Top 90 Wistful Quotes
#1. We are these people,
wistful, ironical, wilful,
who have no part in
new-world reconstruction,
in the confederacy of labour.
Hilda Doolittle
#2. His gaze grew wistful, and he looked so young. 'I don't want to put things off, even though we haven't been together a really long time. I don't want to wait
you never know what can ... Look. I adore you, and I want a home. Again. With you.
Alice Clayton
#3. Five decades on the throne and this is how they treat me, Ms. Blakely. Makes me wish I'd been a teacher." His voice drops. He almost sounds a little wistful. "I would have liked to have been a teacher.
Ally Carter
#4. Now that I near 80, I realize with wistful pleasure that on many occasions I was 10, 20, 40, even 50 years ahead of my time.
Benoit Mandelbrot
#5. You're just ... You're everything
His words are perfect, but the tone in his voice is not right. Wistful. Apologetic.
Jessica Park
#6. Tod's pale brows arched halfway up his forehead, and he looked suddenly, achingly wistful. "She knows not what she says ... "
Maybe not. But I was starting to get a pretty good idea ...
Rachel Vincent
#7. For two summers not a blue wing, not a blue warble. I seemed to miss something kindred and precious from my environment
the visible embodiment of the tender sky and wistful soil. What a loss, I said, to coming generations of dwellers in the country
no bluebird in spring!
John Burroughs
#8. Even when our children are still young and defenseless, we feel intimations of their departure. We find ourselves staring at them with nostalgia, wistful for the person they're about to no longer be.
Jennifer Senior
#9. Debbie Reynolds is as wistful as an iron foundry.
Oscar Levant
#10. Ah, James, our James," she says, sounding wistful. "Can't live with him, can't kill him slowly enough." - Callie (pg. 141)
Cody McFadyen
#11. I sometimes look into the face of my dog Stan and see a wistful sadness and existential angst, when all he is actually doing is slowly scanning the ceiling for flies.
Merrill Markoe
#12. He sits in silence, and his eyes are definitely not the man I know. They're wistful, lonely, and so beautiful I have to close mine. "I
Sally Thorne
#13. Hail the day that sees Him rise,
Ravished from our wistful eyes!
Christ, awhile to mortals given,
Re-ascends His native heaven.
There the glorious triumph waits,
Lift your heads, eternal gates!
Wide unfold the radiant scene,
Take the King of glory in!
Charles Wesley
#14. It was funny, she thought, but her smile turned wistful because she had nobody to tell.
Laini Taylor
#15. But Phoebe loved her mother best as she was now, wistful, out-of-step, her laugh tinged always with sadness, as if things were only funny in spite of themselves.
Jennifer Egan
#16. Many in Hollywood viewed the public persona of the young Debbie Reynolds as demure and vulnerable to be a complete facade. Pianist Oscar Levant once quipped, "She's as wistful as an iron factory."
Elizabeth Taylor
#17. Even the suggestion of swimming be stirring. Watch a swimmer pass a building with a pool: the whiff of chlorine produces a wistful smile. Sit with swimmers when a TV commercial shows someone in the water: they actually stop and watch.
Lynn Sherr
#18. His voice nearly inaudible. He turned to look at me with a wistful expression. The golden eyes held mine, and I lost my train of thought. I stared at him until he looked away. You haven't asked me
Stephenie Meyer
#19. So, what are you doing tonight?"
Me?" Janie laughs. "Homework, of course."
You want company?" Carrie's looking wistful.
Do you have homework to do?"
Of course. WEther I do it or not is the real question.
Lisa McMann
#20. Can Israelis be wistful? It is not the characteristic we usually associate with them; more typically they are said to be tough, sweet, angry, thoughtful, demanding - not wistful.
Elliott Abrams
#21. Life was good then, I though, as I started to cry. Not so much because I missed the good times, although I did. It was more that I knew I was turning into one of those girls who, upon looking at high school photos, feels wistful.
