M Barrie Quotes & Sayings

For to have faith, is to have wings Peter Pan — James M. Barrie

He thought Mrs. Darling was not sufficiently impressed, and he went on sternly, 'I warn you of this, mother, that unless this tie is round my neck we don't go out to dinner to-night, and if I don't go out to dinner to-night, I never go to the office again, and if I don't go to the office again, you and I starve, and our children will be flung into the streets. — J.M. Barrie

The door', replied Maimie, 'will always, always be open, and mother will always be waiting at it for me. — J.M. Barrie

And as she was crossing to the day-nursery he added thoughtlessly, 'And shut that window. I feel a draught.'
'O George, never ask me to do that. The window must always be left open for them, always, always. — J.M. Barrie

She liked his tears so much that she put out her beautiful finger and let them run over it.
Her voice was so low that at first he could not make out what she said. Then he made it out. She was saying that she thought she could get well again if children believed in fairies. — J.M. Barrie

On these magic shores children at play are for ever beaching their coracles. We too have been there; we can still hear the sound of the surf, though we shall land no more. — J.M. Barrie

Peter was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last. A tremor ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea; but on the sea one shudder follows another till there are hundreds of them, and Peter felt just the one. Next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him. It was saying, 'To die will be an awfully big adventure.' TO — J.M. Barrie

fairies never say "We feel happy": what they say is, "We feel dancey." Well, — J.M. Barrie

they gave him power to fly was this: They all tickled him on the shoulder, and soon he felt a funny itching in that part and then up he rose higher and higher and flew away out of the Gardens and over the house-tops. It — J.M. Barrie

Make your feet your friend. — James M. Barrie

Some disquieting confessions must be made in printing at last the play of Peter Pan; among them this, that I have no recollection of having written it. — J.M. Barrie

Peter spoke indignantly. "You don't think I would kill him while he was sleeping! I would wake him first, and then kill him. That's the way I always do." "I say! Do you kill many?" "Tons! — J.M. Barrie

For several days after my first book was published, I carried it about in my pocket and took surreptitious peeps at it to make sure the ink had not faded. — James M. Barrie

Ambition - it is the last infirmity of noble minds. — James M. Barrie

Stars are beautiful, but they must not take an active part in anything, they must just look on forever. It is a punishment put on them for something they did so long ago that no star now knows what it was. — J.M. Barrie

That fiend! Mr. Darling would cry, and Nana's bark was the echo of it, but Mrs. Darling never upbraided Peter; there was something in the right-hand corner of her mouth that wanted her not to call Peter names. — J.M. Barrie

Back in the 1950s and '60s, J. M. Barrie's 'Peter Pan' - starring Mary Martin and Cyril Ritchard - was regularly aired on network television during the Christmas season. I must have seen it four or five times and remember, in particular, Ritchard's gloriously camp interpretation of Captain Hook. — Michael Dirda

Always try to be a litle kinder than necessary. — James M. Barrie

Peter had seen many tragedies, but he had forgotten them all. — J.M. Barrie

Mrs. Darling's kiss with him. The kiss that had been for no one else Peter took quite easily. Funny. — J.M. Barrie

Hook was not his true name. To reveal who he really was would even at this date set the country in a blaze; but as those who read between the lines must already have guessed, — J.M. Barrie

Wall-flower juice is good for reviving dancers who fall to the ground in a fit, and Solomon's Seals juice is for bruises. They bruise very easily — J.M. Barrie

He was so fond of her, he felt he could not live without her. "She will forget her mother in time, and be happy with me," he kept saying to himself, — J.M. Barrie

Do you believe in fairies? ... If you believe, clap your hands! — J.M. Barrie

For long the two enemies looked at one another, Hook shuddering slightly, and Peter with the strange smile upon his face.
"So, Pan," said Hook at last, "this is all your doing."
"Ay, James Hook," came the stern answer, "it is all my doing."
"Proud and insolent youth," said Hook, "prepare to meet thy doom."
"Dark and sinister man,"For long the two enemies looked at one another, Hook shuddering slightly, and Peter with the strange smile upon his face.
"Dark and sinister man," Peter answered, "have at thee. — J.M. Barrie

They will find the cake and they will gobble it up, because, having no mother, they don't know how dangerous 'tis to eat rich damp cake. — J.M. Barrie

The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it. — J.M. Barrie

Fairies have to be one thing or the other, because being so small they unfortunately have room for one feeling only at a time. — J.M. Barrie

....And for that instant his sun was at noon. — J.M. Barrie

Feeling that Peter was on his way back, the Neverland had again woke into life. We ought to use the pluperfect and say wakened, but woke is better and was always used by Peter. — J.M. Barrie

I can give you the power to fly to her house," the Queen said, "but I can't open the door for you. — J.M. Barrie

Nonsense. Young boys should never be sent to bed. They always wake up a day older, and then before you know it, they're grown. — J.M. Barrie

