50 Summer Quotes That Capture the Joy of Beach Season

Summer quotes for those lazy hazy crazy days

Ah, summer. Warm evenings, lazy mornings, lazy afternoons, lazy evenings, lazy weekends … wait, what were we talking about? Oh yes: Barbecues, vacations, ice cream, swimming, beautiful nature and other summer traditions. Summer is many people’s favorite season of the year, and these summer quotes show they have good reason to think so. Whether you’re relaxing with a great beach read or shopping for one of the best bathing suits, summer is a time when everything loosens up a little bit. Summer starts on June 21 this year, and you’ll definitely want to share some summer quotes to spread cheer—and maybe even sprinkle in a few summer memes.

“I live for summer.”—Sandra Boynton, cartoonist. We’re also living for these hilarious summer cartoons.

“To escape and sit quietly on the beach—that’s my idea of paradise.”—Emilia Wickstead, fashion designer. Get laughing this season with the funniest quotes of all time.

“One must maintain a little bit of summer, even in the middle of winter.”—Henry David Thoreau, writer

“I typically enjoy a beautiful beach destination, as I find the water and sand to be the most replenishing.”—Elizabeth Berkley, actor.  Speaking of beaches, check out the best beach Instagram captions that’ll make waves in your feed.

“Spring being a tough act to follow, God created June.”—Al Bernstein, sportscaster

“Long walks on the beach are the supposed holy grail of a romantic evening. The beach becomes a kind of utopia—the place where all our dreams come true.”—Roxane Gay, writer

“There was a magic about the sea. People were drawn to it. People wanted to love by it, swim in it, play in it, look at it. It was a living thing that was as unpredictable as a great stage actor: it could be calm and welcoming, opening its arms to embrace its audience one moment, but then could explode with its stormy tempers, flinging people around, wanting them out, attacking coastlines, breaking down islands.”—Cecelia Ahern, writer

“My sense of direction leads me one way: to the beach.”—Anonymous. You can get the feeling of this summer quote by thinking about your next vacation.

“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”—Henry James, writer. If you’re looking to spread more positive words, read up on the most uplifting quotes that will keep you going. 

“If you’re not barefoot, then you’re overdressed.”—Anonymous

“One cannot collect all the beautiful shells on the beach. One can collect only a few, and they are more beautiful if they are few.”—Anne Morrow Lindbergh, writer and aviator

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”—William Shakespeare, writer

“It was June, and the world smelled of roses. The sunshine was like powdered gold over the grassy hillside.”—Maud Hart Lovelace, writer

“One benefit of summer was that each day we had more light to read by.”—Jeanette Walls, writer

“There’s no place like home. Except for the beach.”—Anonymous

“I like summer. I like warmer weather and long days. I’m one of those silly people who still enjoy lying in the sun—my children are horrified!”—Danielle Steel, writer

“I love how summer just wraps its arms around you like a warm blanket.”—Kellie Elmore, writer. You know what else wraps around you like a warm blanket (apart from summer quotes)? Happiness!

“Live in the sunshine. Swim in the sea. Drink in the wild air.”—Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer

“Then followed that beautiful season…summer…Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape lay, as if new-created in all the freshness of childhood.”—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, poet

“Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability.”—Sam Keen, writer

“Have you summered properly?”—The Beachcomber restaurant, Cape Cod, Massachusetts

“Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August.”—Jenny Han, writer

“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, writer

“The dandelions and buttercups gild all the lawn; the drowsy bee stumbles among the clover tops, and summer sweetens all to me.”—J. R. Lowell, poet

“Summertime. It was a song. It was a season. I wondered if that season would ever live inside of me.”—Benjamin Alire Sáenz, poet. Summer quotes are all very well, but what about summer horoscopes?

“Warm summer sun, shine kindly here.”—Mark Twain, writer

“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass on a summer day listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is hardly a waste of time.”—John Lubbock, politician

“It’s summer and time for wandering…”—Kelli Elmore, writer

“Summertime is always the best of what might be.”—Charles Bowden, writer

“A life without love is like a year without summer.”—Swedish proverb

“I could never in a hundred summers get tired of this.”—Susan Branch, writer

“Summer was our best season: it was sleeping on the back screened porch in cots, or trying to sleep in the treehouse; summer was everything good to eat; it was a thousand colors in a parched landscape.”—Harper Lee, writer

“When all else fails, take a vacation.”—Betty Williams, peace activist

“Every summer has its own story, but mine is a novel.”—Anonymous

“Summer’s lease hath all too short a date.”—William Shakespeare, writer

“In summer, the song sings itself.”—William Carlos Williams, poet

“The summer night is like a perfection of thought.”—Wallace Stevens, poet

“There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart.”—Celia Thaxter, writer

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”—John Steinbeck, writer

Speaking of the cold season, check out these cozy winter quotes.

“If it could only be like this always—always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe.”—Evelyn Waugh, writer

“Some of the best memories are made in flip-flops.”—Kellie Elmore, writer

“It’s a smile, it’s a kiss, it’s a sip of wine … It’s summertime!”—Kenny Chesney, American country music singer

“I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer – its dust and lowering skies.”—Toni Morrison, novelist

“Summer has always been my favorite season. I feel happier.”—Zooey Deschanel, actress

“I love summertime more than anything else in the world. That is the only thing that gets me through the winter, knowing that summer is going to be there.”—Jack McBrayer, actor, comedian

“Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air, and you.”—Langston Hughes, poet, novelist, social activist

“Summer is the annual permission slip to be lazy. To do nothing and have it count for something. To lie in the grass and count the stars. To sit on a branch and study the clouds.”—Regina Brett, author

“In the summer I was a wild child in the woods, with no shoes, and in the fall it was back to the city, shoe shops, and school.”—Margaret Atwood, poet, novelist

“Summer passes and one remembers one’s exuberance.”—Yoko Ono, artist

“She smelled of sun and daisies with a hint of river water.”—Katie Daisy, artist. After reading these summer quotes, feel nostalgic for other seasons with these spring quotes and fall quotes.