--- title: "3 Blank page Quotes By Jonathan Safran Foer" description: "3 Blank page quotes by Jonathan Safran Foer. Plus more from Jonathan Safran Foer and more Blank page sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg" --- > [“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-know-how-to-take-so-i-broke/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg) > [“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-know-how-to-take-so-i-broke-2/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7a4/jonathan-safran-foer-136_alarm-clock_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1960755.jpg) > [“Jonathan Safran Foer’s 10 Rules for Writing: 1.Tragedies make great literature; unfathomable catastrophes (the Holocaust, 9/11) are even better – try to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writing-1-tragedies-make-great/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6ff/jonathan-safran-foer-136_better-place_jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writ_2028408.jpg) ## More by Jonathan Safran Foer > [This brings me back to the image of Kafka standing before a fish in the Berlin aquarium, a fish on which his gaze fell…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/this-brings-me-back-to-the-image-of-kafka-standing-before-a-fish-in/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [I try not to remember the life that I didn’t want to lose but lost and have to remember](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/i-try-not-to-remember-the-life-that-i-didn-t-want-to-lose-but-lost/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“I have an aristocratic smile and like to punch people.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/i-have-an-aristocratic-smile-and-like-to-punch-people/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [He removed several pages of death certificates, which were picked up by another breeze and sent into the trees. Some would fall with the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/he-removed-several-pages-of-death-certificates-which-were-picked-up/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [I would have done anything for him. Maybe that was my sickness. We made love in nothing places and turned the lights off. It…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/i-would-have-done-anything-for-him-maybe-that-was-my-sickness-we-made/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“One day I wandered away from her and hid. I liked the way it felt to have someone look for me, to hear my…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/one-day-i-wandered-away-from-her-and-hid-i-liked-the-way-it-felt-to/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [If nothing matters, there's nothing to save.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/if-nothing-matters-there-s-nothing-to-save/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“It was one of the best days of my life, a day during which I lived my life and didn't think about it at…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/it-was-one-of-the-best-days-of-my-life-a-day-during-which-i-lived-my/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“The appearance was misleading- human dreams; rubbish heaps abundant yet ephemeral sudden and splendid, only to wilt and perish”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/the-appearance-was-misleading-human-dreams-rubbish-heaps-abundant-yet/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“the entirety of human society and moral progress represents an explicit transcendence of what’s “natural.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/the-entirety-of-human-society-and-moral-progress-represents-an/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“Food is not so much a symbol of freedom as the first requirement of freedom. We eat foods that are native to America on…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/food-is-not-so-much-a-symbol-of-freedom-as-the-first-requirement-of/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [“Rationally, factory farming is so obviously wrong, in so many ways. In all of my reading and conversations, I’ve yet to find a credible…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/rationally-factory-farming-is-so-obviously-wrong-in-so-many-ways-in/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [Just because you're an atheist, that doesn't mean you wouldn't love for things to have reasons for why they are.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/just-because-you-re-an-atheist-that-doesn-t-mean-you-wouldn-t-love/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [Do you think I'm wonderful? she asked him one day as they leaned against the trunk of a petrified maple. No, he said. Why?…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/do-you-think-i-m-wonderful-she-asked-him-one-day-as-they-leaned/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) > [My insides don't match up with my outsides. -Do anyone's inside and outsides match up? -I don't know. I'm only me. -Maybe that's what…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/my-insides-don-t-match-up-with-my-outsides-do-anyone-s-inside-and/) [Jonathan Safran Foer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/jonathan-safran-foer/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/blank-page/jonathan-safran-foer/#itemlist", "name": "3 Blank page Quotes By Jonathan Safran Foer", "numberOfItems": 3, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said, 'You don't want to talk to me, do you?' I took my daybook out my knapsack and found the next blank page, the second to last. 'I don't speak,' I wrote. 'I'm sorry.' She looked at the piece of paper, then at me, then back at the piece of paper, she covered her eyes with her hands and cried, tears seeped between her fingers and collected in the little webs, she cried and cried and cried, there weren't any napkins nearby, so I ripped the page from the back-'I don't speak. I'm sorry.'-and used it to dry her cheeks, my explanation and apology ran down her face like mascara, she took my pen from me and wrote on the next blank page of my daybook, the final one: Please marry me.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Jonathan Safran Foer" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-know-how-to-take-so-i-broke/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said…” — Jonathan Safran Foer", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said, \"You don't want to talk to me, do you?\" I took my daybook out of my knapsack and found the next blank page, the second to last. \"I don't speak,\" I wrote. \"I'm sorry.\" She looked at the piece of paper, then at me, then back at the piece of paper, she covered her eyes with her hands and cried, tears seeped between her fingers, she cried and cried and cried, there weren't any napkins nearby, so I ripped the page from the book - \"I don't speak. I'm sorry\" - and used it to dry her cheeks, my explanation and apology ran down her face like mascara, she took my pen from me and wrote on the next blank page of my daybook, the final one: Please marry me I flipped back and pointed at: \"Ha ha ha!\" She flipped forward and pointed at: \"Please marry me.\" I flipped back and pointed at: \"Thank you, but I'm about to burst.\" She flipped forward and pointed at: \"Please marry me.\" I flipped back and pointed at: \"I'm not sure, but it's late.\" She flipped forward and pointed at: \"Please marry me\", and this time put her finger on \"Please\", as if to hold down the page and end the conversation, or as if she were trying to push through the word, and into what she was trying to say. I thought about life, about my life, the embarrassments, the little coincidences, the shadows of alarm clocks on bedside tables, I thought about my small victories and everything I'd seen destroyed. I'd swum through mink coats on my parents' bed while they hosted downstairs, I'd lost the only person with whom I could have spent my only life, I'd left behind a thousand tonnes of marble from which I could have released sculptures, I could have released myself from the marble of myself, I'd experienced joy, but not nearly enough, could there be enough? The end of suffering does not justify the suffering, and so there is no end to suffering, what a mess I am, I thought, what a fool, how foolish and narrow, how worthless, how pinched and pathetic, how helpless in the universe. None of my pets knows their own name. What kind of person am I? I flipped back, one page at a time: Help”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Jonathan Safran Foer" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-know-how-to-take-so-i-broke-2/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7a4/jonathan-safran-foer-136_alarm-clock_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1960755.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7a4/jonathan-safran-foer-136_alarm-clock_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1960755.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7a4/jonathan-safran-foer-136_alarm-clock_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1960755.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“She was extending a hand that I didn't know how to take, so I broke its fingers with my silence, she said…” — Jonathan Safran Foer", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Jonathan Safran Foer’s 10 Rules for Writing: 1.Tragedies make great literature; unfathomable catastrophes (the Holocaust, 9/11) are even better – try to construct your books around them for added gravitas but, since those big issues are such bummers, make sure you do it in a way that still focuses on a quirky central character that’s somewhat like Jonathan Safran Foer. 2. You can also name your character Jonathan Safran Foer. 3. If you’re writing a non-fiction book you should still make sure that it has a strong, deep, wise, and relatable central character – someone like Jonathan Safran Foer. 4. If you reach a point in your book where you’re not sure what to do, or how to approach a certain scene, or what the hell you’re doing, just throw in a picture, or a photo, or scribbles, or blank pages, or some illegible text, or maybe even a flipbook. Don’t worry if these things don’t mean anything, that’s what postmodernism is all about. If you’re not sure what to put in, you can’t go wrong with a nice photograph of Jonathan Safran Foer. 5. If you come up with a pun, metaphor, or phrase that you think is really clever and original, don’t just use it once and throw it away, sprinkle it liberally throughout the text. One particularly good phrase that comes to mind is “Jonathan Safran Foer.” 6. Don’t worry if you seem to be saying the same thing over and over again, repetition makes the work stronger, repetition is good, it drives the point home. The more you repeat a phrase or an idea, the better it gets. You should not be afraid of repeating ideas or phrases. One particularly good phrase that comes to mind is “Jonathan Safran Foer.” 7. Other writers are not your enemies, they are your friends, so you should feel free to borrow some of their ideas, words, techniques, and symbols, and use them completely out of context. They won’t mind, they’re your friends, just like my good friend Paul Auster, with whom I am very good friends. Just make sure you don’t steal anything from Jonathan Safran Foer, it wouldn’t be nice, he is your friend. 8. Make sure you have exactly three plots in your novel, any more and it gets confusing, any less and it’s not postmodern. At least one of those plots should be in a different timeline. It often helps if you name these three plots, I often use “Jonathan,” “Safran,” and “Foer.” 9. Don’t be afraid to make bold statements in you writing, there should always be a strong lesson to be learned, such as “don’t eat animals,” or “the Holocaust was bad,” or “9/11 was really really sad,” or “the world would be a better place if everyone was just a little bit more like Jonathan Safran Foer.” 10. In the end, don’t worry if you’re unsuccessful as a writer, it probably wasn’t meant to be. Not all of us are chosen to become writers. Not all of us can be Jonathan Safran Foer.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Jonathan Safran Foer" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/jonathan-safran-foer/jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writing-1-tragedies-make-great/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6ff/jonathan-safran-foer-136_better-place_jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writ_2028408.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6ff/jonathan-safran-foer-136_better-place_jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writ_2028408.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/6ff/jonathan-safran-foer-136_better-place_jonathan-safran-foer-s-10-rules-for-writ_2028408.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Jonathan Safran Foer’s 10 Rules for Writing: 1.Tragedies make great literature; unfathomable catastrophes…” — Jonathan Safran Foer", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } } ] }, { "@type": "CollectionPage", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/blank-page/jonathan-safran-foer/#webpage", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/blank-page/jonathan-safran-foer/", "name": "Blank page Quotes by Jonathan Safran Foer", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/blank-page/jonathan-safran-foer/#itemlist" }, "primaryImageOfPage": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/602/jonathan-safran-foer-136_blank-page_she-was-extending-a-hand-that-i-didn-t-k_1074064.jpg" }, "description": "3 Blank page quotes by Jonathan Safran Foer. 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