And if he forgets them so quickly," Wendy argued, "how can we expect that he will go on remembering us? — James M. Barrie

When you wake in the morning, the naughtinesses and evil passions with which you went to bed have been folded up small and placed at the bottom of your mind; and on the top, beautifully aired, are spread out your prettier thoughts, ready for you to put on. I — J.M. Barrie

The Elizabethan age might be better named the beginning of the smoking era.. — James M. Barrie

Next year he did not come for her. She waited in a new frock because the old one simply would not meet, but he never came. "Perhaps he is ill," Michael said. "You know he is never ill." Michael came close to her and whispered, with a shiver, "Perhaps there is no such person, Wendy!" and then Wendy would have cried if Michael had not been crying. — James M. Barrie

They have long lost count of the days, but always if they want to do anything special they say this is saturday night, and then they do it. — James M. Barrie

If you shut your eyes and are a lucky one, you may see at times a shapeless pool of lovely pale colours suspended in the darkness; then if you squeeze your eyes tighter, the pool begins to take shape, and the colours become so vivid that with another squeeze they must go on fire. — J.M. Barrie

Generations of British writers would look up to Roget as a kindred soul who could offer both emotional as well as intellectual sustenance. In the stage directions to Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie includes an homage to Roget: The night nursery of the Darling family, which is the scene of our opening Act, is at the top of a rather depressed street in Bloomsbury. We might have a right to place it where we will, and the reason Bloomsbury is chosen is that Mr. Roget once lived there. So did we in the days when his Thesaurus was our only companion in London; and we whom he has helped to wend our way through life have always wanted to pay him a little compliment. For Barrie, Roget's masterpiece was synonymous with virtue itself. To describe the one saving grace of the play's villain, Captain Hook, Barrie adds, "The man is not wholly evil--he has a Thesaurus in his cabin. — Joshua Kendall

Heaven for climate, Hell for company. — James M. Barrie

Off we skip like the most heartless things in the world, which is what children are, but so attractive; and we have an entirely selfish time, and then when we have need of special attention we nobly return for it, confident that we shall be rewarded instead of smacked. — J.M. Barrie

There is a saying in the Neverland that,every time you breathe, a grown-up dies. — J.M. Barrie

If 'Hamlet' had been written in these days it would probably have been called 'The Strange Affair at Elsinore. — James M. Barrie

A child should never go to bed, they only wake up a day older. — J.M. Barrie

but I dared not tell him my suspicions, for he suspected also and his gentle heart would have mourned had I confirmed his fears. The — J.M. Barrie

I wasn't crying about mothers," he said rather indignantly. "I was crying because I can't get my shadow to stick on. Besides, I wasn't crying. — J.M. Barrie

Second to the right,' said Peter, 'and then straight on till morning.' 'What — J.M. Barrie

Wendy, Wendy, when you are sleeping in your silly bed you might be flying about with me saying funny things to the stars. — J.M. Barrie

One could mention many lovable traits in Smee. For instance, after killing, it was his spectacles he wiped instead of his weapon. — J.M. Barrie

The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one does. — J.M. Barrie

She was a large woman who seemed not so much dressed as upholstered. — James M. Barrie

Always be a littler kinder than necessary. — James M. Barrie

Oh, the cleverness of me! — J.M. Barrie

You were hidden behind walls of ice; no man had passed them; I broke them down and love leapt to love, and you lie here, my beautiful, love in the arms of its lover. — James M. Barrie

Two is the beginning of the end. — J.M. Barrie

But he has still a vague memory that he was a human once, — J.M. Barrie

For when you looked into my mother's eyes you knew, as if He had told you, why God sent her into the world - it was to open then minds of all who looked to beautiful thoughts. And that is the beginning and end of literature. — J.M. Barrie

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, 'Oh, why can't you remain like this for ever!' This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end. — J.M. Barrie

She's awfully fond of Wendy,' he said to himself. He was angry with her now for not seeing why she could not have Wendy.
The reason was so simple: 'I'm fond of her too. We can't both have her, lady. — J.M. Barrie

It was the work of one brutal moment to land the beautiful girl on the rock; she was too proud to offer a vain resistance. — J.M. Barrie

Smee", he said huskily, "that crocodile would have had me before this, but by a lucky chance it swallowed a clock that goes tick tick inside it, and so before it can reach me I can hear the tick and bolt." He laughed, but in a hollow way. "Some day", Smee said, "the clock will run down, and then he'll get you. — J.M. Barrie

Fame is rot; daughters are the thing. — James M. Barrie

At first Mrs. Darling did not know, but after thinking back into her childhood she just remembered a Peter Pan who was said to live with the fairies. There were odd stories about him, as that when children died he went part of the way with them, so that they should not be frightened. — J.M. Barrie

