Roald Dahl
A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly.Collection: Book
Watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you.Collection: Eye
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 with his mouth but the eyes stay the same. It's sure to be bogus.Collection: Children
And don’t worry about the bits you can’t understand. Sit back and allow the words to wash around you, like music.Collection: Worry
Don't gobblefunk around with words.Collection: Funny
It's impossible to make your eyes twinkle if you aren't feeling twinkly yourselfCollection: Eye
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.Collection: Book
A little magic can take you a long way.Collection: Long
The greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places.Collection: Inspiring
I is reading it hundreds of times,' the BFG said. 'And I is still reading it and teaching new words to myself and how to write them. It is the most scrumdiddlyumptious story.' Sophie took the book out of his hand. 'Nicholas Nickleby,' she read aloud. 'By Dahl's Chickens,' the BFG said.Collection: Book
Poor Earthworm,' the Ladybird said, whispering in James's ear. 'He loves to make everything into a disaster. He hates to be happy. He is only happy when he is gloomy.Collection: Hate
For me, the pleasure of writing comes with inventing stories.Collection: Writing
Fairy tales have always got to have something a bit scary for children - as long as you make them laugh as well.Collection: Children
I'm right and you're wrong, I'm big and you're small, and there's nothing you can do about it.Collection: Bigs
There are many other little refinements too, Mr. Bohlen. You'll see them all when you study the plans carefully. For example, there's a trick that nearly every writer uses, of inserting at least one long, obscure word into each story. This makes the reader think that the man is very wise and clever. So I have the machine do the same thing. There'll be a whole stack of long words stored away just for this purpose." Where?" In the 'word-memory' section," he said, epexegetically.Collection: Wise
I'm wondering what to read next." Matilda said. "I've finished all the children's books.Collection: Children
A girl should think about making herself look attractive so she can get a good husband later on. Looks is more important than books, Miss Hunky..." "The name is Honey," Miss Honey said. "Now look at me," Mrs Wormwood said. "Then look at you. You chose books. I chose looks.Collection: Girl
You mean you live down here?' Matilda asked. 'I do', Miss Honey replied, but she said no more. Matilda had never once stopped to think about where Miss Honey might be living. She had always regarded her purely as a teacher, a person who turned up out of nowhere and taught at school and then went away again.Collection: Teacher
Two wrongs don't make a right.Collection: Revenge
... and when he put his mind to it, he could make his words coil themselves around and around the listener until they held her in some sort of a mild hypnotic spell.Collection: Mind
There's nothin' you can get from a book that you can't get from a television fastah!" -Harry WormwoodCollection: Book
Fiona has the same glacial beauty of an iceburg, but unlike the iceburg she has absolutely nothing below the surface.Collection: Surface
When you're writing, it's rather like going on a very long walkCollection: Writing
It is preferable to incur a mild punishment than to perform an onerous task.Collection: Punishment
Oh where, oh where had Snow White gone? She'd found it easy, being pretty To hitch a ride into the city.Collection: Cities
I was already beginning to realize that the only way to conduct oneself in a situation where bombs rained down and bullets whizzed past, was to accept the dangers and all the consequences as calmly as possible. Fretting and sweating about it all was not going to help.Collection: Past
Well, first of all," said the BFG, "human beans is not really believing in giants, is they? Human beans is not thinking we exist.Collection: Believe
I therefore invite you all," Mr Fox went on, 'to stay here with me for ever.' For ever!' they cried. 'My goodness! How marvellous!' And Rabbit said to Mrs Rabbit, 'My dear, just think! We're never going to be shot again in our lives!' We will make,' said Mr Fox, 'a little underground village, with streets and houses on each side - seperate houses for Badgers and Moles and Rabbits and Weasels and Foxes. And every day I will go shopping for you all. And every day we will eat like kings.' The cheering that followed this speech went on for many minutes.Collection: Kings
The maid screamed. The Queen gasped. Sophie waved.Collection: Queens
I like enthusiasts of any kind.Collection: Kind
The snozberries taste like snozberries!Collection: Taste
I am totally convinced that most grown-ups have completely forgotten what is it like to be a child between the ages of five and then... I can remember exactly what it was like. I am certain I can.Collection: Children
I was observing her closely as I talked, and after a while I began to get the impression that she was not, in fact, quite so merry and smiling a girl as I had been led to believe at first. She seemed to be coiled in herself, as though with a secret she was jealously guarding. The deep-blue eyes moved too quickly about the room, never settling or resting on one thing for more than a moment; and over all her face, though so faint that they might not even have been there, those small downward lines of sorrow.Collection: Girl
What a fortunate fellow I am, I kept telling myself. Nobody has ever had such a lovely time as this!Collection: Lovely
Perhaps it's chasing me. But I don't think it will ever catch me because I am moving fast.Collection: Moving
I am suspicious of both facility and speed.Collection: Rewriting
Give us strength, oh Lord, to let our children starve.Collection: Children
If the Good Lord intended for us to walk, he wouldn't have invented rollar skates.Collection: Lord
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.Collection: Pigs
But it is impossible to replace a person one has loved to distraction.Collection: Love
When I first thought about writing the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, I never originally meant to have children in it at all!Collection: Children
Now that I am alone, I don't have to hide it; I don't have to hide anything any longer. I can let my face go because no one can see me; because there's twenty-one thousand feet between me and them... No, I don't have to press my teeth together or tighten the muscles of my jaw.Collection: Feet
Eschew all those beastly adjectives.Collection: Adjectives
Both Matilda and Lavender were enthralled. It was quite clear to them that they were at this moment standing in the presence of a master. Here was somebody who had brought the art of skulduggery to the highest point of perfection, somebody, moreover, who was willing to risk life and limb in pursuit of her calling. They gazed in wonder at this goddess, and suddenly even the boil on her nose was no longer a blemish but a badge of courage.Collection: Art
I have found it impossible to talk to anyone about my problems. I couldn't face the embarrassment, and anyway I lack the courage. Any courage I had was knocked out of me when I was young. But now, all of sudden I have a sort of desperate wish to tell everything to somebody.Collection: Wish
So, please, oh please, we beg, we pray, go throw your TV set away, and in its place you can install, a lovely bookcase on the wall.Collection: Motivational
The secret of life', he said, 'is to become very very good at somethin' that's very very 'ard to do.Collection: Secret
It doesn't matter who you are or what you look like, so long as somebody loves you.Collection: Love