. Princess Diana said, Oh God. Whats happened? Movie star James Dean said, Theyve got to see us, just before slamming his Porsche into another car. I know so many last words. But I will never know hers.”

“I dont care if the New York Times writes an obituary for me. I just want you to write one. ... You say youre not special because the world doesnt know about you, but thats an insult to me. I know about you.”

“Oh God, Alaska, I love you. I love you, and the Colonel whispered, Im so sorry, Pudge. I know you did, and I said, No. Not past tense. She wasnt even a person anymore, just flesh rotting, but I loved her present tense.”

“The oblivion fear is something else, fear that I wont be able to give anything in exchange for my life. If you dont live a life in service of a greater good, youve gotta at least die a death in service of a greater good, you know? And I fear that I wont get either a life or a death that means anything.”

“And then I crawled into his unmade bed, wrapping myself in his comforter like a cocoon, surrounding myself with his smell. I took out my cannula so I could smell better, breathing him and out, the scent fading even as I lay there, my chest burning until I couldnt distinguish among the pains.”

“I didnt tell him that the diagnosis came three months after I got my first period. Like: Congratulations! Youre a woman. Now die.”

“What I love about the sculpture is that it makes the bones that we are always walking and playing on manifest, like in a world that so often denies the reality of death and the reality that we are surrounded by and outnumbered by the dead. Here, is a very playful way of acknowledging that and acknowledging that and that always, whenever we play, whenever we live, we are living in both literal and metaphorical ways on the memory and bones of the dead.”

“Like many people, I feel like celebrating. Remember this feeling. It is human, and can help us understand when others express bloodlust.”