The 23 Most Beautiful Sentences I Read in 2023
"Writing is the closest thing we have to real magic" and 22 more sharp and memorable passages I read this year
Hello, friends —
Welcome back to Words on Words, where readers discuss what we love about literature.
Today I am continuing a practice I have done for four years. It started in 2020, the year none of us will forget, when we reached for beauty in unfamiliar ways because so much of the joy in our lives — our loved ones, our families, our hobbies — had been sequestered in lockdown.
One way I sought beauty was by revisiting the books I’d read throughout the year. Thus began my December tradition of collecting the most beautiful lines I’d read in the past 12 months.
This is a cathartic exercise. I can’t tell you how many times I paged through the books I read this year and thought, my god I loved this one. I often found myself reading an underlined sentence, then the paragraph that followed, then the next page.
I read a lot of books this year. Some were wonderful, some were okay (hence my goal to read fewer books next year), and only one was my favorite, which is the first book I highlight below. I categorized the quotes by Universal Truths, Sensational Prose, and On Writing. Skim them, share them, and please — enjoy them!
Universal Truths
“All I want … is work I enjoy, and a place to live, and someone who loves me.”
— A LITTLE LIFE by Hanya Yanagihara
Why I picked it: If you’ve read A LITTLE LIFE, you know whose words these are and what they mean. Jude St. Francis, our protagonist, says this line about 75% of the way through the book. In context, it is gut-wrenching. Out of context, like here, it still has meaning. What else does one really need? It is a spot-on description on what it means to be human.
“People always told you who they were, if only you knew what to look for.”
― THE CIRCUS TRAIN by Amita Parikh
Why I picked it: Relationships are so complex, but people do show you who they are; it’s up to us to make the effort to look for it. This is a lovely explosion of truth found right in the middle of a novel.
“We all love imperfectly.”
― MY NAME IS LUCY BARTON by Elizabeth Strout
Why I picked it: We do all love imperfectly. That’s what love is. Love is messy and wonderful and ugly and nobody knows how to do it properly, but that is where the beauty of love lies.
“We are all stuck in our own stories. And it is so easy to see someone through only one lens: the role they play in yours.”
― THE BALLERINAS by Rachel Kapelke-Dale
Why I picked it: Pair this with Amita Parikh’s “People always told you who they were, if only you knew what to look for,” and you have a manual for understanding people, or — perhaps better put — deciphering the stories we assign to others, and whether or not they are just.
“Midoriko and Makiko and me were still there, in the same room, but it felt like all of this was already a memory.”
— BREASTS AND EGGS by Mieko Kawakami
Why I picked it: Some sentences are beautiful because of the prose; some sentences are beautiful because of the truth in them. The latter is why I find this sentence from BREAST AND EGGS to be so stunning. I have been in situations that felt at the time so ethereal that they were nearly a memory, but I’ve never put the sensation to words. Just lovely.
“If you choose to see rejection as guidance, then what is there to fear?”
— SUPER ATTRACTOR by Gabrielle Bernstein
Why I picked it: This selection is personal. In 2023, I set out to find a literary agent. No 12 months of my life have been filled with as much rejection as these. But all of these rejections allowed me to stay open for the “yes” I eventually received. The “nos” guided me to my “yes.”
This selection, too, is universal. It’s not just literary agents rejecting me; it’s you not getting the promotion you wanted or the guy you’re interested in or the results you expected. Rejection can be a guide, we just have to choose to see it that way.
“People, it turned out, were mostly fine with being victimized in small doses.”
— THE GUEST by Emma Cline
Why I picked it: This line could sum up the entire book, which is about a woman flitting from one person to the next, taking advantage and seeking shelter. The reason I highlight this sentence is because of the heavy lifting it does, speaking to an entire novel in 13 words.
“It seemed the sanest and most logical course: if the world was on fire, you might as well burn bright.”
— OUR MISSING HEARTS by Celeste Ng
Why I picked it: I hate how relatable this is, but it’s true: the world is on fire. All around us, fire blazes and destructs. We can let it smolder and turn us to ash, or we can burn bright. I know what I choose.
“Think of all the wonderful things in life that could never have happened — all the great things that would never have been created or discovered or even imagined — if the top priority had been to make everyone feel safe. Who’d want to live in such a world?
— THE FRIEND by Sigrid Nunez
Why I picked it: Safe is nice, but great is better. Most of the books in this list have an element of “unsafe.” They push buttons, explore taboo topics, appeal to a smaller audience. And here they all are, collected in a list of the most beautiful sentences I encountered throughout the year. I wouldn’t want to live in a world without literature like this — would you?
Sensational Prose
“Today, like yesterday, so let’s call it tomorrow, Button is latched on and is sucking and snoozing in a tender rhythmic loop.”
— THE NURSERY by
Why I picked it: Let’s break this down into the two parts this quote is comprised of. First: “Today, like yesterday, so let’s call it tomorrow.” Incredible. Brilliant. As a writer, I wish this was my line. The frankness of it, the candor — it stopped me in my tracks and I read it over and over, reveling in the simple phrase’s gut-punch. Then we have the second half of the sentence, in which the narrator’s baby, Button, is nursing. This book is about a mother’s early days postpartum. I’ve been there, sitting with a baby in my arms, a baby who nurses, sleeps, nurses, sleeps, ad infinitum. A tender rhythmic loop is such a sharp way of expressing that period in which time stills, life is suspended, and all that’s important exists within that loop.
