Daniel Handler People Quotations

I didn't like books where people played on a sports team and won a bunch of games, or went to summer camp and had a wonderful time. I really liked a book where a witch might cut a child's head off or a pack of angry dogs might burst through a door and terrorize a family.

I'm always interested to see what films are made of books. I kind of don't participate as a filmgoer in any kind of debate about what's better, the book or the movie. So I think it's interesting when people want to do it.

I kind of always think my work is unfilmable, and when I meet people who are interested in filming it, I'm always stunned.

I like writing for movies. It's nice to be alone working on fiction in your room, and then it's nice to be in a room with a bunch of people working on a movie.

I don't know why wicked places generally look wicked. You'd think they'd look nice, to fool people, but they hardly ever do.

We weren't friends[...]We were more like jigsaw pieces, each of us part of the same big picture. There are people like this wherever you go. They are part of the same mystery as you are, but you can't quite tell how you fit together. The world is a puzzle, and we can't solve it alone.

Shyness is a curious thing, because, like quicksand, it can strike people at any time, and also, like quicksand, it usually makes its victims look down.

Like People, animals will become frightened and likely do whatever you say if you whip them enough.

Fetching objects for people who are too lazy to fetch them for themselves is never a pleasant task, particularly when the people are insulting you.

There are some people who believe that home is where one hangs one's hat, but these people tend to live in closets and on little pegs.

It is not the diamonds or the birds, the people or the potatoes; it is not any of the nouns. The miracle is the adverbs, the way things are done. It is the way love gets done despite every catastrophe.

You meet people who are in pain in life and love and you forgive them for behaving the way they do.

People who say money doesn’t matter are like people who say cake doesn’t matter—it’s probably because they’ve already had a few slices.

Friends can make you feel that the world is smaller and less sneaky than it really is, because you know people who have similar experiences.

Everybody will die, but very few people want to be reminded of that fact.

I'm sure you have heard it said that appearance does not matter so much, and that it is what's on the inside that counts. This is, of course, utter nonsense, because if it were true then people who were good on this inside would would never have to comb their hair or take a bath, and the whole world would smell even worse than it already does.

This is love if it's not with you, a terrible fiery something that makes people look away, and it feels like a punch in the throat.

Is it fair for the bears to come down to where humans live, looking for food? Is it fair for the Duke's soldiers to shoot at them? Is it fair for the bears to crush them with giant snowballs? Often, if you point out something that isn't fair, someone will reply, "Life isn't fair." What is to be done with such people?

There is a kind of crying I hope you have not experienced, and it is not just crying about something terrible that has happened, but a crying for all of the terrible things that have happened, not just to you but to everyone you know and to everyone you don’t know and even the people you don’t want to know, a crying that cannot be diluted by a brave deed or a kind word, but only by someone holding you as your shoulders shake and your tears run down your face.

Simply put, dramatic irony is when a person makes a harmless remark, and someone else who hears it knows something that makes the remark have a different, and usually unpleasant, meaning. For instance, if you were in a restaurant and said out loud, "I can't wait to eat the veal marsala I ordered," and there were people around who knew that the veal marsala was poisoned and that you would die as soon as you took a bite, your situation would be one of dramatic irony.

Oftentimes. when people are miserable, they will want to make other people miserable, too. But it never helps.

It is terribly rude to tell people that their troubles are boring.

People don't always get what they deserve in this world.

It is always cruel to laugh at people, of course, although sometimes if they are wearing an ugly hat it is hard to control yourself.

If writers wrote as carelessly as some people talk, then adhasdh asdglaseuyt[bn[ pasdlgkhasdfasdf.

There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something different.

Instead of the word 'love' there was an enormous heart, a symbol sometimes used by people who have trouble figuring out the difference between words and shapes.

This story is about the Baudelaires. And they are the sort of people who know that there’s always something. Something to invent, something to read, something to bite, and something to do, to make a sanctuary, no matter how small. And for this reason, I am happy to say, the Baudelaires were very fortunate indeed.

It is one of the peculiar truths of life that people often say things that they know full well are ridiculous.

It is always terrible to be told to go play with people one doesn’t know...

So you’re reluctant, I said to myself. Many, many people are reluctant. It’s like having feet. It’s nothing to brag about.