Emily Giffin
#22. He is Romeo, and he is heartbroken. Every word is wistful. When he says, 'O, teach me how I should forget to think!' I, for the first time, see what the big deal is about Shakespeare.
Nina LaCour
#23. February, when the days of winter seem endless and no amount of wistful recollecting can bring back any air of summer.
Shirley Jackson
#24. Even there, in that home where lives were fading out, evening was a kind of wistful respite. So close to death, Maman must have felt free then and ready to live it all again.
Albert Camus
#25. The anger. The terror. The feeling of entrapment. the profound distrust of people.The wistful, plaintive conviction that a window, a thing, was more important than she. These feelings and attitudes, expressed in the course of this hour, were symptoms of some profound disturbance.
Flora Rheta Schreiber
#26. It is the mystery of the unknown
That fascinates us; we are children still
Wayward and wistful; with one hand we cling
To the familiar things we call our own,
And with the other, resolute of will,
Grope in the dark for what the day will bring
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
#27. I am obsessed with the Great Depression and with former showgirls - and the Victorians - the idea of wistful, dark romance.
Karen Elson
#28. The cooler days have brought a wistful mood upon him. The smell of coalsmoke in the air at night. Old times, dead years. For him such memories are bitter ones.
Cormac McCarthy
#29. Tom got to rattling off the pranks he and his school boy buddies pulled ... and what I saw wasn't an old man gone wistful but rather an old man still resonating to the glee of a young heart.
Michael Perry
#30. All green and fair the summer lies, Just budded from the bud of spring, With tender blue of wistful skies, And winds that softly sing.
Sarah Chauncey Woolsey
#31. I don't know a writer who doesn't feel some sense of glamour and magic and a complex, wistful sadness emanating from the expats of the twenties in France. Some of the sadness, of course, is that we weren't there.
Guy Gavriel Kay
#32. I always have been and will remain someone who loves real, 3D, substantial books. And I don't believe that it's a wistful, nostalgic interest like vinyl collectors. It's not the same thing.
Art Spiegelman
#33. I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky,
Oscar Wilde
#34. Original love never appears in pure form, but in manifold veils and shapes, such as confidence, humility, reverence, serenity, asfaithfulness and modesty, as gratefulness; but primarily as longing and wistful melancholy.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
#35. Nostalgia is in my blood. My mother was a passionate teacher of history and a lover of all things "was." I, too, prefer the bygone, and I'm prone to waxing wistful over the end of something even as I'm living it--cherishing, hanging on.
Lisa Anselmo
#36. God is your best friend. He gave you this life and He wants you to share it with him." Gabby's voice turned wistful, "You could start by thanking him for your many blessings. Wouldn't you agree, even if you already know, it's still nice to hear thank you?
Greg Sandora
#37. I wonder what Proust would have made of our present-day locus of collective fantasy, the Internet. I'm guessing he would have seized on its wistful aspect, pointing out gently and with wry humor that much of what beguiles us is the act of reaching for what isn't there.
Jennifer Egan
#38. Babbit was an average father. He was affectionate, bullying, opinionated, ignorant, and rather wistful. Like most parents he enjoyed the game of waiting till the victim was clearly wrong, then virtuously pouncing.
Sinclair Lewis
#39. I had not thought of violets of late,
The wild, shy kind that springs beneath you feet
In wistful April days.
Alice Dunbar Nelson
#40. I want a horse and plough, Chickens too, Just one cow, With a wistful moo.
Noel Coward
#41. Can't call 'em zombies anymore," sighed Manny. He seemed almost wistful. "Now we gotta be all politically correct. It's like the Cold Wars never happened.
David S.E. Zapanta
#42. The dance grew into a colorful flower bouquet which caught and contained the glow of sun-happy summer days, the secret of star-studded nights, and the wistful sweetness of overcast and rainy hours.
Mary Wigman
#43. The smile he gave her was wistful, just a little lift to his mouth. "You are a fighter."
""Yes. Always. And sometimes I'm a whole army.
