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QUOTES ABOUT DEATH

Death is one of the few experiences that unites every human life, yet it remains deeply personal and profoundly mysterious. Across cultures, generations, and beliefs, writers, philosophers, and artists have tried to capture its meaning in words. The following quotes explore death from many angles—grief and acceptance, fear and peace, endings and new beginnings.   ◀ Back
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But me
They cannot touch,
Old age and death. The strange
And ignominious end of old
Dead folk!
- Adelaide Crapsey
Verse
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Death's got an Invisibility Cloak?" Harry interrupted again.
"So he can sneak up on people," said Ron. "Sometimes he gets bored of running at them, flapping his arms and shrieking...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
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I DON'T CARE!" Harry yelled at them, snatching up a lunascope and throwing it into the fireplace. "I'VE HAD ENOUGH, I'VE SEEN ENOUGH, I WANT OUT, I WANT IT TO END, I DON'T CARE ANYMORE!"
"You do care," said Dumbledore. He had not flinched or made a single move to stop Harry demolishing his office. His expression was calm, almost detached. "You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
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It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.
- Terry Pratchett
The Last Continent
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Even death has a heart.
- Markus Zusak
The Book Thief
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Older men declare war. But it is youth that must fight and die.
- Herbert Hoover
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Sleep, those little slices of death — how I loathe them.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have done it," she says. At first I do not understand. But then I see the tomb, and the marks she has made on the stone. A C H I L L E S, it reads. And beside it, P A T R O C L U S.
"Go," she says. "He waits for you."

In the darkness, two shadows, reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. Their hands meet, and light spills in a flood like a hundred golden urns pouring out of the sun.
- Madeline Miller
The Song of Achilles
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It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
- Marcus Aurelius
Meditations
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
People living deeply have no fear of death.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.
- Antonio Porchia
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
My sister will die over and over again for the rest of my life. Grief is forever. It doesn't go away; it becomes a part of you, step for step, breath for breath. I will never stop grieving Bailey because I will never stop loving her. That's just how it is. Grief and love are conjoined, you don't get one without the other. All I can do is love her, and love the world, emulate her by living with daring and spirit and joy.
- Jandy Nelson
The Sky Is Everywhere
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Ginny, listen...I can't be involved with you anymore. We've got to stop seeing each other. We can't be together."
"It's for some stupid noble reason isn't it?"
"It's been like...like something out of someone else's life these last few weeks with you. But I can't...we can't...I've got to do things alone now. Voldemort uses people his enemies are close to. He's already used you as bait once, and that was just because you were my best friend's sister. Think how much danger you'll be in if we keep this up. He'll know, he'll find out. He'll try and get me through you."
"What if I don't care?"
"I care. How do you think I'd feel if this was your funeral...and it was my fault...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
- Howard Phillips Lovecraft
The Nameless City
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I am afraid. Not of life, or death, or nothingness, but of wasting it as if I had never been.
- Daniel Keyes
Flowers for Algernon
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was always holding onto people, and they were always leaving.
- Lili St. Crow
Jealousy
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was waiting for the longest time, she said. I thought you forgot.

It is hard to forget, I said, when there is such an empty space when you are gone.
- Brian Andreas
Story People
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.
- Roland Barthes
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have noticed that even those who assert that everything is predestined and that we can change nothing about it still look both ways before they cross the street.
- Stephen Hawking
Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
When writers die they become books, which is, after all, not too bad an incarnation."

