30+ of the best quotes from "The Book Thief"

Set in the small town of Molching, Germany, during World War II, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is the coming-of-age story of Liesel Meminger, an orphan girl who recently lost her only brother. Death is the novel’s omniscient narrator, which provides an unusual perspective on Hitler’s actions and the Holocaust. Liesel is sent to live with foster parents, the kind Hans Hubermann and his stern wife, Rosa. Seeking comfort from grief and the turmoil and brutalities around her, she turns to stealing books–even though (at first) she can’t read them. She shares her books and other treasures with Rudy Steiner, the young neighbor and classmate who later becomes her best friend, and Max Vandenburg, the Jewish man whom Hans offers to hide in their basement. Along with mortality, the novel explores the human capacity for both exceptional kindness and staggering cruelty.

Affirming the power of reading to foster empathy and understanding, The Book Thief remains profoundly relevant. Below are 30+ insightful quotes from the novel.

The best quotes from The Book Thief on pain and love

1. "A snowball in the face is surely the perfect beginning to a lasting friendship."

2. "The only thing worse than a boy who hates you: a boy that loves you."

3. “Somewhere, far down, there was an itch in his heart, but he made it a point not to scratch it. He was afraid of what might come leaking out.”

4. "If only she could be so oblivious again, to feel such love without knowing it, mistaking it for laughter."

The best quotes from The Book Thief on suffering and resilience

1. "Imagine smiling after a slap in the face. Then think of doing it twenty-four hours a day."

2. "Usually we walk around constantly believing ourselves. 'I'm okay' we say. 'I'm alright'. But sometimes the truth arrives on you and you can't get it off."

3. "Like most misery, it started with apparent happiness."

4. “Together, they would watch everything that was so carefully planned collapse, and they would smile at the beauty of destruction.”

5. “It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on.”

6. "So much good, so much evil. Just add water."

7. "He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It's his only detriment. He steps on my heart. He makes me cry."

8. "She took a step and didn't want to take any more, but she did."

9. "Often I wish this would all be over, Liesel, but then somehow you do something like walk down the basement steps with a snowman in your hands."

10. "I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know?”

The best quotes from The Book Thief on books and the influence of words

1. “As always, one of her books was next to her."

2. "I want words at my funeral. But I guess that means you need life in your life."

3. "You can't eat books, sweetheart."

4. "I like that every page in every book can have a gem on it."

5. "I have hated words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right."

6. "She was the book thief without the words."
   

The best quotes from The Book Thief on human nature and mortality–from the perspective of Death

1. "I've seen so many young men over the years who think they're running at other young men. They are not. They are running at me." 

2. "I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it." 

3. "I'm always finding humans at their best and worst. I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both."

4. "I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that's where they begin. Their great skill is their capacity to escalate."

5. "A human doesn't have a heart like mine. The human heart is a line, whereas my own is a circle, and I have the endless ability to be in the right place at the right time."

6. "One opportunity leads directly to another, just as risk leads to more risk, life to more life, and death to more death."

7. "If they killed him tonight, at least he would die alive."

8. "Humans, if nothing else, have the good sense to die."

9. "It kills me sometimes, how people die."

10. "Even death has a heart."