Quotes from The Tragedy of Arthur

Arthur Phillips ·  368 pages

Rating: (2.8K votes)


“You deicde, and you make our night what you want. Brilliant and ours. Stupid and theirs.”
― Arthur Phillips, quote from The Tragedy of Arthur


“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?" wrote Marlowe, the man Shakespeare feared for many years was the better writer, the man who with those words issued a license to misery to millions of underexperienced teenagers and thousands of overeducated middle-aged jackasses.”
― Arthur Phillips, quote from The Tragedy of Arthur


“How strangely distributed are our scruples. When they are evenly spread across our lives, we are judged good people. Mine, unfortunately, tend to bunch up.”
― Arthur Phillips, quote from The Tragedy of Arthur


“Maria, groaning for scraps, would drape his head on my feet as I ate, trying to camouflage himself as my napkin or the rug.”
― Arthur Phillips, quote from The Tragedy of Arthur


“Shakespeare’s lines are a nursery of titles for other, better writers: Pale Fire, Exit Ghost, Infinite Jest, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, The Sound and the Fury, Unnatural Acts, The Quick and the Dead, Against the Polack, To Be or Not to Be, Band of Brothers, Casual Slaughters. At the very least, I have never named one of my books after his stuff.”
― Arthur Phillips, quote from The Tragedy of Arthur



About the author

Arthur Phillips
Born place: in The United States
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“Muffled footsteps sounded in the distance. Goldie heard a shout, and the heavy clank of punishment chains. The footsteps came closer. A boy began to sing in a hoarse, adolescent voice. "Awa-a-a-y, across the ocean-a-an, awa-a-a-y, across the sea-a-a-a-."

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A pause. A furious adult's voice said, "It's not your love that's waiting for you, you little villains, it's the House of Repentance! Deliberate destruction of property, putting the lives of others at risk, oh you're in for it, you are!"

Clank clank clank, went the punishment chains. "I’ve be-e-e-e-en away so long, dear, I've tra-a-a-aveled far and wi-i-i-i-i-ide-" sang the voices.

Goldie edged along the wall and eased the door open. There was a bustle and a shoving and a clanking, and suddenly the corridor in front of her was full of boys, milling backward and forward, rattling their chains and singing loudly. They were all older than Goldie, but they wore the same gray threadbare smock and leggings. Somewhere in the middle of them were two Blessed Guardians. The smell of burning hung over them all.

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Then they closed smoothly around her and began to sing louder than ever, their voices bouncing off the high ceilings. "Three yea-a-a-a-ars I rowed the galley-y-y-ys, three year-a-a-a-ars I was a sla-a-a-a-ave-."

They spilled out into the foyer, a laughing, shouting, singing rabble. The Guardians who led them were shouting too. Only Goldie was silent. She crouched between the tall, raucous boys, her smock blending with theirs, her pulse thundering in her ears.

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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.

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