Quotes by Norton Juster

“Whatever we learn has a purpose and whatever we do affects everything and everyone else, if even in the tiniest way. Why, when a housefly flaps his wings, a breeze goes round the world; when a speck of dust falls to the ground, the entire planet weighs a little more; and when you stamp your foot, the earth moves slightly off its course. Whenever you laugh, gladness spreads like the ripples in a pond; and whenever youre sad, no one anywhere can be really happy. And its much the same thing with knowledge, for whenever you learn something new, the whole world becomes that much richer.”

“How can you see something that isnt there? yawned the Humbug, who wasnt fully awake yet. Sometimes its much simpler than seeing things that are, he said. For instance, if something is there, you can only see it with your eyes open, but if it isnt there, you can just as easily see it with your eyes closed.”

“But as you know, the most important reason for going from one place to another is to see whats in between.”

“This is our canvas. Our easel. This is how we paint, on fresh sheets of ice.”

“I believe that each human being has within himself or herself at least one poem or short story, or perhaps even a full length book.”

... what you learn today, for no reason at all, will help you discover all the wonderful secrets of tomorrow.

if something is there, you can only see it with your eyes open, but if it isnt there, you can see it just as well with your eyes closed. Thats why imaginary things are often easier to see than real ones.

Expect everything, I always say, and the unexpected never happens.

The most important reason for going from one place to another is to see whats in between, and they took great pleasure in doing just that.

You see, its really quite simple. A simile is just a mode of comparison employing as and like to reveal the hidden character or essence of whatever we want to describe, and through the use of fancy, association, contrast, extension, or imagination, to enlarge our understanding or perception of human experience and observation.

You had the courage to try and what you can do is often simply a matter of what you will do.

You may not see it now, said the Princess of Pure Reason, looking knowingly at Milos puzzled face, but whatever we learn has a purpose and whatever we do affects everything and everyone else, if even in the tiniest way.

Words and numbers are of equal value, for in the cloak of knowledge one is warp and the other woof.

…it’s not just learning that’s important. It’s learning what to do with what you learn and learning why you learn things that matters.

Time is a gift, given to you, given to give you the time you need, the time you need to have the time of your life.

But why do only unimportant things? asked Milo, who suddenly remembered how much time he spent each day doing them.Think of all the trouble it saves, the man explained, and his face looked as if hed be grinning an evil grin--if he could grin at all. If you only do the easy and useless jobs, youll never have to worry about the important ones which are so difficult. You just wont have the time. For theres always something to do to keep you from what you really should be doing, and if it werent for that dreadful magic staff, youd never know how much time you were wasting.

You see, he continued, beginning to feel better, once there was no time at all, and people found it very inconvenient. They never knew wether they were eating lunch or dinner, and they were always missing trains. So time was invented to help them keep track of the day and get to places where they should. When they began to count all the time that was available, what with 60 seconds in a minute and 60 minutes in an hour and 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year, it seemed as if there was much more than could ever be used. If theres so much of it, it couldnt be very valuable, was the general opinion, and it soon fell into dispute. People wasted it and even gave it away. Then we were giving the job of seeing that no one wasted time again, he said, sitting up proudly. Its hard work but a noble calling. For you see- and now he was standing on the seat, one foot on the windshield, shouting with his ams outstretched- it is our most valuable possession, more precious than diamonds. It marches on, it and tide wait for no man, and- At that point in the speech the car hit a bump in the road and the watchdog collapsed in a heap on the front seat with his alarm ringing furiously.

And Milo, full of thoughts and questions, curled up on the pages of tomorrows music and eagerly awaited the dawn.

Have you ever heard a blindfolded octopus unwrap a cellophane-covered bathtub?

...its just as bad to live in a place where what you do see isnt there as it is to live in one where what you dont see is.