J.R. Ward
#44. Compassionate the mountains rise
Dim with the wistful dimness of old eyes
That, having looked on life time out of mind,
Know that the simple gift of being kind
Is greater than all the wisdom of the wise.
DuBose Heyward
#45. I wouldn't say she looked exactly wistful, but neither did she look as hard to get as a controlling interest in General Motors
Raymond Chandler
#46. Intelligent and alert, wistful but enthusiastic, frank yet tactful, assured without conceit and tender without sentimentality.
Cecil Beaton
#48. So often we have a kind of vague, wistful longing that the promises of Jesus should be true. The only way really to enter into them is to believe them with the clutching intensity of a drowning man.
William Barclay
#49. That's because they're of the past. All photos of the past look melancholy and wistful precisely because they capture something that's gone.
Maggie O'Farrell
#50. But her voice sounded wistful. It is one of her theories that a woman must never be jealous, never try to hold man against his will; but I could tell that she hadn't enjoyed seeing someone else bring father to life.
Dodie Smith
#51. I just sit here and tell the story as though I can't help it. There's always something in the day that reminds me, that sets me off all hot and guilty and scared and rambling and wistful, like I am now.
Tim Winton
#52. April 19
And now it is spring. Birds are singing. Wistful notes and jubilant. And bare streets and no need for coats, and skipping ropes and bicycles and a thin new moon.
Elizabeth Smart
#53. Those dreams seem very simple to me now, a crude, crayon-drawn picture by a wistful child. But the beauty of impossible dreams is that they are impossible - the hows and whens don't really matter.
Tracy Rees
#54. I never saw sad men who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
We prisoners called the sky,
And at every happy cloud that passed
In such strange freedom by.
Oscar Wilde
#55. When man does not have firm, calm lines on the horizon of his life- mountain and forest lines, as it were- then a man's innermost will becomes agitated, preoccupied, and wistful.
Friedrich Nietzsche
#56. People talk of calf-love with wistful disdain, but mine was as intense as any emotion I knew until I crossed the frontier, years later, when I discovered that all loving is a loving of life in the midst of death.
Hugh MacLennan
#57. His father looked wistful. 'And you don't feel anticlimatic?'
What's that?'
Somewhat the opposite of elated.'
What's elated again?'
Good feelings. That is to say, very good. You can feel, can't you? That's what I'm driving at. You don't ever wonder ... where feeling went?
Ali Shaw
#58. My mom always wanted a bunch of kids, but they stopped after me. I never understood why."
His voice was wistful. Haven closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his neck. "Maybe they realized they created perfection when they made you and didnt need anymore.
J.M. Darhower
#59. Was it so wrong to relish the feeling anyway? To enjoy the way it lingered, leaving her with a wistful awareness, a pleasant unease, as if she had forgotten to do something? Yes, it probably was wrong. But she did not wish it away.
Julie Klassen
#60. The word "miss" is so wistful. As is the word "wistful," for that matter. They both have sighs embedded in them, that "iss" sound. Which also sounds like if.
Joan Wickersham
#61. Dance music is great, but it's not a time to be reflective or particularly wistful.
Sophie Ellis-Bextor
#62. Ikenna was a fragile, delicate bird; he was a sparrow. Little things could unbridle his soul. Wistful thoughts often combed his melancholic spirit in search of craters to be filled with sorrow.
Chigozie Obioma
#63. It was somehow clear, even then, that the monster had been lonely. The folds above its eye made the old face look wistful, and it emanated such a strong sense of solitude that each human standing in the park that day felt miles from the others, though we were shoulder-to-shoulder, touching.
Lauren Groff
#64. The night wears on; the fire dwindles; the wind shifts and my heart aches with nostalgia - summer camps and catching lightning bugs and August skies aflame with stars. The way the desert smells and the long, wistful sigh of wind rushing down from the mountains as the sun dips beneath the horizon.
