Hilary Mantel Quotes

In my heart, I'm so far from done.

Change your thinking, change your life.

What we think determines what happens to us, so if we want to change our lives, we need to stretch our minds.

I think I remember from the offset I said, 'I've visited this territory. This isn't for me.' And then I read the script and I said, 'You know, this is completely something different. This is a whole new life.'

No sooner do we think we have assembled a comfortable life than we find a piece of ourselves that has no place to fit in.

The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.

There's a time in your life where you're not quite sure where you are. You think everything's perfect, but it's not perfect... Then one day you wake up and you can't quite picture yourself in the situation you're in. But the secret is, if you can picture yourself doing anything in life, you can do it.

Very often a change of self is needed more than a change of scene.

Not everything has a happy ending, and not everything has an ending. Some things just kind of dribble away or cut off abruptly.

I often have the impression that the book I've just finished isn't satisfied: that it rejects me because I haven't successfully completed it. Because there is no going back, I'm forced to begin a new book so I can finally complete the previous one.

Life doesn't always end up with a bow wrapped around it.

You can put someone in a new home, but you can't give them a new mindset.

Since cancer, I feel like I have dreams rather than ambitions, visions rather than plans.

I asked myself, 'What are you going to do with your life? Are you going to be like everyone else or are you going to do what's right?' I just made a decision. I said, 'It's time to grow up. It's time to start living for the Lord, do things the right way.' I accepted the Lord, and it changed my life.

Anyone who thinks my story is anywhere near over is sadly mistaken.

There are books on our shelves we haven't read and doubtless never will, that each of us has probably put to one side in the belief that we will read them later on, perhaps even in another life.

It happened to me on 'King of the Hill,' where I'd left it before the end and didn't really participate in the ending, and I always felt a little bit like I wanted to try a different version of that story.

Nobody's life is wrapped up neatly in a bow.

I had no intention of pursuing either the characters or the setting further.

You go out with a girl you used to date, she looks so damn good, and then at a certain point you say, Boy, now I remember. I know why I left!

A lot of people that embark on spiritual endeavors tended to, especially in the '60s and '70s, they tended to give up what they had before and cut themselves off from their lives, previous life as it were. But, I don't think that one should do that.

I sometimes think that so much of our life takes place inside our heads - in memory or imagination or interpretation or speculation - that if I really want to change my life, I might best begin by changing my mind.

I've been with this young lady for about two years now, and my life changed. I don't even think that way no more. I feel good, too, that I'm changed. Now I feel regular. I feel like I'm supposed to.

Your experiences are what made you what you are today. So when tragedy happens in people's lives, and things are left unsaid, it can be very unsettling. The lack of closure can linger.

The dumbest childhood vow I ever made was to finish every book I started.