A Curious Beginning Quotes

“I abhorred weakness of any kind but most particularly in my tea.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Mrs. Clutterthorpe, I can hardly think of any fate worse than becoming the mother of six. Unless perhaps it were plague, and even then I am persuaded a few disfiguring buboes and possible death would be preferable to motherhood.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I am quite determined to be mistress of my own fate, Mrs. Clutterthorpe, but I do sympathize with how strange it must sound to you. It is not your fault that you are entirely devoid of imagination. I blame your education”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“That is the hallmark of a good partnership, you know - when one partner sees the forest and the other studies the trees.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“O, the perfidy of men.” “What have I done?” he protested. “Nothing at present, but you are the only representative of your sex I have at hand to abuse. Take your lumps for your brothers.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“One cannot innovate new improvements without understanding old failures.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I have faith that men can be as reasonable and logical as women if they but try.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“In my experience it is far better to tell a man what he wants to hear then do as you please, than attempt to reason with him.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I have known enough of women to understand they are as duplicitous and vicious as men. If they are capable of being our equals in malice, why not in our better qualities as well? There are no masculine virtues, Veronica. And none sacred to women either. We are all of us just people, and most badly flawed ones at that.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“He considered that a moment, rolling the sweet over his tongue. "There are times when it is entirely safe to show one's vulnerability, to roll over and reveal the soft underbelly beneath. But there are other times when pain must be borne without a murmur, when the pain is so consuming that if you give in to it, even in the slightest, you have lost everything.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“The truth is a hard mirror, and I am in no mood to look upon my reflection.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Everyone has a capacity for cruelty. Not everyone gets the chance to exercise it.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“After all, I might not intend to use him for a plaything, but I could still appreciate looking through the toy-shop window.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I felt in this new adventure I was rousing to life again. I was a butterfly, newly emerged from the chrysalis, damp winged and trembling with expectation.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Should I be in distress? In a meadow? You mean if the cows organize some sort of attack? I have extensive experience with cows. They almost never do that.” “Forget”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“As a scientist I rebelled against the disorder, and I had long since discovered that nothing thwarted the mental processes like clutter.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“We are, as a gender, undereducated and infantilized to the point of idiocy. But those of us who have been given the benefit of learning and useful occupation, well, we are proof that the traditional notions of feminine delicacy and helplessness are the purest poppycock.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“You put us on pedestals and wrap us in cotton wool, cluck over us as being too precious and too fragile for any real labor of the mind, yet where is the concern for the Yorkshire woman working herself into an early grave in a coal mine? The factory girl who chokes herself to an untimely death on bad air? The wife so worn by repeated childbearing that she is dead at thirty? No, my dear Stoker, your sex has held the reins of power for too long. And I daresay you will not turn them loose without a fight.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“You must engage in horizontal refreshment. It isn’t healthy to congest oneself like that.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“One seldom finds something if one never actually looks for it.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“I was merely thinking that it may have been a very grave mistake to introduce you to Lady C. If the pair of you ever put your minds to it, you could probably topple governments together.” I smiled as I pocketed the weapon. “One thing at a time, dear Stoker. One thing at a time.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“In my experience it is the trouble you do not anticipate that is the most dangerous.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Except for my net, everything I have need of in the world is contained in that bag—including a second hat and a rather sizable jar of cold cream of roses. Do not tell me you couldn’t travel with as little. I have faith that men can be as reasonable and logical as women if they but try.” He shook his head. “I cannot seem to formulate a clear thought in the face of such original thinking, Miss Speedwell. You have a high opinion of your sex.” I pursed my lips. “Not all of it. We are, as a gender, undereducated and infantilized to the point of idiocy. But those of us who have been given the benefit of learning and useful occupation, well, we are proof that the traditional notions of feminine delicacy and helplessness are the purest poppycock.”

“You have large opinions for so small a person.”

“I daresay they would be large opinions even for someone your size,” I countered.

“And where did you form these opinions? Either your school was inordinately progressive or your governess was a Radical.”

“I never went to school, nor did I have a governess. Books were my tutors, Mr. Stoker. Anything I wished to learn I taught myself.”

“There are limits to an autodidactic education,” he pointed out.

“Few that I have found. I was spared the prejudices of formal educators."

“And neither were you inspired by them. A good teacher can change the course of a life,” he said thoughtfully.

“Perhaps. But I had complete intellectual freedom. I studied those subjects which interested me—to the point of obsession at times—and spent precious little time on things which did not.”

“Such as?”

“Music and needlework. I am astonishingly lacking in traditional feminine accomplishments.”

He cocked his head. “I am not entirely astonished.” But his tone was mild, and I accepted the statement as nothing like an insult. In fact, it felt akin to a compliment. “And I must confess that between Jane Austen and Fordyce’s Sermons, I have developed a general antipathy for clergymen. And their wives,” I added, thinking of Mrs. Clutterthorpe. “Well, in that we may be agreed. Tell me, do you find many people to share your views?”
“Shockingly few,” I admitted.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“One may be elegant or enthusiastic, but seldom both. If”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“He gave me a look that was almost pitying, and when he smiled it was the smile of a vengeful god. "My dear Veronica, I am suprised you have not already learned -- everyone has a capacity for cruelty. Not everyone gets the chance to exercise it.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Why, that is most intriguing. A lady scientist," he said in a tone of wonderment. "What will they think of next?”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Why must you argue before I even have my tea? So many words.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Aunt Nell used to say it was not decent to have violet eyes, that they were a telltale sign of bad nature, like ginger hair or a hunchback.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning

“Mrs. Clutterthorpe, I can hardly think of any fate worse than becoming the mother of six ... unless perhaps it were plague.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning