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Susanna Kearsley Quotes

Powerful Susanna Kearsley for Daily Growth

About Susanna Kearsley

Susanna Kearsley, a captivating storyteller of historical fiction and romance, was born on March 17th, 1955, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Growing up, she developed a deep love for history and a keen interest in archaeology and folklore, which would later become the cornerstones of her literary career. Before becoming an author, Kearsley worked as a freelance editor, a modern dancer, and even a museum curator. However, it was her passion for storytelling that eventually led her to write full-time. Her debut novel, "The Moons of Jupiter" (1985), showcased her unique ability to interweave history and romance seamlessly, setting the tone for her future works. One of Kearsley's most significant influences was her love for travel, which allowed her to immerse herself in various cultures and historical periods. This global exposure is evident in her novels, such as "The Shadowy Horses" (2000) and "Mariana" (1998), which transport readers across continents and through time. Kearsley's works are renowned for their intricate plotlines, rich historical detail, and emotional depth. Her characters are often strong women grappling with their pasts while navigating complex relationships in the present. This balance between history and personal narrative is a testament to Kearsley's skill as a storyteller and her commitment to creating unforgettable stories that resonate with readers. Today, Susanna Kearsley continues to captivate audiences with her compelling tales of love, mystery, and history. Her latest work, "The Winter Sea" (2010), is a testament to her enduring talent and the timeless appeal of her storytelling.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"Love is like a seed freely sown in a garden of the heart."

This quote suggests that love, like a seed, is freely given and planted into one's heart. Just as a seed can grow and flourish when provided with the right conditions, love too has the potential to blossom when nurtured with care and attention. The garden of the heart symbolizes the receptive space within us that accepts this seed of love. This quote emphasizes the power of giving and receiving love freely, and highlights the potential for growth and beauty that can emerge from such an act.

"History was not just dates and facts; it was people's lives, loves, hopes, and dreams."

This quote by Susanna Kearsley emphasizes that history is more than dry facts and events; it encompasses the human experiences, emotions, relationships, and aspirations that shaped those times. It underscores the importance of understanding history not merely as a series of impersonal occurrences, but as the lived experiences of people who faced love, loss, joy, fear, ambition, and struggle – just like us today.

"The past is never really the past. It is a part of us, within us, always."

This quote highlights that our personal history, experiences, and the past events we've lived through are deeply ingrained in our identities. They shape who we are, influence our thoughts, feelings, and actions, making them an integral part of our present. Therefore, the past is not something distant or detached but continues to exist within us, shaping our current lives.

"In every place we go, every person we meet, we carry with us the shadows of those who have gone before."

This quote emphasizes that wherever we travel or whomsoever we encounter, there's an invisible connection to the past. We are not isolated individuals but bear the echoes of those who came before us. These "shadows" can influence our experiences and interactions in subtle ways, reminding us that history is intertwined with the present.

"The most extraordinary things are often hidden in the most ordinary places, and the most ordinary things can be extra-ordinary if you look at them the right way."

This quote suggests that extraordinary or remarkable qualities may lie undiscovered within seemingly mundane or ordinary aspects of life. It encourages us to adopt a fresh perspective, to observe more deeply, and to find beauty, wonder, and meaning in the everyday things around us. By looking at common objects or situations from an unconventional viewpoint, we can discover hidden depths and transform the ordinary into something extraordinary.

In the years that I worked in museums, first as a summer student and eventually as a curator, one of the primary lessons I learned was this: History is shaped by the people who seek to preserve it. We, of the present, decide what to keep, what to put on display, what to put into storage, and what to discard.

- Susanna Kearsley

Student, Shaped, Discard, Storage

I can have my day carefully planned, but if someone wakes up with a cough or a sniffle, then everything changes. Thinking quickly and adapting without grumbling are essential skills to learn, in my opinion.

- Susanna Kearsley

Quickly, In My Opinion, Adapting

I was born in the city of Brantford, Ontario, Canada - but by the time I'd left high school, I'd moved seven times with my family, my father's engineering work taking us to places as far-flung as Bay City, Texas, and Wolnae-Ri in South Korea.

- Susanna Kearsley

City, By The Time, South, Bay

When I'm dealing with the 18th century, as I do in 'The Firebird,' the difficulty isn't only finding what a woman did, it's finding her at all. Most of the sources I'm dealing with - letters and memoirs and written reports of the day - have been written by men.

- Susanna Kearsley

Woman, Been, Reports, 18th Century

I have seen and really liked the varied movie adaptations of the book, but 'Little Women' has a sprawling, richly tangled story that needs time and space to weave its magic.

- Susanna Kearsley

Magic, Movie, Needs, Time And Space

The recent controversy over the portrayal of Ken Taylor and his embassy staff in the movie 'Argo' brought home to me the great responsibility we writers have when telling stories that involve real people.

- Susanna Kearsley

Movie, Real People, Telling, Portrayal

People didn't just wear wedding dresses in the past. They also wore plain cotton shifts beneath them. As pretty as the dresses might be, and as lovely as they might look on display, if a museum doesn't hang the shifts beside them or acknowledge that the shifts existed, that exhibit's incomplete.

- Susanna Kearsley

Cotton, Hang, Wear, Incomplete

Brantford was the fixed point of my universe, growing up. Both sets of grandparents lived there, with various cousins and uncles and aunts, and no matter how far we'd moved off, we came back there for regular visits. In a way no other houses have ever been, my grandparents' houses were 'home,' and the sale of the last of those houses was hard.

- Susanna Kearsley

Other, Been, How Far, Fixed

The best way to show an emotion is not through a character's words, but their smallest expressions - to take what an actor would visually do and try putting that down on the page for the reader to 'see.'

- Susanna Kearsley

Through, Best Way, Putting, Expressions

Readers in general are not fond of dialect, and I don't blame them. I've read books myself that I've had to put down because sounding out every speech gave me a headache.

- Susanna Kearsley

Myself, Dialect, Read, Headache

Such is the endless dilemma of dialect. Not every reader will ever agree with the way that I handle it, no matter how hard I work to keep everything readable. But again it's that balance I have to maintain between keeping it easy and keeping it real, and I know that I'll never please everyone.

- Susanna Kearsley

Maintain, Dialect, Reader, Dilemma

Romantic fiction, in the broader sense, can be any novel that has a love story somewhere in it. It can be a mystery or a historical novel, as long as it has this very strong romantic thread running through it.

- Susanna Kearsley

Love, Through, Very, Broader

One of the more interesting challenges I face when doing research for my novels is to trace the lives of women who are vital to the narrative and try my best to give them back their voices.

- Susanna Kearsley

Challenges, Doing, Back, Novels

I once walked through an exhibit in a large American museum that displayed First Nations artifacts in old dioramas, with mannequins that hadn't been changed since the 19th century.

- Susanna Kearsley

Through, Been, Displayed, Exhibit

I grew up in a very small town where nearly everyone knew each other, and odds were that whatever you said about a person would make it back to them by nightfall - something incomers learned, to their frequent embarrassment.

- Susanna Kearsley

Small, Other, Very, Odds

Writing is sometimes a balancing act between keeping things easily readable and being accurate.

- Susanna Kearsley

Act, Accurate, Keeping, Balancing

There was no DVR, no Netflix, and no binge-watching. We didn't even have a VCR till I was nearly out of high school.

- Susanna Kearsley

Netflix, Till, Nearly, VCR

My children are as at home in the Port Elgin library as I used to be, and they've sat in the cinema seats where I sat with their aunt every Saturday afternoon, watching the matinee movies.

- Susanna Kearsley

Saturday, Used, Sat, Aunt

If it hadn't been for Bill Macdonald's book 'The True Intrepid,' I might never have found out about the women who went down to work in secret in New York for our own spymaster Sir William Stephenson in the Second World War.

- Susanna Kearsley

Book, Own, Been, Sir

How much of our lives is consumed with meeting people, attracting people, keeping people and missing people? Usually, when everything is resolved romantically in one of my books, the characters stop talking in my head, and I stop telling the story.

- Susanna Kearsley

Talking, Consumed, Telling, Missing

As a former waitress myself, I know firsthand how a simple smile from someone can improve your day and how a single harsh word can destroy it. Being courteous and thoughtful costs you nothing and can sometimes pay you dividends in unexpected ways.

- Susanna Kearsley

Unexpected, Sometimes, Harsh, Firsthand

I spent five years of my childhood in Port Elgin and came back to spend another five years of my young adulthood there as well, including the years in which I was first published.

- Susanna Kearsley

Childhood, Including, Which, Published

After the loss of my sister - my darkest time - I tried to think of the beauty she'd brought to this world and the lives she had touched and the love she had left behind.

- Susanna Kearsley

Love, Think, Behind, Sister

A walk through the storage facility of the community museum where I worked might easily have convinced you that people in the past wore only wedding dresses, carried silver candlesticks, and played with porcelain dolls.

- Susanna Kearsley

Storage, Through, Worked, Dolls

It's the pursuit of love and happiness that is the driving force of the romantic novel.

- Susanna Kearsley

Love, Happiness, Driving, Driving Force

Even a writer like me, who, in 'The Firebird,' is telling the story of people who've been dead for nearly three centuries, needs to take care. Those people may not be around any longer to tell me what actually happened, but neither are they able to defend themselves against unjust portrayals.

- Susanna Kearsley

Against, Been, Telling, Neither

When you say that you write romantic fiction, there are a lot of people who have an image in their mind of the 'bodice ripper.' It's the one term that most romantic fiction writers absolutely hate because it has no bearing on what people are writing.

- Susanna Kearsley

Fiction, Fiction Writers, Term

In my book 'The Winter Sea,' set north of Aberdeen, I couldn't just ignore the fact some people there - especially the people in the past - would speak the Doric.

- Susanna Kearsley

Some, In The Past, Set, Sea

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