Henry > Henry's Quotes

“Idealistic? Ruddy stupid, if you'll pardon the language, miss,: Mr Roberts said. "All this talk about power for the people and down with the ruling classes and everyone should govern themselves. It can never happen, I told him. The ruling classes are born to rule. They know how to do it. You take a person like you or me and you put us up there to run a country and we'd make a ruddy mess of it.”
― Rhys Bowen, A Royal Pain

“Oh, Adam’s sons, how cleverly you defend yourselves against all that might do you good!”
― C.S. Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew

“What you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. It also depends on what sort of person you are.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew

“The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“Chaos is merely order waiting to be deciphered.”
― José Saramago, The Double

“Where you stand depends on where you sit.”
― Nelson Mandela

“Barbarians, we call them, while all the while we timidly cling to our Web like Visigoths crouching in the ruins of Rome's faded glory and proclaim ourselves civilized.”
― Dan Simmons, Hyperion

“How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.”
― Henry David Thoreau

“[The Void Which Binds] actual but unaccessible presence in our universe is one of the prime causes for our species elaborating myth and religion, for our stubborn, blind belief in extrasensory powers, in telepathy and precognition, in demons and demigods and resurrection and reincarnation and ghosts and messiahs and so many other categories of almost-but-not-quite satisfying bullshit.”
― Dan Simmons, The Rise of Endymion

“A man might desire something for a moment, while a larger part of him rejects it. You'll need to learn to judge people by their actions, not their thoughts.”
― Helene Wecker, The Golem and the Jinni

“When you play a game of thrones you win or you die.”
― George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones

“All fiction is largely autobiographical and much autobiography is, of course, fiction.”
― P.D. James

“Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. ”
― George Orwell

“A poet is a musician that can't sing. Words have to find a man's mind before they can touch his heart, and some men's minds are woeful small targets. Music touches their hearts directly no matter how small or stubborn the mind of the man who listens.”
― Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind

“She wasn't dressed like a student. She wore an elaborate burgundy dress with long skirts, a tight waist, and matching burgundy gloves that rose all the way to her elbows.

Moving deliberately, she managed to get down off the stool without tangling her feet and made her way over to stand nest to my table. Her blond hair was artfully curled, and her lips were a deeply painted red. I couldn't help wondering what she was doing in a place like Anker's.”
― Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear

“To see and feel one's beloved naked for the first time is one of life's pure, irreducible epiphanies. If there is a true religion in the universe, it must include that truth of contact or be forever hollow. To make love to the one true person who deserves that love is one of the few absolute rewards of being a human being, balancing all of the pain, loss, awkwardness, loneliness, idiocy, compromise, and clumsiness that go with the human condition. To make love to the right person makes up for a lot of mistakes.”
― Dan Simmons, The Rise of Endymion

“when your true enemies are too strong, you have to choose weaker enemies. I reflected that this is why the simple are so called. Only the powerful always know with great clarity who their true enemies are.”
― Umberto Eco, The Name Of The Rose

“The simple cannot choose their personal heresy, Adso; they cling to the man preaching in their land, who passes through their village or stops in their square.”
― Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose

“The great Bonaventure said that the wise must enhance conceptual clarity with the truth implicit in the actions of the simple...."
"Like the chapter of Perugia and the learned memories of Ubertino, which transform into theological decisions the summons of the simple to poverty." I said.
"Yes, but as you have seen, this happens too late, and when it happens, the truth of the simple has already been transformed into the truth of the powerful, more useful for the Emperor Louis than for a Friar of the Poor Life.”
― Umberto Eco

“No one needs a relationship. What you need is the basic cop-on to figure that out, in the face of all the media bullshit screaming that you're nothing on your own and you're a dangerous freak if you disagree. The truth is, if you don't exist without someone else, you don't exist at all. And that doesn't just go for romance. I love my ma, I love my friends, I love the bones of them. If any of them wanted me to donate a kidney or crack a few heads, I'd do it, no questions asked. And if they all waved good-bye and walked out of my life tomorrow, I'd still be the same person I am today.”
― Tana French, The Trespasser