I love meeting people who have absolutely no sense of irony. It's really fascinating to imagine what it would be like to go through life without understanding even the most basic of ironies.

I was never a fan of anything, and yet some people are fans of my books. That's a bit odd. But I like meeting them.

In general, of course, a stranger who tries to get you into an automobile is anything but noble, and in general a person who quotes great American novelists is anything but treacherous, and in general a man who says you needn't worry about money, or a man who smokes cigarettes, is somewhere in between.

I always think it's silly when people talk about works of culture taking risks. Because there's not any risk involved.

Appearance matters a great deal because you can often tell a lot about people by looking at how they present themselves.

I never thought about whether film is inherently more sincere, because certainly I think if Guy Maddin had directed A Series Of Unfortunate Events, there probably could have been more of the stage-y irony that is in the books. But I was just interested to see what people would do with it, and worrying that Brad Silberling wouldn't do what I had in mind.

Don’t repeat yourself. It’s not only repetitive, it’s redundant, and people have heard it before.

Certain people have said that the world is like a calm pond, and that anytime a person does even the smallest thing, it is as if a stone has dropped into the pond, spreading circles of ripples further and further out, until the entire world has been changed by one tiny action.

I like to think that I get better and better as a writer, but it seems pretty easy to me to slip on disguises of various people.

If you try to avoid every instance of peer pressure you will end up without any peers whatsoever, and the trick is to succumb to enough pressure that you do not drive your peers away, but not so much that you end up in a situation in which you are dead or otherwise uncomfortable. This is a difficult trick, and most people never master it, and end up dead or uncomfortable at least once during their lives.

-Most people would say that she's beautiful. -That's because she's been with most people.

The worst surroundings in the world can be tolerated if the people in them are interesting and kind.

13. 99 percent is a very large percentage. For instance, easily 99 percent of people want a roof over their heads, food on their tables, and the occasional slice of cake for dessert. Surely an arrangement can be made with that niggling 1 percent who disagree.

Historically, a story about people inside impressive buildings ignoring or even taunting people standing outside shouting at them turns out to be a story with an unhappy ending.

When you start reading nonfiction books about piracy, you realize that it's actually just a history of desperate people.

It is not always the job of people shouting outside impressive buildings to solve problems. It is often the job of the people inside, who have paper, pens, desks, and an impressive view.

I wrote a comedy, which hopefully [Rick director] Curtiss Clayton will bring to the screen, that I thought was the antithesis of all my work. I thought it was light and sunshiny, and Mr. Clayton reminded me that it is the story of a woman kidnapped and forced to do things against her will, which is not what most people think of as light and sunshiny.

Is it OK not to be a virgin, yes. Most people aren’t virgins, Min. That’s why there’s people to begin with.

I wrote Rick before I was published, and I had no vision of it, really. It was just a story that occurred to me, and that put its little claws in my brain, and I wrote it, and I showed it to a couple people, and they all said, "This is ghastly."

Maybe, generations ago, young people rebelled out of some clear motive, but now, we know we're rebelling. Between teen movies and sex-ed textbooks we're so ready for our rebellious phase we can't help but feel it's safe, contained. It will turn out all right, despite the risk, snug in the shell of rebellion narrative. Rebellion narrative, does that make sense? It was appropriate to do, so we did it.

Wicked people never have time for reading. It's one of the reasons for their wickedness.

Well-read people are less likely to be evil.

I have produced things that I would say were sincerely cheerful. But then I am reminded by other people that no one else would see them that way.

No matter who you are, no matter where you live, and no matter how many people are chasing you, what you don't read is often as important as what you do read.

Everyone tells you it's all right to cry, but not enough people say it's all right if you don't want people to know.

As I am sure you know, when people say 'It's my pleasure,' they usually mean something along the lines of, 'There's nothing on Earth I would rather do less.' [...]

So every so often, when I meet someone who's honestly appalled by my books and doesn't understand why they would be attractive to people... I find such people sort of charming, even though they usually don't like me.

People can expect poisonous mushrooms, ... And then only if they open the book.

A nice thing about children's books, though I'm probably alone in this opinion among people who write and publish them, is that they did get to be in this unrecognized ghetto for a long time.

I like to give people novels I think they would like, on no particular occasion - just when we're in a bookstore together. I like to receive reference books on my birthday.