The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2)

by Patrick Rothfuss

“If we were living in a better age they’d build a temple around a woman like that.”

It was an odd feeling, this fondness for a place. In some ways it was comforting, but the Ruh in me was restless, rebelling at the thought of putting down roots like a plant.

“Because you are too eager to be properly patient,” he said flippantly. “You’re too proud to listen properly. And you’re too clever by half. That’s the worst of it.”

“You think you can trust me to teach you,” he said. “You think I will keep you safe. But that is the worst sort of foolishness.”

Books are a poor substitute for female companionship, but they are easier to find.

“Names reflect true understanding of a thing, and when you truly understand a thing you have power over it.”

“Arcanists do not do this anymore. It is insane.” He looked at me. “Why are you smiling?” “I’m relieved,” I said honestly. “I was worried I’d given myself cadmium poisoning, or I had some mysterious disease. This is just someone trying to kill me.”

They were the best sort of friends. The sort everyone hopes for but no one deserves, least of all me.

It means I breathe the free air and walk where my feet take me. I do not cringe and fawn like a dog at a man’s title. That looks like pride to people who have spent their lives cultivating supple spines.”

this. It was worth the whole awful, irritating time spent searching the Archives just to watch that moment happen. It was worth blood and the fear of death to see her fall in love with him. Just a little. Just the first faint breath of love, so light she probably didn’t notice it herself. It wasn’t dramatic, like some bolt of lightning with a crack of thunder following. It was more like when flint strikes steel and the spark fades almost too fast for you to see. But still, you know it’s there, down where you can’t see, kindling.

Because while your mouths might speak the same language, your hearts do not.”

“You would rather be close to her heart,” Wilem said without any particular inflection. “You would rather be joyfully held in the circle of her arms. But you fear she will reject you. You fear she would laugh and you would look the fool.”

He barely even owned his own name, and even that had been worn thin and threadbare through the years.

“When someone tells you a piece of their life, they’re giving you a gift, not granting you your due.”

“All the truth in the world is held in stories, you know.”

He advised me to take full advantage of every reckless opportunity that presented itself.

“It is a high place with a chance of falling. Things are more easily seen from edges. Danger rouses the sleeping mind.

“Remember: there are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.”

Our power has limits we can extend, but not indefinitely.”

Pride is always a better lever against the nobility than reason.

The point is not to play as tight as you can. The point is to be bold. To be dangerous. Be elegant.”

trap that’s laid for him. But to stride in boldly with a plan to turn it on its ear, that is a marvelous thing.”

Either he’ll see it or he won’t. In his own time, in his own way.” He shrugged. “Or not, and the sun will still rise in the morning.”

nothing in the world is harder than convincing someone of an unfamiliar truth.

“Think twice and step carefully,”

“Maps don’t just have outside edges. They have inside edges. Holes. Folk like to pretend they know everything about the world. Rich folk especially. Maps are great for that.

“That’s a shot to sing a song about,”

When she spoke, it was matter-of-fact. As if she couldn’t imagine a world in which you didn’t want to do exactly as she said.

Half of seeming clever is keeping your mouth shut at the right times.

Only a fool disbelieves what he sees with his own eyes.

“the gentle shadow fears the candleflame. how could your fledgling shaed not feel the same?”

a wise man views a moonless night with fear.”

“That’s the price you pay for civilization though.” “What price?” I asked. “Arrogance,”

“I swear it by my tongue and teeth,” Bast said crisply. “I swear it on the doors of stone. I am telling you three thousand times. There is nothing in my world or yours more dangerous than the Cthaeh.”

“There’s a look a man has when he knows his way around a woman, Ben Crayton. Not that you would know.

Each woman is like an instrument, waiting to be learned, loved, and finely played, to have at last her own true music made.

Our language is rich with implication, so it is easier for us to accept the existence of things that cannot be explained.

a leader is not a muscle. A leader is a mind.”

I would be whole, but I would be less than I am now.”

“Seriously, it’s like you stepped out of a storybook.”

“This is named Saicere.” “Caesura?” I asked, startled by the name. Wasn’t that what Sim had called the break in the line of Eld Vintic verse? Was I being given a poet’s sword?

You are a good man, and a pretty thing. But still, you are only a man. All you have to offer the world is your anger.”

Cyphus bears the blue flame. Stercus is in thrall of iron. Ferule chill and dark of eye. Usnea lives in nothing but decay. Grey Dalcenti never speaks. Pale Alenta brings the blight. Last there is the lord of seven: Hated. Hopeless. Sleepless. Sane. Alaxel bears the shadow’s hame.”

Travel is the great leveler, the great teacher, bitter as medicine, crueler than mirror-glass. A long stretch of road will teach you more about yourself than a hundred years of quiet introspection.”

“The first few times are the worst. You’ll get the shakes and lose some sleep. But that’s the price of doing what needs to be done.”

“And some folk need killing. That’s all there is to it.”

“Leave mystery to poets, priests, and fools.”

“If whatever you’re going to do is wrong, you might as well do whatever you want.”