“Breslin gives me his wise-teacher smile, which is kind and crinkly and would make me feel warm all over if I was dumber than a bag of hair.”
― Tana French, The Trespasser

“Then I sit there, running the heat to try and thaw my feet after Lucy’s flat, and watch the people going past. They make me edgy. Dozens and dozens of people, they just keep coming, and every single one of their heads is crammed with stories they believe and stories they want to believe and stories someone else has made them believe, and every story is battering against the thin walls of the person’s skull, drilling and gnawing for its chance to escape and attack someone”
― Tana French, The Trespasser

“I'm with the federal government, Drummond, Trust me is another way of saying I'm lying.”
― Brian Haig, The Night Crew

“When I venture to point out the unfairness of this, I am reminded of the second item on my list. Apparently the only acceptable destiny for a young female mem​b​er of the house of Windsor is to marry into another of the royal houses that still seem to litter Europe, even though there are precious few reigning monarchs these days. it seems that even a very minor Windsor like myself is a desirable commodity for those wishing a tenuous alliance with Britain at this unsettled time. I am constantly being reminded that is is my duty to make a good match with some half-lunatic, buck-toothed, chinless, spinele​s​s​​​, and utterly awful European royal, thus cementing ties with a potential enemy. My cousin Alex did this, poor thing. I have learned from her tragic example.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“So none of the young men we encountered during our season gave you hot pants for them?
Belinda! Your language.
I've been mingling with Americans. Such fun. So Naughty.”
― Rhys Bowen, Her Royal Spyness

“Is the princess still in the fitting room?"
"Oh no, darling. She appeared about half an hour ago. Poured herself a black coffee, and looked longingly at the cakes. That child is starving herself if you ask me. Now she's definitely too thin. European men do like a woman to have a little meat on her bones."
"And Prince Nicolas, have you seen him recently?"
"I haven't seen him since lunch. I gather he and Antone went out to shoot. And I expect Max went with them. They're only happy when they're shooting something. Apart from sex of course."
"Mother!" I gave her a warning frown. My mother glanced around at the other women, who were tucking into their tort with abandon.
"They won't understand. Their English is hopeless, darling. Besides, it is about time you are acquainted with the facts of life. I've hopelessly neglected my duty in that area. Men only have two thoughts in their heads. And those are killing or copulating."
"I'm sure there are plenty of men with finer feelings who are interested in art and culture."
"Yes, darling. Of course there are. They are called ferries. And they are quite adorable. So witty and fun to be with. But in my long and varied life I've found that the ones who are witty to be with are no use in bed. And vice versa.”
― Rhys Bowen, Royal Blood

“I gather you weren't keen on going back to Scotland with your brother at this time of year. I don't say I blame you. Terribly bleak and cutoff in the winter."
"Oh no, Mom," I said, as her words sunk in. "My brother is not going back to Scotland. He and my sister-in-law are going to the Riviera."
The Riviera? I had no idea."
"For my sister-in-law's health. She's feeling rather frail at the moment."
"I don't think that frail would ever be a word to describe your sister-in-law," the Queen said, looking up with a half smile on her lips as a tray of coffee was reeled into the room.
"I managed to have six children without making a fuss. One just got on with it.”
― Rhys Bowen, Naughty in Nice

“Aren't you going a little overboard?" I asked, picturing a day ahead of me trying to find these items in a town I didn't know.
"Nonsense, darling. What's the point of a party if you don't go overboard."
I sat on the sofa watching her, admiring her. Not only was she beautiful, but she had a wonderful way of shaking off life's little problems, like water off a duck's back. Nothing seemed to upset her.”
― Rhys Bowen, Naughty in Nice

“A man in love does not notice the cut of the dress, but rather a face of a beloved.”
― Rhys Bowen, Naughty in Nice

“It's not her fault she can't cook."
"You are too nice natured, darling. You won't get anywhere in this world being kind and generous. You must turn into a lioness like me and gobble up people who disagree with you."
"I'm not very good at gobbling," I said. "And I want to like people, and be liked by them."
She sighed. "The sooner you get married and have babies to adore the better.”
― Rhys Bowen, Heirs and Graces