But where do you live mostly now?"
With the lost boys."
Who are they?"
They are the children who fall out of their perambulators when the nurse is looking the other way. If they are not claimed in seven days they are sent far away to the Neverland to defray expanses. I'm captain."
What fun it must be!"
Yes," said cunning Peter, "but we are rather lonely. You see we have no female companionship."
Are none of the others girls?"
Oh no; girls, you know, are much too clever to fall out of their prams. — J.M. Barrie

Forget not your past, for in the future it may help you grow — James M. Barrie

He decided to appeal to the fairies for enlightenment. They are reputed
to know a good deal. — J.M. Barrie

They have real glasses and real wine of three kinds, namely, blackthorn wine, berberris wine, and cowslip wine, — J.M. Barrie

Wendy came first, then John, then Michael. — J.M. Barrie

Growing up is such a barbarous business, full of inconvenience ... and pimples. — J.M. Barrie

They were his dogs snapping at him, but, tragic figure though he had become, he scarcely heeded them. Against such fearful evidence it was not their belief in him that he needed, it was his own. He felt his ego slipping from him. — J.M. Barrie

Just always be waiting for me. — J.M. Barrie

He was top-heavy with conceit. — J.M. Barrie

Second to the right, and straight on till morning.
That, Peter had told Wendy, was the way to the Neverland — J.M. Barrie

I know, I feel, that with the introduction of tobacco England woke up from a long sleep. Suddenly a new zest had been given to life. The glory of existence became a thing to speak of. Men who had hitherto only concerned themselves with the narrow things of home put a pipe into their mouths and became philosophers. — James M. Barrie

If you knew how great is a mother's love, you would have no fear. — J.M. Barrie

Doctors sometimes draw maps of other parts of you, and your own map can become intensely interesting, but catch them trying to draw a map of a child's mind, which is not only confused, but keeps going round all the time. — J.M. Barrie

She asked where he lived.
Second to the right,' said Peter, 'and then straight on till morning. — J.M. Barrie

After a time he fell asleep, and some unsteady fairies had to climb over him on their way home from an orgy. — J.M. Barrie

As for their houses, it is no use looking for them, because they are the exact opposite of our houses. You can see our houses by day but you can't see them by dark. Well, you can see their houses by dark, but you can't see them by day, for they are the colour of night, and I never heard of anyone yet who could see night in the daytime. This does not mean that they are black, for night has its colours just as day has, but ever so much brighter. Their blues and reds and greens are like ours with a light behind them. The palace is entirely built of many-coloured glasses, and is quite the loveliest of all royal residences, — J.M. Barrie

A woman can be anything the man who loves her would have her be. — James M. Barrie

A moment after the fairy's entrance the window was blown open by the breathing of the little stars, and Peter dropped in. — J.M. Barrie

And thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless. — J.M. Barrie

All are keeping a sharp look-out in front, but none suspects that the danger may be creeping up from behind. — James M. Barrie

The policeman comes : in his hand the weapon that has knocked down more malefactors than all the batons the bull's-eye. He strikes with it now, right and left, revealing, as if she had just entered the room, a replica of the Venus of Milo, taller than himself though he is a stalwart. It is the first meeting of these two, but, though a man who can come to the boil, he is as little moved by her as she by him. After the first glance she continues her reflections. Her smile over his head vaguely displeases him. For two pins he would arrest her. — J.M. Barrie

All children, except one, grow up. — J.M. Barrie

Courage is the thing. All goes if courage goes.
[The Rectorial Address Delivered by James M. Barrie at St. Andrew's University May 3, 1922, to the Red Gowns of St. Andrews, Canada, 1922] — J.M. Barrie

Men's second childhood begins when a woman gets a hold of him. — James M. Barrie

The man who is in real danger is the man who thinks he is perfectly safe. — James M. Barrie

The moment where you doubt you can fly, you cease forever being able to do it. — J.M. Barrie

You must see for yourselves that it will be difficult to follow Peter Pan's adventures unless you are familiar with the Kensington Gardens. — J.M. Barrie

In love-making, as in other arts, those who do it best cannot tell how it is done. — James M. Barrie

Has it ever struck you that trout bite best on the Sabbath? God's critters tempting decent men. — James M. Barrie

I'm not young enough to know everything. — J.M. Barrie

Tinker Bell exquisitely gowned in a skeleton leaf, cut low and square, through which her figure could be seen to the best advantage. — J.M. Barrie

Boy, why are you crying? — J.M. Barrie

Peter measures you for your tree as carefully as for a suit of clothes: the only difference being that the clothes are made to fit you, while you have to be made to fit the tree. — J.M. Barrie

It is frightfully difficult to know much about the fairies, and almost the only thing for certain is that there are fairies wherever there are children. — J.M. Barrie

Facts were never pleasing to him. He acquired them with reluctance and got rid of them with relief. He was never on terms with them until he had stood them on their heads. — James M. Barrie

There are, I dare say, many lovers who would never have been drawn to each other had they met for the first time, as, say, they met the second time. — J.M. Barrie

One girl is worth more use than 20 boys. — James M. Barrie