“and he began to understand what a wild game we play in life; he began to understand that a thing once done cannot be undone nor changed by saying "I am sorry!”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“I know; I don't care to die either. But when whining mendeth nothing, wherefore whine?”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“A hanging in a good quarrel is an easy death they say, though I could never hear of any that came back to say so.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“I had four blak arrows under my belt,
Four for the greefs that I have felt,
Four for the number of ill menne
That have oppressid me now and then.
One is gone; one is wele sped;
Old Apulyaird is dead.
One is for Maister Bennet Hatch,
That burned Grimstone, walls and thatch.
One for Sir Oliver Oates,
That cut Sir Harry Shelton’s throat.
Sir Daniel, ye shull have the fourt;
We shall think it fair sport.
Ye shull each have your own part,
A blak arrow in each blak heart.
Get ye to your knees for to pray;
Ye are ded theeves, by yea and nay!
JON AMEND-ALL
Of the Green Wood,
And his jolly fellaweship”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“If the barons live at war, ploughfolk must eat roots.” “Nay,”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“and for the first time began to understand the desperate game that we play in life; and how a thing once done is not to be changed or remedied, by any penitence. But”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“Well! marriage is like death, it comes to all.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“Noh, tead, abielu on nagu surm, see jõuab kord kõigile kätte," ütles Dick alistuvalt.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“Sir Oliver—that knows more of law than honesty—I”
― Robert Louis Stevenson, quote from The Black Arrow
“The wheel of fortune that had once raised her so high had taken her into the utter depths.”
― Bernard Cornwell, quote from The Archer's Tale
“I don't want to know how you did it. I want to believe you are magic.”
― Holly Goldberg Sloan, quote from Counting by 7s
“We get used to living one way, even if it's a bad way or a hard one. When that's gone, there's a hole to fill. It's in our nature to try to fill it with anxieties and fears. It can take time to fill it with good things instead.”
― Cassandra Clare, quote from Lord of Shadows
“Hay momentos en la vida en que se desea tomar el camino más largo a fin de mantener vivo caminando el hervidero de ideas en el que nos encontramos inmersos y a cuyo fluir desea uno abandonarse.”
― Honoré de Balzac, quote from Lost Illusions
“Chang-bo took to his bed, or rather to the quilts on the floor that was all they had left. His legs swelled up like balloons with what Mrs. Song had come to recognize as edema — fluid retention brought on by starvation. He talked incessantly about food. He spoke of the tofu soups his mother made him as a child and an unusually delicious meal of steamed crab with ginger that Mrs. Song had cooked for him when they were newlyweds. He had an uncanny ability to remember details of dishes she had cooked decades earlier. He was sweetly sentimental, even romantic, when he spoke about their meals together. He would take her hand in his own, his eyes wet and cloudy with the mist of his memories.
“Come, darling. Let’s go to a good restaurant and order a nice bottle of wine,” he told his wife one morning when they were stirring on the blankets. They hadn’t eaten in three days. Mrs. Song looked at her husband with alarm, worried that he was hallucinating.
She ran out the door to the market, moving fast and forgetting all about the pain in her back. She was determined to steal, beg — whatever it took — to get some food for her husband. She spotted her older sister selling noodles. Her sister wasn’t faring well — her skin was flaked just like Chang-bo’s from malnutrition — so Mrs. Song had resisted asking her for help, but now she was desperate, and of course, her sister couldn’t refuse.
“I’ll pay you back,” Mrs. Song promised as she ran back home, the adrenaline pumping her legs.
Chang-bo was curled up on his side under the blanket. Mrs. Song called his name. When he didn’t respond, she went to turn him over — it wasn’t diffcult now that he had lost so much weight, but his legs and arms were stiff and got in the way.
Mrs. Song pounded and pounded on his chest, screaming for help even as she knew it was too late.”
― Barbara Demick, quote from Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea
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.