Quotes from Nights at the Circus

“The child's laughter is pure until he first laughs at a clown.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Out of the frying pan into the fire! What is marriage but prostitution to one man instead of many? No different!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“We must all make do with the rags of love we find flapping on the scarecrow of humanity.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“She sleeps. And now she wakes each day a little less. And, each day, takes less and less nourishment, as if grudging the least moment of wakefulness, for, from the movement under her eyelids, and the somnolent gestures of her hands and feet, it seems as if her dreams grow more urgent and intense, as if the life she lives in the closed world of dreams is now about to possess her utterly, as if her small, increasingly reluctant wakenings were an interpretation of some more vital existence, so she is loath to spend even those necessary moments of wakefulness with us, wakings strange as her sleepings. Her marvellous fate - a sleep more lifelike than the living, a dream which consumes the world.
'And, sir,' concluded Fevvers, in a voice that now took on the sombre, majestic tones of a great organ, 'we do believe . . . her dream will be the coming century.
'And, oh, God . . . how frequently she weeps!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“The clown may be the source of mirth, but - who shall make the clown laugh?”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“And from the coffin of your madness there is no escape.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Outside the window, there slides past that unimaginable and deserted vastness where night is coming on, the sun declining in ghastly blood-streaked splendour like a public execution across, it would seem, half a continent, where live only bears and shooting stars and the wolves who lap congealing ice from water that holds within it the entire sky. All white with snow as if under dustsheets, as if laid away eternally as soon as brought back from the shop, never to be used or touched. Horrors! And, as on a cyclorama, this unnatural spectacle rolls past at twenty-odd miles an hour in a tidy frame of lace curtains only a little the worse for soot and drapes of a heavy velvet of dark, dusty blue.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Despair is the constant companion of the clown.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“...in their millenial and long-lived patience they knew quite well how, in a hundred years, or a thousand years' time, or else, perhaps, tomorrow, in an hour's time, for it was all a gamble, a million to one chance, but all the same there was a chance that if they kept on shaking their chains, one day, some day, the clasps upon the shackles would part.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“...for nothing is more boring than being forced to play.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“She was feeling supernatural tonight. She wanted to EAT diamonds.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“And it was sad music fit to make you cut your throat.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“And, conversely, she went on to herself, sneering at the Grand Duke's palace, poverty is wasted on the poor, who never know how to make the best of things, are only the rich without money, are just as useless at looking after themselves, can't handle their cash just like the rich can't, always squandering it on bright, pretty, useless things in just the same way.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Amongst the monsters, I am well hidden; who looks for a leaf in a forest?”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Perhaps...I could not be content with mere contentment!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Sometimes it seems' said Grok, 'that the faces exist of themselves, in a disembodied somewhere, waiting for the clown who will wear them, who will bring them to life. Faces that wait in the mirrors of unknown dressing-rooms, unseen in the depths of the glass like fish in dusty pools, fish that will rise up out of the obscure profundity when they spot the one who anxiously scrutinises his own reflection for the face it lacks, man eating fish waiting to gobble up your being and give you another instead...”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“all white with snow as if under dustsheets, as if laid away eternally as soon as brought back from the shop, never to be seen or touched”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Have you ever stared stark failure in the face, young man? The trick is, to outstare it!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Wherein does a woman’s honour reside, old chap? In her vagina or in her spirit?”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“The harder the bargain men must strike with nature to survive, the more rules they're likely to have amongst themselves too keep them all in order”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Herşeye karşın onun kişiliğinde hâlâ eksik kalmış birşeyler vardı. Mobilyalı olarak kiraya verilmiş bir eve benziyordu. [sf 11]”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“...is it not to the mercies of the eyes of others that we commit ourselves on our journey through the world?”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Those were her best days, although there was always something feckless about her, something so slack and almost fearful in her too frequent smile, so that when you saw Mignon being happy, you always thought: "It can't last." She had the febrile gaiety of a being without a past, without a present, yet she existed thus, without memory or history, only because her past was too bleak to think of and her future too terrible to contemplate; she was the broken blossom of the present tense.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“She looks wonderful, but she doesn't look right.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“At this time, the cusp of the modern age, the hinge of the nineteenth century, had a plebiscite been taken amongst all the inhabitants of the world, by far the great number of them, occupied as they were throughout the planet with daily business of agriculture of the slash and burn variety, warfare, metaphysics and procreation, would have heartily concurred with these indigenous Siberians that the whole idea of the twentieth century, or any other century at all, for that matter, was a rum notion. Had the global plebiscite been acted upon in a democratic manner, the twentieth century would have forthwith ceased to exist, the entire system of dividing up years by one hundred would have been abandoned and time, by popular consent, would have stood still.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Bu tatlı seste sanki tekinsiz olan bir şey varmış, ya bu sesin sahibi büyücüymüş ya da bir büyünün etkisindeymiş gibi geldi odadakilere. Üçü de tüylerinin diken diken olduğunu hissettiler. [sf 184]”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“Palyaço maskesinin altında yatan o yüz, uzun yıllar önce tanışıp sevilmiş, sonra da kaybedilmiş, şimdi de yeniden bulunmuş bir sevgilinin yüzü. Onunla daha önce hç karşılaşmamış olmama, bana tümüyle yabancı bir yüz olmasına karşın, görüp tanımamdan bile önce vurgun olduğum bir yüz bu. [sf 288]”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“What is marriage but prostitution to one man instead of many? No different!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“I raised you up to fly to the heavens, not to brood over a clutch of eggs!”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

“From beggar to thief is one step, but a step in two directions at the same time, for what a beggar loses in morality when he becomes a thief he regains in self-respect.”
― Angela Carter, quote from Nights at the Circus

About the author

Popular quotes

“Lara, are you alright?" Keir asked, still seething.

"I'm fine, belov—"

"As if you really care!" Antas stood, and walked over to face Keir. "You, who have dallied with another, even as your so-called warprize attempts to claim you."

Dallied? Did that mean what I thought it meant? I flushed, and then went cold at the idea that Keir would turn to another while—

"Lower your hood, and show all how true you are to the one you would bond with." Antas pointed at Keir. "Do it now, warrior."

There was absolute silence in the tent as Keir glared at Antas. But then his expression changed slightly, and his eyes crinkled in silent humor. Keir lifted his hands and lowered his hood to reveal a small purplish bruise on his neck. A love bite.

Oh Goddess above. I blushed bright red, heat flooding my face. My love bite.

Keir arched an eyebrow as the Elders reacted to the sight.

Antas, however, was nearly foaming at the mouth. "You see? You see? He has broken faith with this Xyian even before she—"

It took everything I had to say the words aloud before the entire Council of Elders. "I put that there."

"Eh?" Antas twisted to face me.

I drew a deep breath, and raised my voice. "That is my mark on his neck."

As the group reacted to that, my blush deepened, if that was possible. Then I made the mistake of looking at Keir, and had to cover my mouth to prevent myself from laughing. He looked so smug.

Simus was under no such handicap. He was howling with mirth.

Antas was scowling, as were Essa and Wild Winds. "How so?" Antas snapped. "You have been kept apart from—"

"Her bath." Amyu spoke. "It had to be during her bath."

I looked over my shoulder to see that she was none too happy either. I turned back to face the Elders. "It was in my bath," I admitted. "Keir snuck in to see me."

As one, the Eldest turned to glare at Keir.

Keir shrugged.

Simus laughed and slapped him on the back. "The skies favor the bold."

Antas paused as a ripple of laughter swept the room again. "So you talked to Keir, despite our rules, despite our—"

"We didn't waste time talking," I snapped right back, glaring at him. Then I realized what I'd announced to the room, and blushed bright red.

"HEYLA!" Simus shouted. "Truly, the attraction between Warlord and Warprize is as the heat of the summer!”
― Elizabeth Vaughan, quote from Warlord

“If he wants me to stay away, he should leave me alone.”
― Neil Strauss, quote from The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists

“There are gods in Alabama: Jack Daniel's, high school quarterbacks, trucks, big tits, and also Jesus.”
― Joshilyn Jackson, quote from Gods in Alabama

“Looking back, I realized that we were being raised to be schizophrenic; an appearance of perfection was more important than genuine feelings”
― Tehmina Durrani, quote from My Feudal Lord

“When a child disappears, the space she’d occupied is immediately filled with dozens of people. And these people—relatives, friends, police officers, reporters from both TV and print—create a lot of energy and noise, a sense of communal intensity, of fierce and shared dedication to a task.

“But amid all that noise, nothing is louder than the silence of the missing child. It’s a silence that’s two and a half to three feet tall, and you feel it at your hip and hear it rising up from the floorboards, shouting to you from corners and crevices and the emotionless face of a doll left on the floor by the bed.

“It’s a silence that’s different from the one left at funerals and wakes. The silence of the dead carries with it a sense of finality; it’s a silence you know you must get used to. But the silence of a missing child is not something you want to get used to; you refuse to accept it, and so it screams at you.

“The silence of the dead says, Goodbye.

“The silence of the missing says, Find me.”
― Dennis Lehane, quote from Gone, Baby, Gone

Interesting books

About BookQuoters

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.