The arrival of summer can be almost euphoric. The days have been gradually getting longer, life has returned and we can spend more time outside than any other time of year. Writers and poets have long been inspired by the season, capturing its magic in their words and phrases. We've gathered together some of the most glorious quotes about the summer season.
Best quotes about summer
"What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness." (John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America)
"Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language." (Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady)
"August rain: the best of the summer gone, and the new fall not yet born. The odd uneven time." (Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath)
"In early June the world of leaf and blade and flowers explodes, and every sunset is different." (John Steinbeck, The Winter of Our Discontent)
"I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer – its dust and lowering skies." (Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye)
"Green was the silence, wet was the light, the month of June trembled like a butterfly." (Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets)
"And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer." (F Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby)
"Summer’s lease hath all too short a date." (William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18)
"The crickets felt it was their duty to warn everybody that summertime cannot last for ever. Even on the most beautiful days in the whole year – the days when summer is changing into autumn – the crickets spread the rumor of sadness and change." (EB White, Charlotte's Web)
"Spring flew swiftly by, and summer came; and if the village had been beautiful at first, it was now in the full glow and luxuriance of its richness. The great trees, which had looked shrunken and bare in the earlier months, had now burst into strong life and health; and stretching forth their green arms over the thirsty ground, converted open and naked spots into choice nooks, where was a deep and pleasant shade from which to look upon the wide prospect, steeped in sunshine, which lay stretched out beyond. The earth had donned her mantle of brightest green; and shed her richest perfumes abroad. It was the prime and vigour of the year; all things were glad and flourishing." (Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist)
"Gimmerton chapel bells were still ringing and the full, mellow flow of the beck in the valley came soothingly on the ear. It was a sweet substitute for the yet absent murmur of the summer foliage, which drowned that music about the Grange when the trees were in leaf." (Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights)
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