Quotes from Ella Enchanted

“I wished she’d never stop squeezing me. I wished I could spend the rest of my life as a child, being slightly crushed by someone who loved me.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“It is helpful to know the proper way to behave, so one can decide whether or not to be proper.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Do you like to slide?" His voice was eager.
Stair rails! Did he suspect me? I forced a sigh. "No, Majesty. I'm terrified of heights."
"Oh." His polite tone had returned.
"I wish I could enjoy it. This fear of heights is an affliction."
He nodded, a show of sympathy but not much interest. I was losing him.
"Especially," I added, "as I've grown taller.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“That's funny, you're funny. I like you, I'm quite taken by you.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“And so, with laughter and love, we lived happily ever after.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Hush Hattie!" I said, intoxicated with my success. "I don't want to go to my room. Everyone must know I shan't marry the prince." I ran to the door to our street, opened it, and called out into the night, "I shan't marry the prince." I turned back into the hall and ran to Char and threw my arms about his neck. "I shan't marry you." I kissed his cheek. He was safe from me.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“I want to be with you forever and beyond...”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“I trust you to find the good in me, but the bad I must be sure you don't overlook.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“If I couldn't sleep, I could read.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“That fool of a fairy Lucinda did not intend to lay a curse on me. She meant to bestow a gift. When I cried inconsolably through my first hour of life, my tears were her inspiration. Shaking her head sympathetically at Mother, the fairy touched my nose. "My gift is obedience. Ella will always be obedient. Now stop crying, child."
I stopped.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“No, I won't marry you. I won't do it. No one can force me.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“He put his hand on my waist, and my heart began to pound, a rougher rhythm than the music. I held my skirt. Our free hands met. His felt warm and comforting and unsettling and bewildering--all at once.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“He loved me. He'd loved me as long as he he'd known me! I hadn't loved him as long perhaps, but now I loved him equally well, or better. I loved his laugh, his handwriting, his steady gaze, his honorableness, his freckles, his appreciation of my jokes, his hands, his determination that I should know the worst of him. And, most of all, shameful though it might be, I loved his love for me.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Although we didn't invite Lucinda, she arrived anyway-with a gift.
"No need," Char and I chimed together.
"Remember when you were a squirrel," Mandy said.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Would you favor me with a dance?" Over all the others I was his choice! I curtsied, and he took my hand. Our hands knew each other. Char looked at me, startled. "Have we met before, Lady?”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Father asks frequently in his letters whether I fancy any Ayorthaian young lady or any in our acquaintance at home. I say no I suppose I'm confessing another fault: pride. I don't want him to know that I love if my affections are not returned”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“But what I really long to know you do not tell either: what you feel, although I've given you hints by the score of my regard. You like me. You wouldn't waste time or paper on a being you didn't like. But I think I've loved you since we met at your mother's funeral. I want to be with you forever and beyond, but you write that you are too young to marry or too old or too short or too hungry---until I crumple your letters up in despair, only to smooth them out again for a twelfth reading, hunting for hidden meanings.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“No one is here," Char said. "You need resist temptation no longer." "Only if you slide too." "I'll go first so I can catch you at the bottom." He flew down so incautiously that I suspected him of years of practice in his own castle. It was my turn. The ride was a dream, longer and steeper than the rail at home. The hall rose to meet me, and Char was there. He caught me and spun me around.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Oak, granite,
Lilies by the road,
Remember me?
I remember you.
Clouds brushing
Clover hills,
Remember me?
Sister, child,
Grown tall,
Remember me?
I remember you.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“You were her friend?" he asked. "You liked her?" I told him Ella was the best friend I ever had. He paused again, and I feared he would say she died. But he finally answered that he believed her to be well and married to a rich gentleman. He added, " She is happy, I think, She is rich, so she is happy." Without thinking, I blurted, "Ella doesn't care about riches." Then I realized I'd contradicted a prince! " How do you know?" he said. I answered, "At school everyone hated me because I wasn't wealthy and because I spoke with an accent. She was the only one who was kind." "Perhaps she's changed," he said. " I don't think so, your Highness.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“Perhaps we can come here together someday. By the way, you're a month older than the last time I saw you. Are you still too young to marry.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“He bowed. 'The young lady must not dance alone.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“I became simply a pair of eyes, staring through my mask at Char. I needed no ears because I was too far off to hear his voice, no words because I was too distant for speech, and no thoughts - those I saved for later. He bent his head. I loved the hairs on the nape of his neck. He moved his lips. I admired their changing shape. He clasped his hand. I blessed his fingers. Once, the power of my gaze drew his eyes...”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“I know all about you," Char announced after we'd taken a few more steps. "You do? How could you?" "Your cook and our cook meet at the market. She talks about you." He looked sideways at me. "Do you know much about me?”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“To pretend I was sliding down the stair rail." He laughed again. " You should have done it. I would have caught you at the bottom.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“But my last conscious thought was an image of Prince Char when he'd caught the bridle of Sir Stephan's horse. His face had been close to mine. Two curls had spilled onto his forehead. A few freckles dusted his nose, and his eyes said he was sorry for me to go.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“In that moment I found a power beyond any I'd had before, a will and a determination I would never have need if not for Lucinda, a fortitude I hadn't been able to find for a lesser cause.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

