Stargirl Quotes

• I had never realized how much I needed the attention of others to confirm my own presence.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Attention, Needed, My Own

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.82, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• The earth is speaking to us, but we can't hear because of all the racket our senses are making. Sometimes we need to erase them, erase our senses. Then - maybe - the earth will touch us. The universe will speak. The stars will whisper.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Life, Stars, Needs

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.62, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• Do not follow me! Let's just be fabulously where we are and who we are. You be you and I'll be me, today and today and today, and let's trust the future to tommorrow. Let the stars keep track of us. Let us ride our own orbits and trust that they will meet. May our reunion be not a finding but a sweet collision of destinies!

  Jerry Spinelli

  Sweet, Stars, Destiny

  Jerry Spinelli (2011). “Love, Stargirl”, p.240, Hachette UK

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• She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl. We did not know what to make of her. In our minds we tried to pin her to a cork board like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Flower, Butterfly, Mind

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.17, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• She taught me to revel. She taught me to wonder. She taught me to laugh. My sense of humor had always measured up to everyone else's; but timid introverted me, I showed it sparingly: I was a smiler. In her presence I threw back my head and laughed out loud for the first time in my life

  Jerry Spinelli

  Laughing, Firsts, Taught

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.71, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• She was bendable light: she shone around every corner of my day.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Light, Corners

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.71, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• Let's just be fabulously where we are and who we are. You be you and I'll be me, today and today and today, and let's trust the future to tomorrow.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Who We Are, Today, Tomorrow

  Jerry Spinelli (2007). “Love, Stargirl”, p.179, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• You’ll know her more by your questions than by her answers. Keep looking at her long enough. One day you might see someone you know.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Long, One Day, Answers

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.28, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• Who are you if you lose your favorite person? Can you lose your favorite person without losing yourself? I reach for Stargirl and she's gone. I'm not me anymore.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Gone, Losing, Favorite Person

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.142, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• In our minds we tried to pin her to a corkboard like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew

  Jerry Spinelli

  Butterfly, Mind, Cactus

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.17, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• When a stargirl cries, she sheds not tears but light.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Light, Tears, Cry

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• She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Cactus, Today, Tomorrow

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.17, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• I’m erased. I’m gone. I’m nothing. And then the world is free to flow into me like water into an empty bowl…. And… I see. I hear. But not with eyes and ears. I’m not outside my world anymore, and I’m not really inside it either. The thing is, there’s no difference between me and the universe. The boundary is gone. I am it and it is me. I am a stone, a cactus thorn. I am rain. I like that most of all, being rain.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Life, Rain, Eye

  Jerry Spinelli (2011). “Stargirl”, p.83, Hachette UK

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• I have to tell you I love living in a world without clocks. The shackles are gone. I’m a puppy unleashed in a meadow of time. -- Stargirl

  Jerry Spinelli

  Gone, World, Puppy

  Jerry Spinelli (2007). “Love, Stargirl”, p.112, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• I’m not my name. My name is something I wear, like a shirt. It gets worn. I outgrow it, I change it.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Names, Shirts, Worn

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.45, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• Throughout the day, Stargirl had been dropping money. She was the Johnny Appleseed of loose change: a penny here, a nickel there. Tossed to the sidewalk, laid on a shelf or bench. Even quarters. "I hate change," she said. "It's so . . . jangly." "Do you realize how much you must throw away in a year?" I said. "Did you ever see a little kid's face when he spots a penny on a sidewalk?"

  Jerry Spinelli

  Hate, Kids, Years

  "Stargirl". Book by Jerry Spinelli, August 8, 2000.

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• Nothing’s more fun than being carried away.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Fun, Carried Away

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.56, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• Her smile put the sunflower to shame.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Sunflower, Her Smile, Shame

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.54, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• It’s really hard to do nothing totally. Even just sitting here, like this, our bodies are churning, our minds are chattering. There’s a whole commotion going on inside us.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Mind, Sitting, Body

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.62, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• She's in tenth grade,' he said. 'I hear she's been homeschooled till now.' Maybe that explains it,' I said.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Said, Grades

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.12, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• It (enchantment) started when the earth was born. It never stops. It is, always. It's just here.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Enchantment, Earth, Born

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• Every name is real. That's the nature of names.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Real, Names

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.27, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• In that moonlit hour, I acquired a sense of the otherness of things. I liked the feeling the moonlight gave me, as if it wasn't the opposite of day, but its underside, its private side, when the fabulous purred on my snow-white sheet like some dark cat come in from the desert.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Cat, Dark, Opposites

  Jerry Spinelli (2012). “The Stargirl Collection”, p.15, Knopf Books for Young Readers

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• As we meandered, she said my name three times: "Stargirl?" "Yes?" "That was better than TV." "It was." "Stargirl?" "Yes?" "Does the sun do that everyday?" "Yes." "Stargirl?" "Yes?" "Everyday is sun day.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Names, Everyday, Doe

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• of all the unusual features of Stargirl, this struck me as the most remarkable. Bad things did not stick to her. Correction: her bad things did not stick to her. If we were hurt, if we were unhappy or otherwise victimized by life, she seemed to know about it, and to care, as soon as we did. But bad things falling on her -- unkind words, nasty stares, foot blisters -- she seemed unaware of. I never saw her look in a mirror, never heard her complain. All of her feelings, all of her attentions flowed outward. She had no ego.

  Jerry Spinelli

  Hurt, Fall, Mirrors

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