Jason Reynolds is a popular author with a rich collection of awards including a Newbery Honor and a National Book Award finalist.
He has written several bestsellers like “When I Was the Greatest” and “Long Way Down.”
Starting as a poet inspired by rap Reynolds published his first novel in 2014 and quickly added more including a Marvel novel.
His recent works include collaborations and a unique blend of poetry and art.
He lives in Washington D.C.
I have curated the list of top quotes by Jason Reynolds.
Best Jason Reynolds Quotes
History can only teach its lesson if it is remembered. ~ Jason Reynolds.
People always love people more when they’re dead. ~ Jason Reynolds.
You love first, and that’s always a good thing. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Little. Don’t ever let someone call your life, your dreams, little. Hear me? ~ Jason Reynolds.
Just remember, when you’re walking in the nighttime, make sure the nighttime ain’t walking into you. ~ Jason Reynolds.
The discomfort seemed to lower the ceiling… ~ Jason Reynolds.
Mr. Ray had no problems opening the door, but he just couldn’t close it, as my dad would say. ~ Jason Reynolds.
We needed to talk, plain and simple. And seeing as through she was texting me, she clearly was opening the door. I just had to be man enough to walk through it. ~ Jason Reynolds.
What it was like to love something enough to do anything to come back to it. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Writing is like any other sort of sport. In order for you to get better at it, you have to exercise the muscle. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Nobody says the words anymore, but somehow the violence still remains. If I didn’t want the violence to remain, I had to do a hell of a lot more than just say the right things and not say the wrong things. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Famous Jason Reynolds Quotes
It had been a few days since everything went down, and when you’re used to hanging out with a person every single day, a few days off can sometimes seem more like a few months. ~ Jason Reynolds.
So this was about you saving somebody, huh? Yeah, well, let me ask you something, Super Hero… Who’s gonna save you? ~ Jason Reynolds.
There are lazy, hardworking, wise, unwise, harmless, and harmful individuals of every race, but no racial group is better or worse than another racial group in any way. ~ Jason Reynolds.
The most addictive drug known to America. Racism. It causes wealth, an inflated sense of self, and hallucinations. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Having a superpower has nothing to do with the ability to fly or jump, or superhuman strength. The truest superpowers are the ones we all possess: willpower, integrity, and most importantly, courage. ~ Jason Reynolds.
But you know how death is. Your body goes but your ideas don’t. Your impact lingers on even when it’s poisonous. Some bodies get put into the ground and daisies bloom. Others encourage the sprouting of weeds. Weeds that work to strangle whatever’s living, and growing, around them. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Gratitude is one of the greatest gifts we can give. And it’s not a gift we often give to children. We expect it of them, but we don’t necessarily give it back. ~ Jason Reynolds.
I’ve been told what I can’t do my whole life. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Popular Jason Reynolds Quotes
Like I was holding my breath. Maybe I was. Maybe I was hoping I could give some back to Shawn. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Light always wins. ~ Jason Reynolds.
It’s hard to be what you can’t see. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Had our hearts really become so numb that we needed dead bodies in order to feel the beat of compassion in our chests? Who am I if I need to be shocked back into my best self? ~ Jason Reynolds.
You, my dear, should spend more time in a library. It’s not just a hiding place, but also the place where the chases happen. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Miles fired the shooter at the TV, a wad of web turning it on. Ganke shook his head. So lazy. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Bullies should be snitched on, especially if you don’t feel like you can back them down. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Shawn turned back toward me, eyes dull from death but shining from tears, finally spoke to me. Just two words, like a joke he’d been saving. YOU COMING? ~ Jason Reynolds.
We had been texting for exactly thirteen minutes, asking random questions, trying to figure out if we knew any of the same people, or if we liked the same kind of music – the usual interview process you go through when you’re trying to get the job as boyfriend. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Top Jason Reynolds Quotes
You can’t be out there saving the world when your neighborhood ain’t event straight. ~ Jason Reynolds.
