Ana > Ana's Quotes

“Can a magician kill a man by magic?” Lord Wellington asked Strange.
Strange frowned. He seemed to dislike the question. “I suppose a magician might,” he admitted, “but a gentleman never could.”
― Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

“She wore a gown the color of storms, shadows, and rain and a necklace of broken promises and regrets.”
― Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

“He's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”
― Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

“What would you do if I died?
If you died I would want to die too.
So you could be with me?
Yes. So I could be with you.
Okay.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road

“You have to carry the fire."
I don't know how to."
Yes, you do."
Is the fire real? The fire?"
Yes it is."
Where is it? I don't know where it is."
Yes you do. It's inside you. It always was there. I can see it.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road

“What I really love about them... is the fact that they contain someone's personal history...I find myself wondering about their lives. I can never look at a garment... without thinking about the woman who owned it. How old was she? Did she work? Was she married? Was she happy?... I look at these exquisite shoes, and I imagine the woman who owned them rising out of them or kissing someone...I look at a little hat like this, I lift up the veil, and I try to imagine the face beneath it... When you buy a piece of vintage clothing you're not just buying the fabric and thread - you're buying a piece of someone's past.”
― Isabel Wolff, A Vintage Affair

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”
― Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

“To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“I wish I was a woman of about thirty-six dressed in black satin with a string of pearls.”
― Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.”
― Daphne Du Maurier, Rebecca

“Style comes from knowing who you are and who you want to be in the world; it does not come from wanting to be somebody else, or wanting to be thinner, shorter, taller, prettier.”
― Nina Garcia, The Little Black Book of Style

“The Romans can not be condemned for the conquest of Egypt; we were conquered by time itself in the end. And all the wonders of this brave new century should draw me from my grief and yet I can not heal my heart; and so the mind suffers; the mind closes as if it were a flower without sun”
― Anne Rice, The Mummy

“And how shall I think of you?' He considered a moment and then laughed. 'Think of me with my nose in a book!”
― Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

“Not all those who wander are lost.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

“A piece of writing is like a piece of magic. You create something out of nothing.”
― Susanna Clarke

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
― Leo Tolstoy

“He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun, yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

“There’s no such thing as ruining your life. Life’s a pretty resilient thing, it turns out.”
― Sophie Kinsella, The Undomestic Goddess

“Every woman is the architect of her own fortune.”
― Jessie Burton, The Miniaturist

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
― Leo Tolstoy , Anna Karenina

“Happy endings aren't for cowards.”
― Jill A. Davis, Girls' Poker Night

“Call me Ishmael.”
― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

“Here dwell together still two men of note
Who never lived and so can never die:
How very near they seem, yet how remote
That age before the world went all awry.
But still the game’s afoot for those with ears
Attuned to catch the distant view-halloo:
England is England yet, for all our fears–
Only those things the heart believes are true.

A yellow fog swirls past the window-pane
As night descends upon this fabled street:
A lonely hansom splashes through the rain,
The ghostly gas lamps fail at twenty feet.
Here, though the world explode, these two survive,
And it is always eighteen ninety-five.”
― Vincent Starrett

“But there can be no grave for Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson...Shall they not always live in Baker Street? Are they not there this moment, as one writes? Outside, the hansoms rattle through the rain, and Moriarty plans his latest devilry. Within, the sea-coal flames upon the hearth and Holmes and Watson take their well-won case...So they still live for all that love them well; in a romantic chamber of the heart, in a nostalgic country of the mind, where it is always 1895.”
― Vincent Starrett, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes

“Nothing erases the past. There is repentance, there is atonement, and there is forgiveness. That is all, but that is enough.”
― Ted Chiang, The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate

“Four things do not come back: the spoken word, the sped arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity.”
― Ted Chiang, The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate

“Not long, not long my father said
Not long shall you be ours
The Raven King knows all too well
Which are the fairest flowers.

The priest was all too worldly
Though he prayed and rang his bell
The Raven King three candles lit
The priest said it was well

Her arms were all too feeble
Though she claimed to love me so
The Raven King stretched out his hand
She sighed and let me go

The land is all too shallow
It is painted on the sky
And trembles like the wind-shook rain
When the Raven King goes by

For always and for always
I pray remember me
Upon the moors, beneath the stars
With the King’s wild company.”
― Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

“Beware; for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.”
― Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Dumbledore watched her fly away, and as her silvery glow faded he turned back to Snape, and his eyes were full of tears.
"After all this time?"
"Always," said Snape.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows