The Knight Quotes

“[N]ot for ten thousand puking maidens.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“it’s not wise to deny everything you can’t understand.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“Each time you gain your hearts desire, your heart shall reach for something higher.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“You saw it?” “Yes. Honest, I did. It didn’t seem like it could be real, but I got up and ran after it, trying to keep it in sight, and it was real, a six-sided castle of white stone up above the clouds.” “You saw it.” His hands were trembling worse than ever. I nodded. “Up among the clouds and moving with them, driven by the same wind. It was white like they were, but the edges were hard and there were colored flags on the towers.” The memory took me by the throat. “It was the most beautiful thing I ever saw.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“They've got tits!”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“The Aelf have struggled to free themselves from the monster called Kulili throughout their history. You are their last hope, and their best. I am not letting you out of my sight—no, not for ten thousand puking maidens.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“A knight,” I told myself, “doesn’t bother to count the enemy.” Another step, and another. “But I wish I’d found Disiri—that I could see her once more before I go.” Ben, I cannot tell you how I knew then that I was going to lose even the memory of her. But I did.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“I thought I saw something and borrowed his big brass telescope. And there it was. The tall, proud trees and the waves lapping a beach of blood-colored sand. I looked and looked, and pretty soon I started to cry. If I could tell you why, I would, but I cannot. Tears ran down my face, and I could not breathe right. I took the telescope down and wiped my eyes and blew my nose. And when I looked again, it was gone.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“I floated there a long time, or anyhow it seemed long to me. There was a little current that turned me slowly, around and around, and carried me along, and that felt great. I was thinking about Disiri and the statue, and they got mixed up in my mind, and I started wondering if I was really real at all. It seemed to me this might be what it was like when you were just a memory, and maybe Disiri was remembering me, and would always remember me, would always love me like I would always love her, and this was me in her mind.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“Every cat is royal,” Mani declared in a tone that said he would be mad if you argued. “I am myself.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“A knight is a man who lives honorably and dies honorably, because he cares more for his honor than for his life. If his honor requires him to fight, he fights. He doesn’t count his foes or measure their strength, because those things don’t matter. They don’t affect his decision.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“Spiny orange,” he said. “You planted it ’fore you went away. It was on my land, and I wouldn’t let nobody cut it. Only somebody done, when I wasn’t looking.” I said nothing. “Thought it might have put up shoots.” He rose again with the help of his staff. “They do, sometimes.” I knelt, took one of the two remaining seeds from my pouch, and planted it near where the earlier stump had grown. When I rose again, his face was streaked with tears.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“She stopped spinning to smile at me. I knew she meant it to be friendly, but her teeth were terrible and looked as sharp as razors.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight

“I had been crazy since I was born, and now I was sane and it felt wonderful. The wind and the waves were sitting in that cave with me twisting thread, and nature was not something outside anymore.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Knight