Quotes from The 13 Clocks

“Remember laughter. You'll need it even in the blessed isles of Ever After.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“Time is for dragonflies and angels. The former live too little and the latter live too long.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“I can feel a thing I cannot touch and touch a thing I cannot feel. The first is sad and sorry, the second is your heart.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“I make mistakes, but I am on the side of Good," the Golux said, "by accident and happenchance. I had high hopes of being Evil when I was two, but in my youth I came upon a firefly burning in a spider's web. I saved the victim's life."
"The firefly's ?" said the minstrel.
"The spider's. The blinking arsonist had set the web on fire.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“You mere device," he gnarled. "You platitude! Your Gollux ex machina!”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“The brambles and the thorns grew thick and thicker in a ticking thicket of bickering crickets. Farther along and stronger, bonged the gongs of a throng of frogs, green and vivid on their lily pads. From the sky came the crying of flies, and the pilgrims leaped over a bleating sheep creeping knee-deep in a sleepy stream, in which swift and slippery snakes slid and slithered silkily, whispering sinful secrets.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“What would you do without me? Say 'nothing.'"
"Nothing," said the Prince.
"Good. Then you're helpless and I'll help you.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“Time lies frozen there. It's always Then. It's never Now.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“I am the Golux, the only Golux in the world and not a mere device”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“There was an old coddle so molly,
He talked in a glot that was poly,
His gaws were so gew
That his laps became dew,
And he ate only pops that were lolly.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“They've got him!" squealed the Duke. "Eleven men to one!"

"You may have heard of Galahad," said Hark, "whose strength was as the strength of ten."

"That leaves one man to get him," cried the Duke.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“I can do a score of things that can’t be done.

I can find a thing I can’t see, and I see a thing I can’t find.

The first is time, and the second is a spot before my eyes.

I can feel a thing I cannot touch, and I touch a thing I cannot feel.

The first is sad and sorry, and the second is your heart.

What would you do without me? Say “nothing”.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“Half the places I have been to, never were. I make things up. Half the things I say are there cannot be found. When I was young I told a tale of buried gold, and men from leagues around dug in the woods. I dug myself."

"But why?"

"I thought the tale of treasure might be true."

"You said you made it up."

"I know I did, but then I didn't know I had. I forget things, too.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“A dehoy who was terribly hobble,
Cast only stones that were cobble
And bats that were ding,
From a shot that was sling,
But never hit inks that were bobble.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“The oyster is a blob of glup, but a woman is a woman.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“Once upon a time, in a gloomy castle on a lonely hill, where there were thirteen clocks that wouldn't go, there lived a cold, aggressive Duke, and his niece, the Princess Saralinda. She was warm in every wind and weather, but he was always cold. His hands were as cold as his smile and almost as cold as his heart. He wore gloves when he was asleep, and he wore gloves when he was awake, which made if difficult for him to pick up pins or coins or the kernels of nuts, or to tear the wings from nightingales. He was six feet four, and forty-six, and even colder than he thought he was.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“You'll never live to wed his niece. You'll only die to feed his geese.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“Something very much like nothing anyone had ever seen before came trotting down the stairs and crossed the room.

"What is that?" the Duke asked, palely.

"I don't know what it is," said Hark, "but it's the only one there ever was.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“We all have flaws," he said, "and mine is being wicked.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“The Princess Saralinda was tall, with freesias in her dark hair, and she wore serenity brightly like the rainbow. It was not easy to tell her mouth from the rose, or her brow from the white lilac. Her voice was faraway music, and her eyes were candles burning on a tranquil night. She moved across the room like wind in violets, and her laughter sparkled on the air, which, from her presence, gained a faint and undreamed fragrance. The Prince was frozen by her beauty, but not cold, and the Duke, who was cold but not frozen, held up the palms of his gloves, as if she were a fire at which to warm his hands.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

“The Duke is lamer than I am old, and I am shorter than he is cold, but it comes to you with some surprise that I am wiser than he is wise.”
― James Thurber, quote from The 13 Clocks

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“In your madness you said you loved me," she murmured shyly.

His humor fled, and the smile left her lips as she continued, "You said it before, too. When the storm struck, I asked you to love me, and you said you did." Her voice was the barest of whispers.

Ruark's gaze turned away from her, and he rubbed the bandage on his leg before he spoke. "Strange that madness should speak the truth, but truth it is." He met her questioning eyes directly. "Aye, I love you." The pain of longing marked his face with a momentary sadness. "And that is madness, in all truth."

Shanna raised herself form his side and sat on her heels, staring down at him. "Why do you love me?" Her tone was wondrous. "I beset you at every turn. I deny you as a fit mate. I have betrayed you into slavery and worse. There is no sanity in your plea at all. How can you love me?"

"Shanna! Shanna! Shanna!" he sighed, placing his fingers on her hand and gently tracing the lines of her finely boned fingers. "What man would boast the wisdom of his love? How many time has this world heard, 'I don't care, I love.' Do I count your faults and sins to tote them in a book?"

...

"I dream of unbelievable softness. I remember warmth at my side the likes of which can set my heart afire. I see in the dark before me softly glowing eyes of aqua, once tender in a moment of love, then flashing with defiance and anger, now dark and blue with some stirring I know I have caused, now green and gay with laughter spilling from them. There is a form within my arms that I tenderly held and touched. There is that one who has met my passion with her own and left me gasping."

Ruark caressed Shanna's arm and turned her face to him, making her look into his eyes and willing her to see the truth in them as he spoke.

"My beloved Shanna. I cannot think of betrayal when I think of love. I can count no denials when I hold you close. I only wait for that day when you will say, 'I love."

Shanna raised her hands as if to plead her case then let them fall dejectedly on her knees. Tears coursed down her cheeks, and she begged helplessly, "But I do not want to love you." She began to sob. "You are a colonial. You are untitled, a murderer condemned, a rogue, a slave. I want a name for my children. I want so much more of my husband." She rolled her eyes in sudden confusion. "And I do not want to hurt you more."

Ruark sighed and gave up for the moment. He reached out and gently wiped away the tears as they fell. "Shanna, love," he whispered tenderly, "I cannot bear to see you cry. I will not press the matter for a while. I only beg you remember the longest journey is taken a step at a time. My love can wait, but it will neither yield nor change.”
― Kathleen E. Woodiwiss, quote from Shanna

“Without darkness, nothing comes to birth, As without light, nothing flowers.”
― Jessica Shirvington, quote from Enticed

“I'll show you how," Peter said. "Stop hiding behind your ignorance.”
― Diana Wynne Jones, quote from House of Many Ways

“I plant my elbows on the kitchen table, prop up my chin and think: When the hell did the compass needle get out of whack and lead my life astray?”
― Haruki Murakami, quote from The Elephant Vanishes

“God had already made me realise that His mercy does not grow weary of waiting for some souls and that He enlightens them only slowly. So I took good care not to anticipate Him.”
― Thérèse de Lisieux, quote from Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux

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