Quotes from This Dark Endeavor

Kenneth Oppel ·  298 pages

Rating: (10.3K votes)


“There is a passion in you that scares me.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“The preface? Why would he waste time with the preface? Skip the preface and move on to the meat of the thing!”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“It was as though, in one moment, he had become a stranger. And I a stranger to myself.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“You see, when medicine works, it is blessed science, and when it fails, it is witchcraft. - Polidori”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“No, indeed, 'pig' is very expressive. And an excellent description of a fellow who flirts with his brother's beloved.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor



“If she can bite a vulture, she can jump a crack.
~Victor Frankenstein”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“Beyond the lake, over the mountains, the clouds were illuminated from within by a brilliant stutter of lightning, and in that split second Elizabeth and I were etched against the sky.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“Konrad had gone to the New World without me, and no matter how fast I ran westward, how close I kept to the sunsets, I would never catch up with him now.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“We all knew no respectable physician would remove my fingers just for the asking, and we had no time anyway.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“What do you make of him?" I asked Elizabeth.

"Apart from the fact he's clearly insane?"

"What can he learn from Konrad's blood?" I said. "Except that he needs it in his body to live!"

"There is something ghoulish about it."

"He's like a vampyre,”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor



“Behind us I saw the water, still welling up from the tunnel, curving round in a frothing serpentine torrent to plunge down the other descending passage. For a moment we all sat there and watched, numb and exhausted.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


“Do you worry it is sinful?" I asked.
She took a breath. "No," she said firmly. "God is the creator, and anything on this earth is here by His permission. I cannot think He minds if we use His creations - only how. For good or ill. What we seek is for good, so I will not worry about it.”
― Kenneth Oppel, quote from This Dark Endeavor


About the author

Kenneth Oppel
Born place: Port Alberni, British Columbia, Canada
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“Tibet has not yet been infested by the worst disease of modern life, the everlasting rush. No one overworks here. Officials have an easy life. They turn up at the office late in the morning and leave for their homes early in the afternoon. If an official has guests or any other reason for not coming, he just sends a servant to a colleague and asks him to officiate for him.
Women know nothing about equal rights and are quite happy as they are. They spend hours making up their faces, restringing their pearl necklaces, choosing new material for dresses, and thinking how to outshine Mrs. So-and-so at the next party. They do not have to bother about housekeeping, which is all done by the servants. But to show that she is mistress the lady of the house always carries a large bunch of keys around with her. In Lhasa every trifling object is locked up and double-locked.
Then there is mah-jongg. At one time this game was a universal passion. People were simply fascinated by it and played it day and night, forgetting everything else—official duties, housekeeping, the family. The stakes were often very high and everyone played—even the servants, who sometimes contrived to lose in a few hours what they had taken years to save. Finally the government found it too much of a good thing. They forbade the game, bought up all the mah-jongg sets, and condemned secret offenders to heavy fines and hard labor. And they brought it off! I would never have believed it, but though everyone moaned and hankered to play again, they respected the prohibition. After mah-jongg had been stopped, it became gradually evident how everything else had been neglected during the epidemic. On Saturdays—the day of rest—people now played chess or halma, or occupied themselves harmlessly with word games and puzzles.”
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