Paul Zindel Quotes

“Now Lorraine can blame all the other things on me, but she was the one who picked out the Pigman’s phone number. If you ask me, I think he would have died anyway. Maybe we speeded things up a little, but you really can’t say we murdered him.”

“Also, you’ll find out soon enough that John distorts—when he isn’t out-and-out lying. For example, in Problems in American Democracy the other day, Mr. Weiner asked him what kind of homes early American settlers lived in, and John said tree huts. Now John knows early American settlers didn’t live in tree huts, but he’ll do just about anything to stir up some excitement.”

“I realized how many things the Pigman and his wife must have shared—even the fun of preparing good food. Good food is supposed to produce good conversation, I’ve heard. I guess it’s no wonder my mother and I never had an interesting conversation when all we eat is canned soup, chop suey, and instant coffee”

“That’s how the three of us were. If one of us did something that was funny, the other two had to come up with something too. Three copycats. It wasn’t exactly that we had to show off so much as that we wanted to entertain each other. We wanted to show equally how much we were thankful for each other’s company.”

“I think that’s probably the real reason I go to the graveyard. I’m not afraid of seeing ghosts. I think I’m really looking for ghosts. I want to see them. I’m looking for anything to prove that when I drop dead there’s a chance I’ll be doing something a little more exciting than decaying.”

“The smell of hospitals always makes me think of death. In fact I think hospitals are exactly what graveyards are supposed to be like. They ought to bury people in hospitals and let sick people get well in the cemeteries.”

“The reason John gets away with all these things is because he’s extremely handsome. I hate to admit it, but he is. An ugly boy would have been sent to reform school by now.”

″‘An actor?’ Bore blurted as if it finally got through to him. ‘Dad, it’s the only thing I’m really interested in doing. I want to go to acting school right after graduation. Everyone says that’s what I should be, with my imagination—’ ‘Try eating your imagination when you’re hungry sometime.‘”

“I’m asking you to try working for a change. At your age I was working hard, not floundering around in a fool’s dream world.”

″‘Dinner is served,’ she announced, carrying this big plate of congealed spaghetti. We each sat at opposite ends of the table with the candles burning away. I poured us some wine in these long-stemmed glasses, and for a few moments we just sat looking at each other—her with the feather in her hair and me with my moustache. ‘To the Pigman,’ I said softly. ‘To the Pigman.’ She lifted her glass, and she was lovely.”