The Other Boleyn Girl

You can smile when your heart is breaking because you're a woman.

If it means something, take it to heart. If it means nothing, it's nothing. Let it go.

I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can't do anything but think about him. At night I dream of him, all day I wait to see him, and when I do see him my heart turns over and I think I will faint with desire.

I would know you anywhere for my true love. Whoever I was and whoever you were, I would know you at once for my true love.

The world hasn't changed that much; men still rule.

Jane," I said quietly. She opened her eyes, she had been far away in prayer. "Yes, Mary? Forgive me, I was praying." "If you go on flirting with the king with those sickly little smiles, one of us Boleyns is going to scratch your eyes out.

I never thought it would end like this. I never thought he would leave me without saying goodbye.

I shall be dark and French and fashionable and difficult. And you shall be sweet and open and English and fair. What a pair we shall be! What man can resist us?

He is my brother. She is my sister. Come what will, they are my kin.

Anyone can attract a man. The trick is to keep him.

I was born to be your rival,' she [Anne] said simply. 'And you mine. We're sisters, aren't we?

I am too dark in my heart tonight.

Tell my daughter Elizabeth -- no! Tell all my daughters, everywhere, in all the ages yet to come. Tell them how I died, and why. And tell them to remember this: the future is unwritten. Know your rights.

I woke at dawn every morning to his touch, the delight of his warmth and the heady smell of his skin. I had never before lain with a man who had loved me completely, for myself, and it was a dizzy experience. I had never lain with a man whose touch I adored without any need to hide my adoration, or exaggerate it, or adjust it at all. I simply loved him as if he were my one and only lover, and he loved me too with the same simplicty of appetite and disire which made me wonder what I thought I had been doing all those years when I had been dealing in the false coin of vanity and lust. I had not known then that all along there had been this other currency of pure gold.

When they see us dance. When they see how you look at me. When they see how I smile at you.

I had meant my promise to George. I had said that I was, before anything else, a Boleyn and a Howard through and through; but now, sitting in th shadowy room, looking out over the gray slates of the city, and up at the dark clouds leaning on the roof of Westminster Palace, I suddenly realized that George was wrong, and that my family was wrong, and that I had been wrong-- for all my life. I was not a Howard before anything else. Before anything else I was a woman who was capable of passion and who had a great need and a great desire for love, I didn't want the rewards for which Anne had surrendered her youth. I didn' want the arid glamour of George's life, I wanted the heat and the sweat and the passion of a man that I could love and trust. And I wanted to give myself to him: not for advantage, but for desire.

Before anything else I was a woman who was capable of passion and who had a great need and a great desire for love.

Every woman has to have something which singles her out, which catches the eyes, which makes her the center of attention. I am going to be french.

Some women attract desire. Others do not.

Oh yes. Draw your hem back from my mud, little sister.

We're going' Anne said firmly. So soon?' Percy pleaded. 'But stars come out at night.' Then they fade at dawn', Anne replied. 'This star needs to veil herself in darkness.

When it's done, it's done. And no one will know until it's done.

Good Evening , Sir John. I hope that you will accept a little gift from me.' I should be honored, Your Majesty.' I want to give you a little carved stool from my privy chambers. A pretty little piece from France. I hope you will like it.' I should be grateful.' It is for your daughter. For Jane. To sit on. She seems not to have a seat of her own but she must borrow mine.

When they launch snakes you'll have your namesake.

We might, either of us, be Queen of England and yet we'll always be nothing to our family.

You can smile when your heart is breaking because you are a woman, and a courtier, and a Howard. That's three reasons for being the most deceitful creature on God's earth.

Good Christian people, I am come hither to die, for according to the law, and by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will speak nothing against it. I am come hither to accuse no man, nor to speak anything of that, whereof I am accused and condemned to die, but I pray God save the king and send him long to reign over you, for a gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never: and to me he was ever a good, a gentle and sovereign lord. And if any person will meddle of my cause, I require them to judge the best. And thus I take my leave of the world and of you all, and I heartily desire you all to pray for me. O Lord have mercy on me, to God I commend my soul.' After being blindfolded and kneeling at the block, she repeated several times: To Jesus Christ I commend my soul; Lord Jesu receive my soul.

Katherine of Aragon was speaking out for the women of the country, for the good wives who should not be put aside just because their husbands had taken a fancy to another, for the women who walked the hard road between kitchen, bedroom, church and childbirth. For the women who deserved more than their husband's whim.

I would play ball with Catherine, and hide and seek: Not a very challenging game in an open meadow, but she was still at the age where she believed that if she shut her eyes and buried her head under a shawl then she could not be seen.

Stars in the night,' he said. 'Something something something something, some delight