[As attributed by Alastair Reid in Neruda and Borges, The New Yorker, June 24, 1996; as well as in The Talk of the Town, The New Yorker, July 7, 1986]
- Jorge Luis Borges
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Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.
- Horace Mann
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One of the first signs of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die. This life appears unbearable, another unattainable. One is no longer ashamed of wanting to die; one asks to be moved from the old cell, which one hates, to a new one, which one willl only in time come to hate. In this there is also a residue of belief that during the move the master will chance to come along the corridor, look at the prisoner and say: "This man is not to be locked up again, He is to come with me.
- Franz Kafka
The Blue Octavo Notebooks
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. I sob, I sob.
- Virginia Woolf
The Waves
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
But me
They cannot touch,
Old age and death. The strange
And ignominious end of old
Dead folk!
- Adelaide Crapsey
Verse
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Death's got an Invisibility Cloak?" Harry interrupted again.
"So he can sneak up on people," said Ron. "Sometimes he gets bored of running at them, flapping his arms and shrieking...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I DON'T CARE!" Harry yelled at them, snatching up a lunascope and throwing it into the fireplace. "I'VE HAD ENOUGH, I'VE SEEN ENOUGH, I WANT OUT, I WANT IT TO END, I DON'T CARE ANYMORE!"
"You do care," said Dumbledore. He had not flinched or made a single move to stop Harry demolishing his office. His expression was calm, almost detached. "You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.
- Terry Pratchett
The Last Continent
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Even death has a heart.
- Markus Zusak
The Book Thief
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Older men declare war. But it is youth that must fight and die.
- Herbert Hoover
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Sleep, those little slices of death — how I loathe them.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have done it," she says. At first I do not understand. But then I see the tomb, and the marks she has made on the stone. A C H I L L E S, it reads. And beside it, P A T R O C L U S.
"Go," she says. "He waits for you."

In the darkness, two shadows, reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. Their hands meet, and light spills in a flood like a hundred golden urns pouring out of the sun.
- Madeline Miller
The Song of Achilles
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
- Marcus Aurelius
Meditations
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
People living deeply have no fear of death.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.
- Antonio Porchia
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
My sister will die over and over again for the rest of my life. Grief is forever. It doesn't go away; it becomes a part of you, step for step, breath for breath. I will never stop grieving Bailey because I will never stop loving her. That's just how it is. Grief and love are conjoined, you don't get one without the other. All I can do is love her, and love the world, emulate her by living with daring and spirit and joy.
- Jandy Nelson
The Sky Is Everywhere
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Ginny, listen...I can't be involved with you anymore. We've got to stop seeing each other. We can't be together."
"It's for some stupid noble reason isn't it?"
"It's been like...like something out of someone else's life these last few weeks with you. But I can't...we can't...I've got to do things alone now. Voldemort uses people his enemies are close to. He's already used you as bait once, and that was just because you were my best friend's sister. Think how much danger you'll be in if we keep this up. He'll know, he'll find out. He'll try and get me through you."
"What if I don't care?"
"I care. How do you think I'd feel if this was your funeral...and it was my fault...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
- Howard Phillips Lovecraft
The Nameless City
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I am afraid. Not of life, or death, or nothingness, but of wasting it as if I had never been.
- Daniel Keyes
Flowers for Algernon
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was always holding onto people, and they were always leaving.
- Lili St. Crow
Jealousy
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was waiting for the longest time, she said. I thought you forgot.

It is hard to forget, I said, when there is such an empty space when you are gone.
- Brian Andreas
Story People
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.
- Roland Barthes
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have noticed that even those who assert that everything is predestined and that we can change nothing about it still look both ways before they cross the street.
- Stephen Hawking
Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
When writers die they become books, which is, after all, not too bad an incarnation."

