Gatherings Quotes

“Plan your guest list carefully. That is the key ingredient to any memorable gathering.”
― Annie Falk

“The food's always better if there's a fiddler in the kitchen.”
― Melanie Eccles

“Below us was a frozen lake. It was perfectly round, a great gleaming eye in which the moon and stars were mirrored. Lanterns glowing the same cold white as the aurora dangled from the lake's edge to a scattering of benches and merchant-stands, draped in bright awnings of opal and blue. Delicious smells floated on the wind---smoked fish; fire-roasted nuts and candies; spiced cakes. A winter fair.*


* Outside of Russia, almost all known species of courtly fae, and many common fae also, are fond of fairs and markets; indeed, such gatherings appear in stories as the interstitial spaces between their worlds and ours, and thus it is not particularly surprising that they feature in so many encounters with the Folk. The character of such markets, however, varies widely, from sinister to benign. The following features are universal: 1) Dancing, which the mortal visitor may be invited to partake in; 2) A variety of vendors selling foods and goods which the visitor is unable to recall afterwards. More often than not, the markets take place at night. Numerous scholars have attempted to document these gatherings; the most widely referenced accounts are by Baltasar Lenz, who successfully visited two fairs in Bavaria before his disappearance in 1899.”
― Heather Fawcett, Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

“In intimate conversation I am as supportive and positive as the next man, but gatherings of happy people make me miserable. I long to share in the collective joy, but instead I am racked with anxiety.”
― Joel Derfner, Swish: My Quest to Become the Gayest Person Ever

“There is nothing more magical than gathering an interesting group of people and enjoying good food in the expansive beauty of nature.”
― Annie Falk

“It was not so much that he had anything against people in general, more that he saw no purpose in deliberately setting up occasions on which you stood around trying to think of something to say. Moreover, the whole process was self-perpetuating; the guest became the host in an act of social revenge and thus it was on for ever. The only sensible course was never to start it in the first place.”
― Penelope Lively, Passing On