123 Quotes by Heather O'Neill

Love is a big and wonderful idea, but life is made up of small things.

A girl’s desire is like a pretty butterfly. And a man’s desire is like a butterfly net. His desire captures and kills her. He turns her into an object to be pinned on a corkboard. I don’t think I’m interested in the tyranny of the couple. I’m more interested in what a person does when they’re forced to be by themselves.

I went into the room and sat next to Linus on the bed. I put my hand on his shoulder. I was always surprised at how soft other people were. I thought I felt his heartbeat, although it could have been my own.

Every day the average person will witness six miracles. But it isn’t that we don’t believe in miracles – we just don’t believe that miracles are miracles. There are so many miracles all around us.

There is no real dignity in any of these costumes. If I’m a maid, I do what the owner of the house tells me to do. If I’m a nurse, I do whatever the doctor tells me to do. What are we as women, other than barnacles that attach themselves to higher life forms in some pathetic attempt to clean up messes? Tidy up what men have left behind- make the world a lovelier, better place for men. I would like to play a part in which I don’t have a superior.

Everything written by any woman was written by all women, because they all benefited from it. If one woman was a genius, it was proof that it was possible for the rest of them.

There was a scent called Five Minutes Before It Rains. If you put it on your neck, whoever kissed you would cry.

In Moscow there were a hundred different words for sadness, and one of them was joy.

Poor people knew that all good times had to be paid for.