“I had been able to break the curse myself. I'd had to have reason enough, love enough to do it, to find the will and the strength.”
― Gail Carson Levine, quote from Ella Enchanted

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Popular quotes

“[Dialogue between Solon and an Egyptian Priest]
In the Egyptian Delta, at the head of which the river Nile divides, there is a certain district which is called the district of Sais [...] To this city came Solon, and was received there with great honour; he asked the priests who were most skilful in such matters, about antiquity, and made the discovery that neither he nor any other Hellene knew anything worth mentioning about the times of old. On one occasion, wishing to draw them on to speak of antiquity, he began to tell about the most ancient things in our part of the world-about Phoroneus, who is called "the first man," and about Niobe; and after the Deluge, of the survival of Deucalion and Pyrrha; and he traced the genealogy of their descendants, and reckoning up the dates, tried to compute how many years ago the events of which he was speaking happened. Thereupon one of the priests, who was of a very great age, said: O Solon, Solon, you Hellenes are never anything but children, and there is not an old man among you. Solon in return asked him what he meant. I mean to say, he replied, that in mind you are all young; there is no old opinion handed down among you by ancient tradition, nor any science which is hoary with age.”
― Plato, quote from Timaeus/Critias

“But time does heal. Not like we think it does, not like we would—from the front—but more from the back or side or someplace we can’t see it coming. It bubbles up beneath and rises all around.”
― Charles Martin, quote from Where the River Ends

“From the floor, I see the tops of the Philadelphia skyline out of her window. Staring at it, I realize that the night sky isn't really black, which is the way I've always thought of it. It's actually a dark shade of blue, the darkest possible.”
― Siobhan Vivian, quote from Same Difference

“And if we had learned anything from this story it was to be cautious of paper--to be mindful of its fragile construction and sharp edges, but mostly to be cautious of what is written on it.”
― Salvador Plascencia, quote from The People of Paper

“Zen does not ask you to believe in anything you cannot confirm for yourself. It does not ask you to memorize any sacred words. It does not require you to worship any particular thing or revere any particular person. It does not offer any rules to obey. It does not give you any hierarchy of learned men whose profound teachings you must follow to the letter. It does not ask you to conform any code of dress. It does not ask you to allow anyone else to choose what is right for you and what is wrong. Zen is complete absence of belief. Zen is the complete lack of authority. Zen tears away every false refuge in which you might hide from the truth and forces you to sit naked before what is real. That's real refuge.”
― Brad Warner, quote from Hardcore Zen: Punk Rock, Monster Movies and the Truth about Reality

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