Lauren Groff Quotes

Powerful Lauren Groff for Daily Growth

About Lauren Groff

Lauren Groff is an acclaimed American novelist and short story writer, known for her lush prose and deeply human characters. Born on March 17, 1983, in Cooperstown, New York, Groff grew up in a family that valued literature and education. She attended the prestigious Barnard College in New York City, where she studied English and Creative Writing. Groff's writing career began with short stories published in various literary magazines before the release of her debut novel, "The Monsters of Templeton," in 2008. This sweeping family saga set in a small town in upstate New York was longlisted for the Orange Prize and earned Groff critical acclaim. In 2015, Groff published "Fates and Furies," a novel that explores marriage from two perspectives. The book received widespread praise, earning her a finalist position for the National Book Award for Fiction. The following year, she was named one of the 20 Most Influential People in American Fiction by Granta magazine. Groff's most recent novel, "Matrix," published in 2021, is a retelling of the biblical story of Leah and Rachel from Jacob's life. The book showcases Groff's mastery of historical fiction and her ability to breathe new life into ancient stories. Throughout her career, Groff has been influenced by a wide range of authors, including Virginia Woolf, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Her writing is known for its vivid descriptions, complex characters, and exploration of the human condition. When not writing, Groff lives in Florida with her husband and two children.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"Language is a living thing, and it changes to suit our needs."

This quote emphasizes that language, much like a living organism, evolves and adapts over time to meet the changing needs of its users. It suggests that language is dynamic, flexible, and adaptable. As societies and cultures grow and develop, so too does our use and understanding of words and phrases. This constant evolution reflects the way humans communicate and interact with each other, making language a powerful tool for expression, connection, and innovation.


"We live in stories, whether we choose them for ourselves or they are chosen for us."

This quote emphasizes that human life is deeply rooted in narratives – personal or imposed. We all construct our own stories through the choices we make and experiences we encounter, but sometimes external forces also shape our narrative. Recognizing this can help us understand ourselves better and appreciate the role of storytelling in shaping our identities and perceptions of the world.


"Love is an act of heroism, a sheltering wing."

This quote suggests that love is not just a feeling or emotion, but rather an active choice to care for another person deeply and selflessly. It implies that showing love involves courage, as one must be willing to face challenges and difficulties in order to provide protection and support. The image of a sheltering wing represents the protective and nurturing aspect of love, suggesting that it provides safety, comfort, and encouragement to those who are loved. Overall, this quote emphasizes the profound and powerful nature of love as an act of heroism and protection.


"Stories can save us, or break us."

This quote by Lauren Groff underscores the profound impact stories can have on our lives. They can be powerful tools for healing and growth (saving us) as they offer insights into human experiences, helping us understand and empathize with others. On the other hand, they can also cause harm if misused or if their narratives reflect negative or harmful worldviews, potentially influencing us in detrimental ways (breaking us). Ultimately, stories are a reflection of our shared humanity, and it's up to us to use them wisely and critically.


"Fear and love are not so different, after all. They both grip the heart, make it swell or stop, twist it in knots."

This quote suggests that fear and love share a profound emotional intensity. Both emotions have the power to impact the heart significantly, causing it to feel a range of sensations such as expansion, constriction, or twisting into knots. The shared characteristic is the deep physical and emotional response they elicit, highlighting their potency in shaping our experiences and relationships with the world around us.


Sometimes I read a biography of some tempestuous artist and find myself longing for fireworks! booze! bloody fights!; I do think that life must be so much more thrilling when you're actively miserable.

- Lauren Groff

Artist, Sometimes, Some, Thrilling

At some point, I picked up an old library copy of 'To The Lighthouse' someone had bought for 25 cents. I began to read and didn't stop until the sun had blistered my back. A mysterious rightness, a beautiful submerged truth had invaded me, one that has ever since seemed slightly beyond my grasp.

- Lauren Groff

Some, Lighthouse, Slightly, Submerged

I see history as really cyclical in terms of the intense idealism and the desire to create a better life outside of societal norms. In America, possibly because of whatever the American dream is, this happens over and over again. These eras repeat.

- Lauren Groff

Life, American, I See, Better Life

If there's a black cat that crosses the street in my path, I will turn around and walk 20 minutes out of my way to not cross it. You know how in New York there's a lot of scaffolding? I won't walk under scaffolding or under ladders. I wear things like a baseball player wears things that are supposed to have luck.

- Lauren Groff

Luck, Wear, Ladders, Baseball Player

While I know some women who are stunningly sanguine when they're pregnant, I dissolve into a total mess. What normally appears sturdy turns fragile: the economy, the climate, humanity's baseline social contract.

- Lauren Groff

Some, Mess, Appears, Dissolve

The darkest period of my life, so far, arrived the summer I was pregnant with my eldest son. The future was growing in me with all of its terrifying unpredictability, and I found myself anxious, unable to work and woefully at sea.

- Lauren Groff

Life, My Life, Terrifying, Eldest

I write everything out in longhand in one fast go. And then I throw out the first few and start over again. By the end of the first draft, the whole thing's messy and disgusting and horrible, but you really understand the foundational stuff.

- Lauren Groff

Out, I Write, Whole, Longhand

But I've married a deeply sensible person who is extremely good at talking me down from my various ledges, and who takes care of me in a billion ways.

- Lauren Groff

Good, Down, Talking, Sensible Person

The greatest texts, I think, first dazzle, then with careful rereading, they instruct. I have learned from Virginia Woolf more than I even know how to articulate.

- Lauren Groff

Think, I Think, Learned, Articulate

Among so many things, 'Time Passes' has shown me subversive ways of portraying time, of looking away from the human to the far more terrifying, far more immense texture of time beneath the minute span of a human life.

- Lauren Groff

Away, Terrifying, Subversive, Immense

Sometimes immense things, like war and death and aging, are best seen from the corner of the eye and written of only obliquely, with tremendous lightness.

- Lauren Groff

Death, Sometimes, Like, Immense

I see history as really cyclical in terms of the intense idealism, and the desire to create a better life outside of societal norms.

- Lauren Groff

Desire, I See, Idealism, Societal

I seem to long for community and mistrust it in equal measure, and so I spend most of my days carefully constructing various communities in stories and seeing if they fly.

- Lauren Groff

Mistrust, Constructing, Communities

I love that he's both comic and tragic, and highly poetic but also just dirty at times. ... I love that within the world of Shakespeare's plays, the whole world is sort of encompassed in a certain way.

- Lauren Groff

Love, Dirty, Poetic, Highly

At least in my case, a very simple, regular, happy life makes for better writing.

- Lauren Groff

Happy Life, Better, Very, Regular

We think of stories a lot of the time as being horizontal texts, beginning to end. But I love the idea of having little vertical spikes in the story, too.

- Lauren Groff

Love, Think, Stories, Horizontal

A lot of books about marriage are about marriages falling apart.

- Lauren Groff

Falling, Marriages, Lot, Apart

I once spent an entire night in a hotel in New York looking across the way into someone's apartment where nothing was happening but daily life, a phone call, television watching, staring into the fridge. Seeing how those strangers lived over that small distance and in absolute silence moved me deeply.

- Lauren Groff

Small, Distance, Fridge, Staring

We're all functions of our societies, right? And we all become who we are because of the invisible forces that mold us.

- Lauren Groff

Invisible, Mold, Functions, Societies

If there's a black cat that crosses the street in my path, I will turn around and walk 20 minutes out of my way to not cross it.

- Lauren Groff

Black, Will, Minutes, Crosses

There aren't very many good models of feminine rage - and the ones that we remember are ones where women take that anger internally and implode themselves in a real way, like Anna Karenina or Emma Bovary.

- Lauren Groff

Feminine, Very, Models, Anna

I am a person beset with fears, and one of my fears is that this thing that I will be writing for five years won't work. And the likelihood, of course, is that it won't - and that's fine.

- Lauren Groff

Work, Will, Am, Likelihood

Time is the currency - the highest valued currency we have now. And people giving you their time is so incredible. They don't have to like your book, either. That's a totally separate gift.

- Lauren Groff

Gift, Like, Separate, Currency

I have a feeling that books are a lot like people - they change as you age, so that some books that you hated in high school will strike you with the force of a revelation when you're older.

- Lauren Groff

Will, Some, Like, Hated

Total intimacy is a myth; that said, a particular kind of loneliness can be both beautiful and fruitful.

- Lauren Groff

Beautiful, Intimacy, Total, Fruitful

I feel as if I've been so inured to failure, because I fail more than I succeed. As with any kind of fiction, I throw out so many pages; I get rejected so many times.

- Lauren Groff

Fiction, Been, Rejected, Inured

Bigger stories are made out of longer acquaintance with fact and character, but I also love the tiny stories in which almost everything has to be inferred and imagined.

- Lauren Groff

Love, Stories, Which, Tiny

My childhood was as conventional as you could get.

- Lauren Groff

Childhood, Get, Could, Conventional

My childhood was as conventional as you could get. I think I probably created 'Arcadia' with a certain amount of wishful thinking. I would have loved to have more looseness and freedom and community.

- Lauren Groff

Think, Wishful, Amount, Conventional

As a person, I do ascribe to a lot of magical thinking myself.

- Lauren Groff

Myself, Person, Lot, Magical

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