Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo Quotes

“Of all the things that men may heed
'Tis most of love they sing indeed.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“She shone in beauty upon the shore; Long did my glance on her alight, and the longer I looked I knew her more.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“No hill was so tall that it stayed my tread.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“Marry! Good man, 'tis madness thou askest, and since folly thou hast sought, thou deservest to find it.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“... for a man may cover his blemish, but unbind it he cannot, for where once 'tis applied, thence part will it never.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“... right glad is the grass that grows in the open, when the damp dewdrops are dripping from the leaves, to greet a gay glance of the glistening sun.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“I am but dirt and dust in kind, and you a rich and radiant rose...”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“... she shone in beauty upon the shore; Long did my glance on her alight, and the longer I looked I knew her more.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo

“but in his one hand he held a holly-bundle,
that is greatest in greenery where groves are leafless,
and an axe in the other, ugly and monstrous,
a ruthless weapon aright for one in rhyme to describe:
the head was as large and as long as an ellwand,
a branch of green steel and of beaten gold;
the bit, burnished bright and broad at the edge,
as well shaped for shearing as sharp razors;
the stern was a stout staff, by which sternly he gripped it,
all bound with iron about to the base of the handle,
and engraved in green in graceful patterns,
lapped round with a lanyard that was lashed to the head
and down the length of the haft was looped many times;
and tassels of price were tied there in plenty
to bosses of the bright green, braided most richly.”
― Christopher Tolkien, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo