A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.
I have a passion for teaching kids to become readers, to become comfortable with a book, not daunted. Books shouldn’t be daunting, they should be funny, exciting and wonderful; and learning to be a reader gives a terrific advantage.
If you are going to get anywhere in life you have to read a lot of books.
You chose books, I chose looks. Now see the difference?
Good authour Good books.
What a fortunate fellow I am, I kept telling myself. Nobody has ever had such a lovely time as this!
Badger: The cuss you are. Mr. Fox: The cuss am I? Are you cussing with me?
I’d rather be fried alive and eaten by Mexicans.
Oh where, oh where had Snow White gone? She’d found it easy, being pretty To hitch a ride into the city.
The little pig began to pray But Wolfie blew his house away. He shouted, “Bacon, Pork, and Ham! Oh what a lucky wolf I am!” And though he ate the pig quite fast, He carefully kept the tail till last.
Fiona has the same glacial beauty of an iceburg, but unlike the iceburg she has absolutely nothing below the surface.
The maid screamed. The Queen gasped. Sophie waved.
You is getting nosier than a parker.
Give us strength, oh Lord, to let our children starve.
I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. He taught me that if you are interested in something, no matter what it is, go at it at full speed ahead. Embrace it with both arms, hug it, love it and above all become passionate about it. Lukewarm is no good. Hot is no good either. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.
I was glad my father was an eye-smiler. It meant he never gave me a fake smile because it’s impossible to make your eyes twinkle if you aren’t feeling twinkly yourself. A mouth-smile is different. You can fake a mouth-smile any time you want, simply by moving your lips. I’ve also learned that a real mouth-smile always has an eye-smile to go with it. So watch out, I say, when someone smiles at you but his eyes stay the same. It’s sure to be a phony.
Sometimes Matilda longed for a friend, someone like the kind, courageous people in her books.
Of course they’re real people. They’re Oompa-Loompas... Imported direct from Loompaland... And oh what a terrible country it is! Nothing but thick jungles infested by the most dangerous beasts in the world – hornswogglers and snozzwangers and those terrible wicked whangdoodles. A whangdoodle would eat ten Oompa-Loompas for breakfast and come galloping back for a second helping.
It is almost worth going away because it’s so lovely coming back.
These books gave Matilda a hopeful and comforting message: You are not alone.