39 Opening Lines From Quotes

When it comes to grabbing attention and sparking curiosity, nothing does the job quite like a powerful opening line. Whether you're delving into a new book, watching a movie, or listening to someone speak, those first few words can captivate your imagination and set the tone for what’s to come. In this post, we've curated a collection of the top 39 opening lines from quotes—each one a master class in capturing interest and evoking emotions. Join us as we explore these memorable beginnings that have left a lasting impression on readers, viewers, and listeners alike.

1. “There are gods in Alabama: Jack Daniel's, high school quarterbacks, trucks, big tits, and also Jesus.” - Joshilyn Jackson

2. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” - Charles Dickens

3. “Call me Ishmael.” - Herman Melville

4. “Who is John Galt?” - Ayn Rand

5. “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” - J.R.R. Tolkien

6. “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” - Charles Dickens

7. “The last thing one discovers in composing a work is what to put first.” - Blaise Pascal

8. “Two households, both alike in dignity,In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.From forth the fatal loins of these two foesA pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;Whole misadventured piteous overthrowsDo with their death bury their parents' strife.The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,And the continuance of their parents' rage,Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;The which if you with patient ears attend,What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.” - William Shakespeare

9. “There was no possibility of taking a walk that day.” - Charlotte Brontë

10. “If you want to find Cherry-Tree Lane all you have to do is ask the Policeman at the cross-roads.” - P. L. Travers

11. “To the as-yet-unborn, to all innocent wisps of undifferentiated nothingness: Watch out for life.” - Kurt Vonnegut

12. “There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife.” - Neil Gaiman

13. “Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.” - James Joyce

14. “In the beginning we were a group of nine.Three are gone, dead.There are six of us left.They are hunting us, and they won't stop until they've killed us all.I am Number Four.I know that I am next.” - Pittacus Lore

15. “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” - J.K. Rowling

16. “Where shall we three meet again in thunder, lightning, or in rain? When the hurlyburly 's done, when the battle 's lost and won” - William Shakespeare

17. “A dead man fell from the sky, landing at my feet with a thud.” - Gary Corby

18. “I died on a bitter cold night. Beneath a black sky and a bruised winter moon, I tried to fly, hoping my arms might act as wings.” - Jennifer Archer

19. “I did it! I stopped time.[Hampton Green]” - Tim Tharp

20. “It was a dark, blustery afternoon in spring, and the city of London was chasing a small mining town across the dried-out bed of the old North Sea.” - Philip Reeve

21. “There is a delicate-looking plant native to North America called bleeding heart.” - Josh Aterovis

22. “I was looking for a quiet place to die.” - Paul Auster

23. “Lok was running as fast as he could. His head was down and he carried his thorn bush horizontally for balance and smacked the drifts of vivid buds aside with his free hand.” - William Golding

24. “This is the story of a man named Eddie and it starts at the end, with Eddie dying in the sun. It may seem strange to start a story with and ending, but all endings are also beginnings. We just don't know it at the time.” - Mitch Albom

25. “Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn New York. Especially in the summer of 1912. Somber as a word was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg Brooklyn. Prairie was lovely and Shenandoah had a beautiful sound but you couldn't fit those words into Brooklyn. Serene was the only word for it especially on a Saturday afternoon in summer.” - Betty Smith

26. “Indian summer is like a woman.” - Grace Metalious

27. “It was 7 minutes after midnight. The dog was lying on the grass in the middle of the lawn in front of Mrs. Shears's house.” - Mark Haddon

28. “There is no lake at Camp Green Lake.” - Louis Sachar

29. “The idea really came to me the day I got my new false teeth.” - George Orwell

30. “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. It was the future, and everything sucked.” - Greg Nagan

31. “The baloney weighed the raven down, and the shopkeeper almost caught him as he whisked out the delicatessen door.” - Peter S. Beagle

32. “Grandfather recently died. He died alone on a trip away from home in a town where no one expected him to be” - Téa Obreht

33. “It was dusk - winter dusk. Snow lay white and shining over the pleated hills, and icicles hung from the forest trees. Snow lay piled on the dark road across Willoughby Wold, but from dawn men had been clearing it with brooms and shovels. There were hundreds of them at work, wrapped in sacking because of the bitter cold, and keeping together in groups for fear of the wolves, grown savage and reckless from hunger.” - Joan Aiken

34. “A mile below the lowest cloud, rock breaches water and the sea begins.It has been given many names. Each inlet and bay and stream has been classified as if it were discrete. But it is one thing, where borders are absurd. It fills the space between stones and sand, curling around coastlines and filling trenches between the continents.” - China Miéville

35. “Did you wish upon a star and take the time to try to make your wish come true?Did you try to paint the sunrise and find the gift of life within?Did you write a song just for the joy of it?Or write a poem just to feel the pain?Did you find a reason to ignore the petty injustices, the spoken barbs, or the envies, jealousies and greed that crossed your path?Did you wake up this morning and whisper inside, “Today, I’ll find every reason to smile, and ignore the excuses to frown.”Today will be the day I’ll whisper nothing snide, I’ll say nothing cruel. I’ll be kind to my enemy, I’ll embrace my friends, and for thisone day, I’ll forget the slights of the past.Today will be the day I’ll live for the joy of it, laugh for the fun of it, and today, I’ll love whether it’s returned, forsaken, or simplyignored.And if you did, then your heart has joined the others who have as well, uniting, strengthening, and in a single heartbeat you’ve createda world of hope.” - Lora Leigh

36. “She'd be lucky if she got out of this alive . . . and she'd never been lucky in her life.” - Dorian Paul

37. “If a lioness spends her hours pacing back and forth in a cage of gold with the finest meats at her disposal, does that make her any less of a prisoner? If that same feline’s fangs are filed down to blunt, un-tearing teeth and her roar is silenced, can she still be called a lioness?” - Kristen Reed

38. “On a pitch black, starless night, a solitary man was trudging along the main road from Marchiennes to Montsou, ten kilometres of cobblestones running straight as a die across the bare plain between fields of beet.” - Émile Zola

39. “To say the least, it was inconsiderate of Diana’s almost-dead husband to show up at her engagement party.” - Robin Lee Hatcher