“If it takes a million years for a fish to become a reptile, has Man, in our few hundred, altered out of recognition?”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“Lancelot and Guenever were sitting at the solar window. An observer of the present day, who knew the Arthurian legend only from Tennyson and people of that sort, would have been startled to see that the famous lovers were past their prime. We, who have learned to base our interpretation of love on the conventional boy-and-girl romance of Romeo and Juliet, would be amazed if we could step back into the Middle Ages - when the poet of chivalry could write about Man that he had 'en ciel un dieu, par terre une deesse'. Lovers were not recruited then among the juveniles and adolescents: they were seasoned people, who knew what they were about. In those days people loved each other for their lives, without the conveniences of the divorce court and the psychiatrist. They had a God in heaven and a goddess on earth - and, since people who devote themselves to godesses must exercise some caution about the ones to whom they are devoted, they neither chose them by the passing standards of the flesh alone, nor abandoned it lightly when the bruckle thing began to fail.”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“Even his conversation was, as it were, a spoken part.”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“Do you think that they, with their Battles, Famine, Black Death and Serfdom, were less enlightened than we are, with our Wars, Blockade, Influenza, and Conscription.”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“He had conquered murder only to be faced with war. There were no laws for that.”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“Any one war seems rooted in its antecedents.”
― T.H. White, quote from The Candle in the Wind
“he must not know how much power he had to move her.”
― Maeve Binchy, quote from Tara Road
“Tis action moves the world....[in] the game of chess, mind that: ye cannot leave your men to stand unmoving on the board and hope to win. A soldier must first step upon the battlefield if does mean to cross it.”
― Susanna Kearsley, quote from The Winter Sea
“Αν ίσως μάζευε κανείς δέκα χιλιάδες θαλάσσιους ελέφαντες μέσα σε μια κοιλάδα του βυθού και τους έβαζε να μουγκρίσουν όλοι μαζί από έρωτα, κι αν έβαζε παρέα και ένα εκατομμύριο μπάμπουρες να ζουζουνίζουν βόσκοντας μέλι και γύρη, θα μπορούσε να πλησιάσει κάπως το επίμονο μουγκρητό της ικανοποίησης που έβγαινε από τα χείλια του Βασιλικού Φαλαινόσαυρου.”
― Walter Moers, quote from The 13½ Lives of Captain Bluebear
“Seventeen's not a good age. That's when you realize that you have a heart. That's when feelings get in the way of thinking.”
― Mahbod Seraji, quote from Rooftops of Tehran
“In any case, this was a deep human prejudice. Human beings to find a central command in any organization. States had governments. Corporations had CEOs. Schools had principals. Armies had generals. Human beings tended to believe that without central command, chaos would overwhelm the organization and nothing significant could be accomplished.”
― Michael Crichton, quote from Prey
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.