Quotes from Night Watch

“Love is happiness, but only when you believe it will last forever. Even though every time it turns out to be a lie, it’s only faith that gives love its strength and its joy.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“The common good and the individual good rarely coincide.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Of course we got drunk!" Semyon said. "It's okay to get drunk, Anton. If you need to real bad. Only you have to get drunk on vodka. Cognac and wine—that's all for the heart."

"So what's vodka for?"

"For the soul. If it's hurting real bad”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“An introverted, bookish child, with a mass of complexes and her head full of crazy ideals and a childish faith in the beautiful prince who was searching for and would surely find her.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“The hardest thing of all is when pain is hidden behind a mask of calm.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Many years ago someone told me something that I flatly refused to accept. And I still don't accept it now, despite all the times I've seen it proved right.
"The common good and the individual good rarely coincide..."
Sure, I know, it's true.
But some truths are probably worse than lies.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“One day you will hear the sound of time rustling as it slips through your fingers like sand. Remember me then. I wish you luck.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“I believe it, she's a very good person, kind. There's weariness there, but no bitterness or spite. When you're with a girl like that you feel like a different person. You try to be better, and that's a strain. Men prefer to be friends with her kind, flirt a bit, share confidences. They don't often fall in love with girls like that, but everybody loves them.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Why was is that the Light acted through lies, and the Darkness acted though the truth? Why was is that our truth proved powerless, but lies were effective? And why was the Darkness able to manage perfectly well with truth in order to do Evil?”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“What was my truth worth, if I was prepared to defend the entire world, but not those who were close to me? If I subdued hate, but wouldn't give love a chance?”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“An assassin can be found for every president. And for every prophet there are a thousand interpreters to distort the essence of the religion, to replace the bright flame with the heat of the inquisitors' pyres. The time came when every book was cast into the fire, when every symphony was reduced to a popular tune and played in all the drinking dens. A sound philosophical basis could be set in place under any vile nonsense.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“How wonderful it would be if everything could always be as clear and simple as it used to be when you were twelve years old, or twenty years old. If there really were only two colors in the world: black and white. But even the most honest and ingenuous cop, raised on the resounding ideal of the stars and stripes, has to understand sooner or later that there's more than just Darkness and Light out on the streets. There are understandings, concessions, agreements. Informers, traps, provocations. Sooner or later the time comes when you have to betray your own side, plant bags of heroin in pockets, and beat people on the kidneys—carefully, so there are no marks.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“There is no abstract Evil; you have to understand that! Its roots are here, all around us, in this herd that goes on chewing and having a good time only an hour after a murder! That's what you have to fight for. For people. Evil is a hydra with many heads, and the more of them you cut off, the more it grows! Hydras have to be starved to death, do you understand that? Kill a hundred Dark Ones, and a thousand more will take their place.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“That's how myths are born. Out of our carelessness, out of our tattered nerves, out of jokes that go wrong and flashy gestures.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“In a war the most dangerous thing is to understand the enemy. To understand is to forgive.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Do you have a truth of your own, Anton? Tell me, do you? Are you certain of it? Then believe it, not in my truth, not in Geser's. Believe in it and fight for it. If you have enough courage. If the idea doesn't make you shudder. What's bad about Dark freedom is not just that it's freedom from others. That's another explanation for little children. Dark freedom is first and foremost freedom from yourself, from your own conscience and your own soul. The moment you can't feel any pain in your chest—call for help. Only by then it'll be too late”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Fairy tales lie just as much as statistics do, but sometimes you can find a grain of truth in them.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“If we do any deed that is unconditionally good, it gives the Dark Magicians the right to do an evil deed.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“What if every time you fought for love, you were fighting for the whole world? For the whole world - not against the whole world.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“When we acknowledge that human beings have the right to choose, we deprive ourselves of it,”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“I’d stopped giving a damn about the human world a long time ago. It’s our basis. Our cradle. But we are Others. We walk through closed doors and we maintain the balance of Good and Evil. There are pitifully few of us, and we can’t reproduce—it”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“The common good and the individual good rarely coincide. Sure, I know it's true. But some truths are probably worse than lies.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“„Je l' ti znaš šta je to? Biti osu�en na ljubav?
„Ali zar to nije uvijek?“ Svetlana čak zadrhta od negodovanja. „Kada se dvoje vole, kada
se pronalaze među tisućama, milijunima... To je uvijek sudbina!”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“„Ne. Sveta, jesi li ikada čula za analogiju... ljubav - to je cvijet?“
„Da.“
„Cvijet se može uzgojiti. A može se i kupiti. Ili se dobije kao poklon."
„Je l’ Anton kupio?“
„Ne“, rekoh suviše oštro, po svoj prilici, jesam... „Dobio je na poklon. Od sudbine.“
„I šta s tim? Je l' to ljubav?“
„Sveta, isječeno cvijeće je lijepo. Ali nije dugovječno. Ono ipak umire, pa makar i brižljivo
spušteno u kristalnu vazu sa sviježom vodom.“
„On se boji da voli“, zamišljeno reče Svetlana. „Je l' da? Ja se nisam bojala, zato što
nisam znala ovo...”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Love is happiness, but only when you believe it will last forever. Even though every time it turns out to be a lie, it’s only faith that gives love its strength and its joy.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“Konjak, vino - tako se opija srce.“
„ A votka, za šta je ona?“
„Za dušu. Ako je bol neutoljiv.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“—Numer jeden — rzekł Siemion, wyciągając z plastykowej siatki z reklamą jogurtu „Danone-Kids" butelkę wódki.
— Smirnowka.
—Rekomendujesz? — spytałem ze zwątpieniem. Nie uważam się za specjalistę od wódek.
—Już ją dwieście lat piję. A przedtem była znacznie gorsza, możesz mi wierzyć.
Zaraz pojawiły się dwie szklanki z rżniętego szkła, dwulitrowy słoik, gdzie pod zaklepaną metalową pokrywką znajdowały się ściśnięte maleńkie ogóreczki, duża torba z kiszoną kapustą.
—A popitka? — spytałem.
—Wódki się nie popija, chłopcze — pokiwał głową Siemion. — Popija się podróbki.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“He enjoyed life for its own sake, not for material possessions. Life was the exact opposite of money, which in itself meant nothing.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“How many of you there still are, girls and boys of various ages, raised by naïve parents in the sixties. How many of you there are, so unhappy, not knowing how to be happy. How I long to take pity on you, how I long to help you. To touch you through the Twilight—gently, with no force at all. To give you just a little confidence in yourself, just a tiny bit of optimism, a gram of willpower, a crumb of irony. To help you, so that you could help others.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

“It's about waking up in the morning with everything around you looking gray. Gray sky, gray sun, gray city, gray people, gray thoughts. And the only way out is to have another drink. Then you feel better. Then the colors come back.”
― Sergei Lukyanenko, quote from Night Watch

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― Mary Pope Osborne, quote from Magic Tree House: #1-4

“Life’s like that, too,” Aunt Felicity continued. “Too much push, and bang through the bottom one goes. Still, if one doesn’t paddle, one doesn’t get anywhere.”
― Alan Bradley, quote from The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches

“I don't want to take the women into the city until I know how things stand.' ' I'll tell you precisely how they stand,' Nicolo bitterly replied. 'The absolute ruler of this city is a Medici. The Pope is a Medici. People round here say that probably God is a Medici and as for the Devil, he's definitely one, beyond any doubt.”
― Salman Rushdie, quote from The Enchantress of Florence

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BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.