“The winter afternoons were all glare of mauve sunlight, finishing in cobalt black sparkling and the rushing feeling of the passage of time.”
— THE ABSOLUTES by Molly Dektar
Why I picked it: As I learn to embrace winter here in the North, I find this description to be spell-binding. Mauve sunlight, cobalt black sparkling — there’s magic in winter if you are open to seeing it.
“Cities like diamonds in the night. Deserts the color of blood and bone.”
— THE ROAD TO DALTON by Shannon Bowring
Why I picked it: These two sentences (yes, a cheat) make me feel the same way Molly Dektar’s mauve sunlight and cobalt black did, which is to say infinitesimal — but in a good way. Winters and cities and deserts are so large, and we readers are so small. But when we come across passages like these, we get to luxuriate in the lack of words we have to describe something so grand, and so we cling to adjectives that have no limits.
“The pleasant crackle of the small branches and pinecones she had used settled into a comfortable lapping as the fire took the logs.”
— THE SENTENCE by Louise Erdrich
Why I picked it: Erdrich’s prose is as crisp as the crackle of those branches. Her words are not indulgent; they are resourceful, and the simple way these words are strung together landed the sentence on this list.
“I’m good, but not good enough, which is worse than simply being bad.”
LUSTER by Raven Leilani
Why I picked it: This quote is reminiscent of Szilvia Molnar’s quote, “Today, like yesterday, so call it tomorrow.” It tackles the liminal; the space between. I am fascinated by the space between, and any sentence that explores that suspension between point A and B will provoke me to pull out my pen and underline it for its beauty.
“When I reached her, she was a star, pulling me into her orbit.”
― ALL THE UGLY AND WONDERFUL THINGS by Bryn Greenwood
Why I picked it: This is an attraction you can feel. When words make you feel something, you know they’re doing what they’re supposed to do. I think this is a perfect sentence.
“Like a woman who had swallowed the moon.”
— HAMNET by Maggie O’Farrell
Why I picked it: The narrator is speaking here of a pregnant woman. Before this line are details: a neat rib cage, the spine down the back, a rounded sphere at the front. But then the line — like a woman who had swallowed the moon — says all we need to know about this woman and how the person in whose eyes she rests thinks of her. Gorgeous imagery.
“She is cherry blossoms falling. She is serious moonlight. She is shivering green leaves.”
— BUNNY by Mona Awad
Why I picked it: A metaphor is a literary device to reveal a truth better than adjectives could. Here, we understand how the narrator feels about the woman she is describing. It’s an incandescent description that I adore.
“All around the light is golden and liquid and heavy, like it’s just beginning on its second glass of wine.”
— ONE ITALIAN SUMMER by Rebecca Serle
Why I picked it: I can picture this, can you? I don’t think anything more needs to be said about that!
“Soon the greenish, brownish air filled with a dark tangy smell, metallic and sharp, like licking the end of a spent battery.”
— SHUGGIE BAIN by Douglas Stuart
Why I picked it: This book was so ugly. So much of it was dark and drunken; dilapidated and crumbling. But the way Douglas Stuart described destitute Glasgow in the 1980s is a thing of beauty.
On Writing
“Writing fiction is an exercise in giving a shit — an exercise in finding out what you really care about.”
Why I picked it: It’s true that I read through the lens of a writer, but I think this applies to non-writers, too. The beauty of this sentence is, to me, its truth (truth so often leads to beauty, doesn’t it?) Fiction is just that — fiction; made up stories — but it reveals a lot of what the author is concerned with, and that’s a vulnerable, truth-telling position. What do the authors of the books you read care about?
“Writing is the closest thing we have to real magic”
― YELLOWFACE by R.F. Kuang
Why I picked it: If the authors didn’t write these books, we wouldn’t get to read these beautiful lines. The act of coming up with an idea, interpreting it in your head, putting it on the page, and then gifting it to others — that is magic.
“Writing is seizing everything that has already been written and gradually learning to spend that enormous fortune.”
— IN THE MARGINS by Elena Ferrante
Why I picked it: I think this applies to life. When we read, we soak up all that has been written — all that we lay our eyes on — and we can spend that fortune as we see fit, having learned easily, as Ryan Holiday says in THE BOY WHO WOULD BE KING, what others learned with great difficulty. Which is to say: by reading, we are collecting a currency. How will we spend it?
“We read not to escape life but to learn how to live it more deeply and richly, to experience the world through the eyes of the other.”
— THE ECHO OF OLD BOOKS by Barbara Davis
Why I picked it: This is the perfect line to end on. If you’ve read this far, my guess is that you enjoy experiencing the world through the eyes of the other just as much as I do. Books expand our horizons in ways unparalleled, and this last beautiful sentence explains exactly how they do that.
Wow, that’s a lot of beautiful sentences. If you enjoyed reading through these passages, you can find my favorites from 2022, 2021, and 2020 on my website.
Now it’s your turn: What was the most beautiful sentence you read this year? Do any of the sentences above speak to you? Please share!
In case you missed it, last week’s bonus post is about how opening up about a taboo topic led to a stunning pottery collection:
What I’m reading: The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell and In Altre Parole by Jhumpa Lahiri.
What I’m listening to: Daddy by Emma Cline
Love,
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Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something is worth doing no matter how it turns out. Vaclav Havel. Disturbing The Peace.