If only is what’s circling in my mind every morning before I breathe in beauty and breathe out bad decisions; If only is the cool breeze before I spin the world apart. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Shawn’s dead. So strange to say. So sad. But I guess not surprising, which I guess is even stranger, and even sadder. ~ Jason Reynolds.
There will come a time when we will love humanity, when we will gain the courage to fight for an equitable society for our beloved humanity, knowing, intelligently, that when we fight for humanity, we are fighting for ourselves. ~ Jason Reynolds.
He always walks like the sidewalk was put there just for his feet. ~ Jason Reynolds.
For all the people who came before us, fighting this fight, I was here, screaming at the top of my lungs. ~ Jason Reynolds.
But if the blood inside you is on the inside of someone else, you never want to see it on the outside of them. ~ Jason Reynolds.
I mean, I had seen this happen so many times. Not personally, but on TV. In the news. People getting beaten, and sometimes killed, by the cops, and then there’s all this fuss about it, only to build up to a big heartbreak when nothing happens. The cops get off. And everybody cries and waits for the next dead kid, to do it all over again. That’s the way the story goes. A different kind of Lifetime movie. I didn’t want all that. Didn’t need it. ~ Jason Reynolds.
How do you small-talk your father when dad is a language so foreign that whenever you try to say it, it feels like you got a third lip and a second tongue? ~ Jason Reynolds.
It’s so weird how a person can be a normal part of your everyday life, and then just disappear. And when they do, you realize that some of those everyday things go with them. Like the smell of food cooking. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Powerful Jason Reynolds Quotes
I know people mean well when they ask those kinds of questions, but at the end of the day, they are stupid questions. How am I feeling? Well, let me think. My mother’s funeral was a couple days ago, so I damn sure ain’t happy. ~ Jason Reynolds.
I should probably introduce myself. My name is Patina Jones. And I ain’t no junk. I also ain’t no hair flipper. And most of the girls at Chester Academy are hair flippers who be looking at me like my mom some kind of junk maker. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Racist ideas cause people to look at an innocent Black face and see a criminal. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Be not afraid of discomfort. If you can’t put yourself in a situation where you are uncomfortable, then you will never grow. You will never change. You’ll never learn. ~ Jason Reynolds.
The truths are universal: Every kid knows fear. Every kid knows family and friendship. Loss, love, laughter. Everything else is just detail. ~ Jason Reynolds.
All I want kids to know is that I see them for who they are and not who everyone thinks they are. ~ Jason Reynolds.
You can’t run away from who you are, but what you can do is run toward who you want to be. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Wise Jason Reynolds Quotes
I wanted him to know that I saw him, a guy who, even with a tear-streaked face, seemed to have two tiny smiles framing his eyes like parentheses, a guy on the ground pantomiming his death to remind the world he was alive. ~ Jason Reynolds.
I know the feeling of confusion and betrayal. I know the feeling of fearing for my life. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Weird talking to my dad like he was a stranger even though we hugged like family. ~ Jason Reynolds.
I do believe we can do better, be better. But we can’t hide behind fear. We can’t tuck truth between the cushions of comfort. We have to deal with it, really confront it, so that our children can live with a lot less weight. We owe it to them. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Sometimes, when people get treated as less than human, the best way to help them feel better is to simply treat them as human. Not as victims. Just you as you. Rashad Butler, before all this. ~ Jason Reynolds.
If we understand how the tree works, how the trunk and roots are where the power lies, and how gravity is on our side, we can attack it, each of us with small axes, and change the face of the forest. So let’s learn all there is to know about the tree of racism. The root. The fruit. The sap and trunk. The nests built over time, the changing leaves. That way, your generation can finally, actively chop it down. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Rap music was and is, for me, everything. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Dreams don’t have timelines, deadlines, and aren’t always in straight lines. ~ Jason Reynolds.
Black Power was met by a new slogan, one spat out like a racist slur. Law and order. ~ Jason Reynolds.
So these were the 57 top quotes about Jason Reynolds.
If you like these quotes and sayings, then you can also read my other posts on Sheila Jackson Lee quotes and Rita Moreno quotes.
