Joanna Coles Quotes

I think you do a lot of your growing as a human being between the ages of 13 and 18.

Coming-of-age stories in high school are exciting because everything that happens during that time is very heightened.

I think that the path that I took was normal in the American society where young women and men are not trained as to how to make the transition from being a girl to being a woman, from being a boy to being a man. And so I think that most young people in America live by trial and error, and not by parental instruction, community guidance.

The donning of the ear buds marks the beginning of teen life, when children set off on their own for the passage through adolescence.

Adolescence is a modern construct and very American in so many ways.

With 'Dazed and Confused,' I got the high school experience I didn't get to have.

Teenagers are philosophers. They are thinking about the big things like existence and identity at a time when their identities are changing so fast.

I've realized that I will probably write about teenagers and that time in people's lives - I'll probably come back to it a lot.

When I did 'Fast Times,' I felt very close emotionally to the characters. I liked those characters because they all had to work, so they were dealing with adult problems even though they were very immature, and I could relate to that.

I remember being wise beyond my years when I was little.

Many of the things that I have written on have focused, at least a big part of the story, on adolescents. I think that in that period of life, so much happens, and it's the period of life where you're forming into an adult. In certain ways, you're already an adult and in certain ways you're still a kid.

I was a 'young adult' when I wrote 'The Outsiders,' although it was not a genre at the time. It's an interesting time of life to write about, when your ideals get slammed up against reality, and you must compromise.

The area of teenage life is not necessarily rarefied; we've all gone through that period. It's not as rarefied as a western or a space adventure or a gangster film, but it has its own dynamic.

When you are in your teenage years you are consciously experiencing everything for the first time, so adolescent stories are all beginnings. There are never any endings.

Hey, don't knock Judy Blume. Without her, my younger self would never have been able to decode the random acts of madness perpetrated by the fascinating creature known as the teenage girl.

I was wanting to be a kid at 18 instead of being a young woman.

I can deal with it now, but 13 is a tough age to be recognized and famous. It's a tough age, period.

Adolescence, that swampy zone between safety and power, is best patrolled by adults armed with sense and mercy, not guns and a badge.

I learned by example. ...As a kid you think you are just the same as other adults.

Being a teenager is an amazing time and a hard time. It's when you make your best friends - I have girls who will never leave my heart and I still talk to. You get the best and the worst as a teen. You have the best friendships and the worst heartbreaks.

Even as kids reach adolescence, they need more than ever for us to watch over them. Adolescence is not about letting go. It's about hanging on during a very bumpy ride.

I think you go through a period as a teenager of being quite cool and unaffected by things.

Oh the innocent girl in her maiden teens knows perfectly well what everything means.

The thing about adolescence is that you are emerging from a state of obscurity. You are coming out into the world from your family. Your family can seem normal because it is your family and all you know, but in fact it is a mess.

I was 11 years old when I saw the first season of 'The Real World.' Initially, I was drawn to the show because it was what I imagined the adult version of my life should be.