Marie Brennan > Quotes

“Science is not separate from politics. As much as I would like it to be a pure thing, existing only in some intellectual realm unsullied by human struggle, it will always be entangled with the world we live in.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents

“I sometimes imagine there is a clerk behind a desk situated between the brain and the mouth. It is his job to examine utterances on their way out, and stamp them with approval or send them back for reconsideration. If such a clerk exists, mine must be very harried and overworked; and on occasion he puts his head down on the desk in despair, letting things pass without so much as a second glance.”
― Marie Brennan, In the Labyrinth of Drakes

“I believed myself to be ready then; now, with the hindsight brought by greater age, I see myself for the naive and inexperienced young woman I was. We all begin in such a manner, though. There is no quick route to experience.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“Be warned, then: the collected volumes of this series will contain frozen mountains, foetid swamps, hostile foreigners, hostile fellow countrymen, the occasional hostile family member, bad decisions, misadventures in orienteering, diseases of an unromantic sort, and a plenitude of mud.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“But coming to terms with one’s sorrow is one thing; sharing it with strangers is quite another.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“Nudity, I find, rapidly becomes boring when it is not treated as scandalous.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents

“There is no faster way to harden my determination than to assume I will fail at something.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents

“I have never attempted to hide that I have had two husbands in my life.
I have, however, neglected to mention that in between them, I had a wife.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“Would that I were a man,’” I said, quoting Sarpalyce’s legend. “Except that I do not wish I were a man. I only wish that being a woman did not limit me so.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents

“The dragon within my heart stirred, shifting her wings, as if remembering they could be used to fly.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“This will sound peculiar, I know. But this love I have for dragons, my compulsion to understand them ... I have thought of it before as though there were a dragon within me. A part of my spirit. I do not believe it is true in any mystical sense, of course; I am as human as you are. But in the metaphorical sense, yes. 'Dragon-spirited' is a good a term for me as any."

He listened to this in silence, his expression settled into the grave lines it assumed when he was deep in thought. "Do you believe you are neither male nor female?"

I almost gave a malapert answer, but caught myself in time. We had an established habit of intellectual debate, and I valued it; I would not discard it now.

"So long as my society refuses to admit of a concept of femininity that allows for such things," I said, "then one could indeed say that I stand in between.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“If you wish, gentle reader, you may augment your mental tableau with dramatic orchestral accompaniment.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“I find that respectability grows wearisome after a time, when one is accustomed to being a disgrace.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“A husband willing to fund a library for his bookish wife is not so easy to obtain; most would see it as a pointless expense. You might, however, find one willing to share his library.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“It’s—it’s as if there is a dragon inside me. I don’t know how big she is; she may still be growing. But she has wings, and strength, and—and I can’t keep her in a cage. She’ll die. I’ll die. I know it isn’t modest to say these things, but I know I’m capable of more than life in Scirland will allow. It’s all right for women to study theology, or literature, but nothing so rough and ready as this. And yet this is what I want. Even if it’s hard, even if it’s dangerous. I don’t care. I need to see where my wings can carry me.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“Matriarchy is a time-honored staple for any writer looking to invent an exotic society.”
― Marie Brennan

“That should be my epitaph when I die 'she did not have to do it'.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“Their characteristics are well-known. They're beautiful -- when they're not astoundingly ugly. They're both goddesses for men to worship, and demons for them to flee. They adore children, sometimes to the point of unhealthy obsession. They have a strong association with nature, from which they're often assumed to draw magical power. Their anger is a terrible thing to behold, and all the more fearsome because anything can spark it; the rules by which these creatures operate are not those of rational men. They are creatures of fanciful whim, and they never, ever, can be understood.

I'm talking, of course, about women.”
― Marie Brennan

“But I know, at least, that you would keep a library on the subject, and I hoped that I might be allowed to read from it.” He regarded me with a bemused expression. “You want me for my library.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“One benefit of being an old woman now, and moreover one who has been called a "national treasure," is that there are very few who can tell me what I may and may not write.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“You may think you see plenty of stars, friend reader, but you are wrong. Night is both blacker and more brilliant than you can imagine, and the sky a glory that puts to shame the most splendid jewels at Renwick's.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“There is nothing in the world so enticing as that which you have been told you may not have.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents

“Sheep eat the grass, wolves eat the deer, and dragons eat everything that doesn’t run away fast enough.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“There are proverbs about frying pans and fires that I might have quoted to myself, but I preferred to adapt a different one to my purposes: better the devil that would attack everyone impartially than the devil specifically looking to kill us.”
― Marie Brennan, A Natural History of Dragons

“You and I are not held to the same standards, Andrew. People will forgive a slip, a weakness, a minor personal folly — when it comes from a man. They may click their tongues at you, even gossip about your behavior…but at worst, it will only reflect on you.

“If I misstep, it goes far beyond me. Errors on my part are proof that women are unsuited to professional work.”
― Marie Brennan, In the Labyrinth of Drakes

“Once we love, we cannot revoke it,' she said. 'We can only glory in what it brings -- pain as well as joy, grief as well as hope.”
― Marie Brennan, Midnight Never Come

“Jake pried the head open, giving me a look when I warned him not to cut himself on the teeth. It is a look I think all children master at about his age—the one that insists the looker needs no warning while, by its very confidence, convincing the one looked at that the warning was very necessary indeed.”
― Marie Brennan, The Voyage of the Basilisk

“This was London, in all its filth and glory. Nostalgic for the past, while yearning to cast off the chains of bygone ages and step forward into the bright utopia of the future. Proud of its achievements, yet despising its own flaws. A monster in both size and nature, that would consume the unwary and spit them out again, in forms unrecognizable and undreamt.

London, the monster city.”
― Marie Brennan, With Fate Conspire

“...A widow has freedoms a wife does not. But when I look at you, I do not see obstacles for my career, I see-" My face burned even more. "I see wings. A way to fly higher and further than I can on my own.”
― Marie Brennan, In the Labyrinth of Drakes

“One does not cease to treasure a gem simply because one owns another that is larger.”
― Marie Brennan, The Tropic of Serpents