Jonathan Franzen Quotes

I did Vibe, and I felt old and paternal. I've got ties older than people in that audience. I had a talk with myself. I said, You've got to deal with this better.

I don't feel like a 27-year-old; I feel I am way mature than someone that age.

I'm OK being the veteran, but I'm still just a kid.

Even the people I surround myself with... are wiser, a little bit older than me, where before, all my boyfriends were younger.

We tend to think of age only in time, but I don't think it has much to do with time at all; there's a whole load of other things. I've met 16-year-olds who are old and 90-year-olds who are young.

I met Ray Charles at 14, and he was 16. But he was like a hundred years older than me.

I always felt older than my years, maybe because I was married to someone older.

My friends joke I'm a 90-year-old stuck in a young man's body.

Since I was 15 I've felt kinda like... an old man.

People have always said I have an old soul, and all my best friends are 10 to 15 years my senior.

I think age is just something written down on a piece of paper. I mean, you come across 20-year-olds who are like old people sometimes. I've never taken much account of age throughout my life - my own or anyone else's.

I feel young at heart, and I feel, like, you know, 40.

I always had an easier time with adults. Somehow, I was always old! I still feel old.

The difference between rearing a child in your 20s and one in your 50s is one of patience.

My mother was 45 when she had me, so when I was in high school my parents were the same age as my friends' grandparents.

What's weird is when you meet a girl who is 23 and you are talking to her, even her voice is high-pitched, she's young. You ask her how old she is, she says, 'Twenty-three, how old are you?' and when I tell her I'm 41 it's like I've just told her I have cancer. It's, 'Oh my God, how long have you had that?'

As you get older, all the things your parents said to you when you were younger ring true, but when you're younger, you reject them.

I've always had a maturity level different than guys my age.

I've often been told that I'm a 30-year-old trapped in a teenager's body. I don't know how I feel about that, but I'll take it, I guess. I'm definitely mature, and I'm the one that takes care of everyone in my friendship group.

I think I was born aged about 86.

I was getting calls in 1970 from teenagers, little girls, and they'd say, 'Oh, I like your stories about so-and-so so much. How old are you? 20?' 'No. Older than that.' '30?' 'No. Older than that.' And they'd hang up.

As you get older, you kind of take a more sober view of life.

Now that I'm 40, I knew I wasn't going to pass for 25.

If you get a child when you're 50, you'll understand what children are.

My best mates when I was 19 were all in their 30s. I used to go to all their house parties, and they were crazier than the guys who were 17, 18. They were so much more liberated than the people who were apparently shackle-free.