Re:no > Re:no's Quotes

“Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.”
― Groucho Marx, The Essential Groucho: Writings For By And About Groucho Marx

“Tell them stories.”
― Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

“I've been making a list of the things they don't teach you at school. They don't teach you how to love somebody. They don't teach you how to be famous. They don't teach you how to be rich or how to be poor. They don't teach you how to walk away from someone you don't love any longer. They don't teach you how to know what's going on in someone else's mind. They don't teach you what to say to someone who's dying. They don't teach you anything worth knowing.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones

“Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow-truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 3: Dream Country

“The way you're singing in your sleep
The way you look before you leap
The strange illusions that you keep
You don't know
But I'm noticing

The way your touch turns into arcs
The way you slide into the dark
The beating of my open heart
You don't know
But I'm noticing”
― David Levithan, Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist

“His lips made a grim twist that was like the joyless cousin of a smile.”
― Laini Talyor

“There are few men with more blood on their hands than me. None, that I know of.
The Bloody-Nine they call me, my enemies, and there’s a lot of ’em. Always more enemies, and fewer friends.
Blood gets you nothing but more blood.
It follows me now, always, like my shadow, and like my shadow I can never be free of it.
I should never be free of it.
I’ve earned it.
I’ve deserved it.
I’ve sought it out.

Such is my punishment.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“The lowly squabble over trifles. The great wage secret wars for power and wealth, and they call it government. Wars of words, and tricks, and guile, but no less bloody for that.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“The more you learn, the more you realize how little you know. Still, the struggle itself is worthwhile. Knowledge is the root of power, after all.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“Some things have to be done. It's better to do them, than to live with the fear of them.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“History is littered with dead good men.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“You have to learn to love the small things in life, like a hot bath. You have to love the small things, when you have nothing else.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“I’ve fought in three campaigns,” he began. “In seven pitched battles. In countless raids and skirmishes and desperate defences, and bloody actions of every kind. I’ve fought in the driving snow, the blasting wind, the middle of the night. I’ve been fighting all my life, one enemy or another, one friend or another. I’ve known little else. I’ve seen men killed for a word, for a look, for nothing at all. A woman tried to stab me once for killing her husband, and I threw her down a well. And that’s far from the worst of it. Life used to be cheap as dirt to me. Cheaper.

“I’ve fought ten single combats and I won them all, but I fought on the wrong side and for all the wrong reasons. I’ve been ruthless, and brutal, and a coward. I’ve stabbed men in the back, burned them, drowned them, crushed them with rocks, killed them asleep, unarmed, or running away. I’ve run away myself more than once. I’ve pissed myself with fear. I’ve begged for my life. I’ve been wounded, often, and badly, and screamed and cried like a baby whose mother took her tit away. I’ve no doubt the world would be a better place if I’d been killed years ago, but I haven’t been, and I don’t know why.”

He looked down at his hands, pink and clean on the stone. “There are few men with more blood on their hands than me. None, that I know of. The Bloody-Nine they call me, my enemies, and there’s a lot of ’em. Always more enemies, and fewer friends. Blood gets you nothing but more blood. It follows me now, always, like my shadow, and like my shadow I can never be free of it. I should never be free of it. I’ve earned it. I’ve deserved it. I’ve sought it out. Such is my punishment.”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“Has it ever occured to you, Master Ninefingers, that a sword is different from other weapons? Axes and maces and so forth are lethal enough, but they hang on the belt like dumb brutes. But a sword...a sword has a voice.
Sheathed it has little to say, to be sure, but you need only put your hand on the hilt and it begins to whisper in your enemy's ear. A gentle word. A word of caution. Do you hear it?
Now, compare it to the sword half drawn. It speaks louder, does it not? It hisses a dire threat. It makes a deadly promise. Do you hear it?
Now compare it to the sword full drawn. It shouts now, does it not? It screams defiance! It bellows a challenge! Do you hear it?”
― Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself

“Anyone can face ease and success with confidence. It is the way we face trouble and misfortune that defines us.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Before They Are Hanged

“One should learn the lessons of history. The mistakes of the past need only be made once. Unless there are no other choices. ~ Bayaz”
― Joe Abercrombie, Before They Are Hanged

“You have to realistic about these things.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“Proof is boring. Proof is tiresome. Proof is an irrelevance. People would far rather be handed an easy lie than search for a difficult truth, especially if it suits their own purposes.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“Sometimes it doesn't matter too much what choice you make, as long as you make it quick and stick to it.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“You can never have too many knives, his father had told him. Unless they're pointed at you, and by people who don't like you much. ”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“It's hard to be done a favor by a man you hate. It's hard to hate him so much afterwards. Losing an enemy can be worse than losing a friend, if you've had him for long enough.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“It always amazes me, how swiftly problems can be solved, once you start cutting things off people.”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“They appear somewhat unreliable," he murmured.
"Unreliable? Nonsense, Superior! Out of luck is all, and we both know how that goes, no? Why, there's not a man of them I wouldn't trust my mother to."
"Are you sure?"
"She's been dead these twenty years. What harm could they do her now?”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“The lamplight gleamed on the Magus’ white grin. “People like to watch the pretty puppets, Superior. Even a glimpse of the puppeteer can be most upsetting for them. Why, they might even suddenly notice the strings around their own wrists”
― Joe Abercrombie, Last Argument of Kings

“It frightens me, the awful truth, of how sweet life can be...”
― Bob Dylan

“I hear laughter and someone asks if I need help, not in a nice way. I snarl, 'What I need is for your mother to have thought a little harder nine months before your birthday.”
― Maggie Stiefvater, The Scorpio Races

“Sleep my little baby-oh
Sleep until you waken
When you wake you'll see the world
If I'm not mistaken...

Kiss a lover
Dance a measure,
Find your name
And buried treasure...

Face your life
Its pain,
Its pleasure,
Leave no path untaken.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book

“There’s no freedom quite like the freedom of being constantly underestimated.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora

“Difficult" and "impossible" are cousins often mistaken for one another, with very little in common.”
― Scott Lynch, Red Seas Under Red Skies

“If reassurances could dull pain, nobody would ever go to the trouble of pressing grapes.”
― Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora