Betty Smith Quotes - Page 2

Quotes about:

• I want to live for something. I don't want to live to get charity food to give me enough strength to go back to get more charity food.

  Betty Smith

  Giving, Charity, Want

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  13 Copy quote

• If you love someone, you'd rather suffer the pain alone to spare them.

  Betty Smith

  Pain, Suffering, If You Love Someone

  8 Copy quote

• Look at everything as though you are seeing it for the first time.

  Betty Smith

  Perspective, Looks, Firsts

  12 Copy quote

• She had become accustomed to being lonely. She was used to walking alone and to being considered 'different.' She did not suffer too much.

  Betty Smith

  Girl, Lonely, Suffering

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  12 Copy quote

• It's a beautiful religion and I wish I understood it more. No, I don't want to understand it all. It's beautiful because it's always a mystery. Sometimes I say I don't believe in God and Jesus and Mary. I'm a bad Catholic because I miss mass once in a while and I grumble when, at confession, I get a heavy penance for something I couldn't help doing. But good or bad, I am a Catholic and I'll never be anything else. Of course, I didn't ask to be born Catholic, no more than I asked to be born American. But I'm glad it turned out that I'm both these things.

  Betty Smith

  Beautiful, Jesus, Believe

  4 Copy quote

• A lie was something you told because you were mean or a coward. A story was something you made up out of something that might have happened. Only you didn't tell it like it was, you told it like you thought it should have been.

  Betty Smith

  Lying, Mean, Should Have

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  38 Copy quote

• Bad quarrels come when two people are wrong. Worse quarrels come when two people are right.

  Betty Smith

  Two, People, Quarrels

  4 Copy quote

• I can never give a 'yes' or a 'no.' I don't believe everything in life can be settled by a monosyllable.

  Betty Smith

  Believe, Giving, Don't Believe

  4 Copy quote

• Someday you'll remember what I said and you'll thank me for it." Francie wished adults would stop telling her that. Already the load of thanks in the future was weighing her down. She figured she'd have to spend the best years of her womanhood hunting up people to tell them that they were right and to thank them.

  Betty Smith

  Hunting, Years, People

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  6 Copy quote

• From that moment on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again.

  Betty Smith

  Lonely, Reading, World

  6 Copy quote

• The difference between rich and poor", said Francie, "is that the poor do everything with thier own hands and the rich hire hands to do things.

  Betty Smith

  Hands, Differences, Rich

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  4 Copy quote

• It meant that she belonged some place. She was a Brooklyn girl with a Brooklyn name and a Brooklyn accent. She didn't want to change into a bit of this and a bit of that.

  Betty Smith

  Girl, Names, Brooklyn

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  4 Copy quote

• But the penciled sheets did not seem like nor smell like the library book so she had given it up, consoling herself with the vow that when she grew up, she would work hard, save money and buy every single book that she liked.

  Betty Smith

  Book, Hard Work, Smell

  Betty Smith (2009). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”, p.26, Harper Collins

  7 Copy quote

• As she read, at peace with the world and happy as only a little girl could be with a fine book and a little bowl of candy, and all alone in the house, the leaf shadows shifted and the afternoon passed.

  Betty Smith

  Girl, Book, House

  Betty Smith (2009). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”, p.26, Harper Collins

  6 Copy quote

• All of us are what we have to be and everyone lives the kind of life its in him to live.

  Betty Smith

  Life, Live Life, Kind

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  4 Copy quote

• There had to be dark and muddy waters so that the sun could have something to background it's flashing glory.

  Betty Smith

  Dark, Water, Sun

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  4 Copy quote

• How much do they be paying you?" he asked mellowly. "The usual salary. A little more than they think I'm worth and a little less than I think I'm worth.

  Betty Smith

  Thinking, Usual, Salary

  6 Copy quote

• She told Papa about it. He made her stick out her tongue and he felt her wrist. He shook his head sadly and said, "You have a bad case, a very bad case." "Of what?" "Growing up.

  Betty Smith

  Growing Up, Papa, Tongue

  BETTY SMITH (1943). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”

  4 Copy quote

• No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps, and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in the tenements districts.... That was the kind of tree it was. It liked poor people.

  Betty Smith

  Sky, People, Tree

  Betty Smith (2009). “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”, p.6, Harper Collins

  20 Copy quote

• There's a tree that grows in Brooklyn. Some people call it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed falls, it makes a tree which struggles to reach the sky. It grows in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps. It grows up out of cellar gratings. It is the only tree that grows out of cement. It grows lushly . . . survives without sun, water, and seemingly without earth. It would be considered beautiful except that there are too many of it.

  Betty Smith

  Beautiful, Growing Up, Struggle

  A Tree Grows in Brooklyn epigraph (1943)

  7 Copy quote

• We'll leave now, so that this moment will remain a perfect memory...let it be our song and think of me every time you hear it.

  Betty Smith

  Song, Memories, Thinking

  4 Copy quote

• Francie looked at her legs. They were long, slender, and exquisitely molded. She wore the sheerest of flawless silk stockings, and expensively made high-heeled pumps shod her beautifully arched feet. "Beautiful legs, then, is the secret of being a mistriss," concluded Francie. She looked down at her own long thin legs. "I'll never make it, I guess." Sighing , she resigned herself to a sinless life.

  Betty Smith

  Beautiful, Feet, Long

  8 Copy quote

• I never listen to what people tell me and I can't read. The only way I know what is right and wrong is the way I feel about things. If I feel bad, it's wrong. If I feel good, it's right.

  Betty Smith

  People, Feel Good, Way

  BETTY SMITH (1947). “A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN MAGGIE NOW”

  4 Copy quote

• There's a tree that grows in Brooklyn. Some people call it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed falls, it makes a tree which struggles to reach the sky.

  Betty Smith

  Fall, Struggle, Sky

  A Tree Grows in Brooklyn epigraph (1943)

  4 Copy quote

• It doesn't take long to write things of which you know nothing. When you write of actual things, it takes longer, because you have to live them first.

  Betty Smith

  Writing, Long, Firsts

  BETTY SMITH (1947). “A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN MAGGIE NOW”

  7 Copy quote

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