Rick Yancey
#65. The look of wistful passion in Kellan's eyes in that one brief glance almost had me running across the room to throw myself in his arms - Thoughtless
S.C. Stephens
#66. Almost as if speaking to herself, she continued, I would love to fly. I've always wondered what it be like to have that sense of freedom.
A wistful note in her voice tugged at something deep inside him.He replied. I couldn't conceive of living without it. I can't imagine being forever grounded.
Thea Harrison
#67. The earl got up and paced to the window. Anna and Dev were on the terrace, and she was smiling at something he'd said. Dev's smile was flirtatious and a little wistful - charmingly so, damn the scoundrel.
Grace Burrowes
#68. It feels wistful to imagine a time when people didn't go about their daily routine with the assumption that at any moment another massive media technology will be dumped on us by some geek in California.
Douglas Coupland
#69. Soon or late, every dog's master's memory becomes a graveyard; peopled by wistful little furry ghosts that creep back unbidden, at times, to a semblance of their olden lives.
Albert Payson Terhune
#70. Matthew gave her such a hurt, wistful, nobly forbearing, and absolutely infuriating look that if Caroline had been a rich aunt she would have cut him out of her will on the spot.
Jude Morgan
#71. We are wistful about the golden days of the past and dream of a distant future unclouded by necessity. But I suspect that if our inner souls were asked what in life they really missed, the answer would be primal danger and stress.
Robert Grudin
#73. When I was a boy, my own dad told me in a smiling and wistful way that it's a wise man that knows his own father.
Michael Leunig
#74. I was so utterly content that I was slightly wistful. It was the feeling I got when I was about to finish a really great book. I was nostalgic for this moment even as I was still in it.
Noelle Hancock
#75. Amazing? My heart fluttered. "But I don't want Flash or Harry," I murmured. "You want Spider-Man," he finished for me, looking a little wistful. I shrugged. "And Peter Parker." He looked at me, very seriously. "Then don't settle," he said.
J.M. Richards
#76. If you wanted to be cheerful, or melancholic, or wistful , or thoughtful, or courteous, you simply had to act those things with every gesture.
Patricia Highsmith
#77. It was seldom that Mr Standen, a peace-loving young gentleman, was conscious of a wish to come to blows with his fellow-men, but a wistful desire to land his cousin a facer did for an instant flicker in his mind.
Georgette Heyer
#78. It takes so little to make a child happy, that it is a pity in a world full of sunshine and pleasant things, that there should be any wistful faces, empty hands, or lonely little hearts.
Louisa May Alcott
#79. Nothing is more wistful than the scent of lilac, nor more robust than its woody stalk, for we must remember that it is a tree as well as a flower, we must try not to forget this ...
Stevie Smith
#80. The lonely, wistful revisionism of memories is as gratingly repetitive as snow and ice in Canada. I avoid them both at all costs - memories and Canada.
Brian D'Ambrosio
#81. All these years I've had a story in my mind, the story about us that never really existed. And because of that story, I've kept you framed up on the wall in a little box of nostalgic moonlight.
Cathleen Schine
#82. Everyone's thought that: maybe even if, maybe we still could, maybe small bits of precious things can be salvaged. No one with cop-on thinks it after the first try. But her voice, quiet and sad, shimmering the air into those pearly colors: for a second I believed it, all over again.
Tana French
#83. That you should not be here when something we've both wanted happens is no new thing for me. Today too, as always, you're not here.
Sachin Kundalkar
#85. Funny, isn't it? We hear the same name and while they see dark, I see light.
Nadia Hashimi
#87. we always knew
that good times came
with termination contracts
even if we weren't quite ready
to sign it.
Sanober Khan
#88. I'm rambling again. Wandering off the point. But this is the true story of my wasted life ...
Mordecai Richler
#89. What, and end up like you? Wistfully recalling a lover from long ago? Please.
Elizabeth Carlton
#90. some winters
will never melt
some summers
will never freeze
and some things will only
... live in poems.
Sanober Khan