[As attributed by Alastair Reid in Neruda and Borges, The New Yorker, June 24, 1996; as well as in The Talk of the Town, The New Yorker, July 7, 1986]
- Jorge Luis Borges
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.
- Horace Mann
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One of the first signs of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die. This life appears unbearable, another unattainable. One is no longer ashamed of wanting to die; one asks to be moved from the old cell, which one hates, to a new one, which one willl only in time come to hate. In this there is also a residue of belief that during the move the master will chance to come along the corridor, look at the prisoner and say: "This man is not to be locked up again, He is to come with me.
- Franz Kafka
The Blue Octavo Notebooks
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. I sob, I sob.
- Virginia Woolf
The Waves
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
But me
They cannot touch,
Old age and death. The strange
And ignominious end of old
Dead folk!
- Adelaide Crapsey
Verse
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Death's got an Invisibility Cloak?" Harry interrupted again.
"So he can sneak up on people," said Ron. "Sometimes he gets bored of running at them, flapping his arms and shrieking...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I DON'T CARE!" Harry yelled at them, snatching up a lunascope and throwing it into the fireplace. "I'VE HAD ENOUGH, I'VE SEEN ENOUGH, I WANT OUT, I WANT IT TO END, I DON'T CARE ANYMORE!"
"You do care," said Dumbledore. He had not flinched or made a single move to stop Harry demolishing his office. His expression was calm, almost detached. "You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.
- Terry Pratchett
The Last Continent
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Even death has a heart.
- Markus Zusak
The Book Thief
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Older men declare war. But it is youth that must fight and die.
- Herbert Hoover
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Sleep, those little slices of death — how I loathe them.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have done it," she says. At first I do not understand. But then I see the tomb, and the marks she has made on the stone. A C H I L L E S, it reads. And beside it, P A T R O C L U S.
"Go," she says. "He waits for you."

In the darkness, two shadows, reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. Their hands meet, and light spills in a flood like a hundred golden urns pouring out of the sun.
- Madeline Miller
The Song of Achilles
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
- Marcus Aurelius
Meditations
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
People living deeply have no fear of death.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.
- Antonio Porchia
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
My sister will die over and over again for the rest of my life. Grief is forever. It doesn't go away; it becomes a part of you, step for step, breath for breath. I will never stop grieving Bailey because I will never stop loving her. That's just how it is. Grief and love are conjoined, you don't get one without the other. All I can do is love her, and love the world, emulate her by living with daring and spirit and joy.
- Jandy Nelson
The Sky Is Everywhere
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Ginny, listen...I can't be involved with you anymore. We've got to stop seeing each other. We can't be together."
"It's for some stupid noble reason isn't it?"
"It's been like...like something out of someone else's life these last few weeks with you. But I can't...we can't...I've got to do things alone now. Voldemort uses people his enemies are close to. He's already used you as bait once, and that was just because you were my best friend's sister. Think how much danger you'll be in if we keep this up. He'll know, he'll find out. He'll try and get me through you."
"What if I don't care?"
"I care. How do you think I'd feel if this was your funeral...and it was my fault...
- J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
- Howard Phillips Lovecraft
The Nameless City
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I am afraid. Not of life, or death, or nothingness, but of wasting it as if I had never been.
- Daniel Keyes
Flowers for Algernon
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was always holding onto people, and they were always leaving.
- Lili St. Crow
Jealousy
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I was waiting for the longest time, she said. I thought you forgot.

It is hard to forget, I said, when there is such an empty space when you are gone.
- Brian Andreas
Story People
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.
- Roland Barthes
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
I have noticed that even those who assert that everything is predestined and that we can change nothing about it still look both ways before they cross the street.
- Stephen Hawking
Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
When writers die they become books, which is, after all, not too bad an incarnation."

[As attributed by Alastair Reid in Neruda and Borges, The New Yorker, June 24, 1996; as well as in The Talk of the Town, The New Yorker, July 7, 1986]
- Jorge Luis Borges
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.
- Horace Mann
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
One of the first signs of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die. This life appears unbearable, another unattainable. One is no longer ashamed of wanting to die; one asks to be moved from the old cell, which one hates, to a new one, which one willl only in time come to hate. In this there is also a residue of belief that during the move the master will chance to come along the corridor, look at the prisoner and say: "This man is not to be locked up again, He is to come with me.
- Franz Kafka
The Blue Octavo Notebooks
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. I sob, I sob.
- Virginia Woolf
The Waves
Avg Rating: --Rate This Quote
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