Jonathan Ames famous quotes

I drink coffee. Without coffee, I probably couldnt write.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Coffee #Writing #Drink

People don't expect too much from literature. They just want to know they're not alone with being confused.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Confused #People #Literature

I live for coincidences. They briefly give to me the illusion or the hope that there's a pattern to my life, and if there's a pattern, then maybe I'm moving toward some kind of destiny where it's all explained.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Moving #Destiny #Giving

I grew up in northern New Jersey - the banlieue of New York - and I now live in Brooklyn. I am separated from my parents by about 50 miles, but really there is almost no distance between us. I speak to them nearly every day.
-- Jonathan Ames

#New York #Distance #Parent

How terrible to be alcoholic. You just want to quietly soothe and maybe poison yourself, but you end up poisoning those around you as well, like trying to commit suicide with a gas oven and unwittingly murdering your neighbors.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Suicide #Trying #Poison

To write about a place, you have to live there.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Writing

A lot of writing is a form of seeing - putting down what you see in terms of action and landscape.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Writing #Landscape #Action

As a child, I wanted to be an athlete, a professional tennis player or something like that.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Children #Athlete #Player

For me, the past is dead. Can't go back.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Past

Having a show get canceled is like, 'Oh, you have caviar between your teeth,' you know what I mean? Because you had a show in the first place.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Mean #Teeth #Caviar

I've always been intrigued by Stockholm Syndrome. Reminds me of my childhood.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Childhood #Syndromes #Stockholm Syndrome

I wondered where the person was who had taken my place, who wanted to know what news people had been told. I'm always looking for the person who replaces me, who thinks the things I do, who fills in for me when I'm not there. I know there is someone younger than me doing what I did and someone older doing what I will do, and someone my age being just like me.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Taken #Thinking #People

I'm on the verge of a total breakdown. Sciatica. Taxes. Cars. Fleas, possibly. It's an absurd existence.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Car #Fleas #Absurd

I was aware that I was acting atrociously but I couldn't stop myself. Rarely had I behaved in such a manner. But I guess when we're feeling lonely in life, we attack those who actually do love us. It's one of the things that characterizes human nature and can be summed up in one word: FLAWED.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Lonely #Feelings #Acting

Oh, God, I don't know what's more difficult, life or the English language.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Language #Difficult #Difficult Life

For me, books have always been a way to feel less alone while being alone.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Book #Way #Feels

For me, books have always been a way to feel less alone while being alone. Perhaps if I was depressed and isolated, just communicating with these authors through their sentences helped me.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Book #Way #Communicate

I have very few hobbies. In fact, I have no hobbies.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Hobbies #Facts

I need to stay in the present and use that new-age mantra: 'I'm okay right now.' But I worry about all the things I'm failing at every moment.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Worry #Age #Needs

I promote my own self-hatred.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Self #Hatred #Self Hatred

There are so many talented young writers named Jonathan, with whom by comparison I suffer terribly.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Suffering #Young #Comparison

I'm actually much more shy and self-conscious than people's perception of me.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Self #People #Perception

I don't like to publicly acknowledge being a Jew.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Jew #Acknowledge

I don't laugh that much, but I do like humorous books, and I like to entertain readers that way.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Humorous #Book #Laughing

I didn't think I was in a morbid mood, but it appears I am. My mind goes round and round trying to figure things out, but I always come back to the same two things: Loneliness and Death. Life ends before we figure anything out, most importantly how not to be lonely. Solitude is fine. But feeling like you have no one to love - abject lonliness - is not alright.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Lonely #Loneliness #Thinking

It was one of those days when every time I went to go out the door, something grabbed me in the back of the brain and said, lie down and ***** one more time.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Lying #Doors #Brain

I don't really recognise success. I don't see myself as on an upwardly mobile trajectory. I see myself as on the edge of a cliff about to fall off.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Fall #Cliffs #Recognise

Unfortunately, I'm one of those idiots who knows everything about health and is in a constant state of alarm, and yet I continue to do everything I shouldn't do.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Alarms #Idiot #States

I didn't play or like a lot of board games as a child. I liked playing with my G.I. Joes and making up adventures for them.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Children #Adventure #Games

I am always the source of the worst rumors about myself.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Rumor #Source #Worst

I am part of a vast generation of people who perpetually live as if they just graduated from college.
-- Jonathan Ames

#College #People #Generations

I've always been inspired by Don Quixote as a role model of sorts, of the power of books to sort of make you insane in maybe a beautiful way.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Beautiful #Book #Role Models

There's no shortage of material in life.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Shortage #Materials

The reason it's hard for me to tweet is I don't want to pronounce anything, and Twitter is for pronouncing.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Want #Reason #Tweet

Something has happened where you almost never grow up in America. Maybe it's the greater wealth.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Growing Up #America #Wealth

Mostly I have to try to censor myself so as not to write things that will hurt other people, or that will go too far.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Hurt #Writing #People

It's hard for me to think of writing a novel, because it takes so long.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Writing #Thinking #Long

I've really never written about my relationships, or things like that. I wouldn't want to divulge things that were too private.
-- Jonathan Ames

#Want #Divulge

It's hard to leave New York: this is where my friends are, my parents are. It is so vital. The whole world seems to look to New York.
-- Jonathan Ames

#New York #Parent #Looks