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bc71161
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And how shall I think of you?' He considered a moment and then laughed. 'Think of me with my nose in a book!
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Susanna Clarke |
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43dfd3e
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Can a magician kill a man by magic?" Lord Wellington asked Strange. Strange frowned. He seemed to dislike the question. "I suppose a magician might," he admitted, "but a gentleman never could."
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killing
magic
honor
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Susanna Clarke |
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6254357
|
Time and I have quarrelled. All hours are midnight now. I had a clock and a watch, but I destroyed them both. I could not bear the way they mocked me.
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madness
time
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Susanna Clarke |
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02d2165
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She wore a gown the color of storms, shadows, and rain and a necklace of broken promises and regrets.
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Susanna Clarke |
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405662f
|
Such nonsense!" declared Dr Greysteel. "Whoever heard of cats doing anything useful!" "Except for staring at one in a supercilious manner," said Strange. "That has a sort of moral usefulness, I suppose, in making one feel uncomfortable and encouraging sober reflection upon one's imperfections."
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Susanna Clarke |
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1bc4bfa
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There is nothing in the world so easy to explain as failure - it is, after all, what everybody does all the time.
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Susanna Clarke |
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4f53719
|
To be more precise it was the color of heartache.
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Susanna Clarke |
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eff55c8
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I reached out my hand, England's rivers turned and flowed the other way... I reached out my hand, my enemies's blood stopt in their veins... I reached out my hand; thought and memory flew out of my enemies' heads like a flock of starlings; My enemies crumpled like empty sacks. I came to them out of mists and rain; I came to them in dreams at midnight; I came to them in a flock of ravens that filled a northern sky at dawn; When they thought ..
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Susanna Clarke |
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d451b21
|
Houses, like people, are apt to become rather eccentric if left too much on their own; this house was the architectural equivalent of an old gentleman in a worn dressing-gown and torn slippers, who got up and went to bed at odd times of day, and who kept up a continual conversation with friends no one else could see.
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Susanna Clarke |
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e4279a4
|
He understood for the first time that the world is not dumb at all, but merely waiting for someone to speak to it in a language it understands.
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Susanna Clarke |
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19fb591
|
I have a scholar's love of silence and solitude. To sit and pass hour after hour in idle chatter with a roomful of strangers is to me the worst sort of torment.
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Susanna Clarke |
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87de579
|
The argument he was conducting with his neighbor as to whether the English magician had gone mad because he was a magician, or because he was English.
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Susanna Clarke |
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8fecb13
|
Oh! And they read English novels! David! Did you ever look into an English novel? Well, do not trouble yourself. It is nothing but a lot of nonsense about girls with fanciful names getting married.
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literature
novels
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Susanna Clarke |
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fcc3074
|
Mr. Robinson was a polished sort of person. He was so clean and healthy and pleased about everything that he positively shone - which is only to be expected in a fairy or an angel, but is somewhat disconcerting in an attorney.
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Susanna Clarke |
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254b3f2
|
For, though the room was silent, the silence of half a hundred cats is a peculiar thing, like fifty individual silences all piled one on top of another.
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Susanna Clarke |
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6b014df
|
It has been remarked (by a lady infinitely cleverer than the present author) how kindly disposed the world in general feels to young people who either die or marry. Imagine then the interest that surrounded Miss Wintertowne! No young lady ever had such advantages before: for she died upon the Tuesday, was raised to life in the early hours of Wednesday morning, and was married upon the Thursday; which some people thought too much excitement ..
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Susanna Clarke |
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ab06d9e
|
When he awoke it was dawn. Or something like dawn. The light was watery, dim and incomparably sad. Vast, grey, gloomy hills rose up all around them and in between the hills there was a wide expanse of black bog. Stephen had never seen a landscape so calculated to reduce the onlooker to utter despair in an instant. "This is one of your kingdoms, I suppose, sir?" he said. "My kingdoms?" exclaimed the gentleman in surprize. "Oh, no! This is Sc..
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mr-norrell
thistle-down-hair
jonathan-strange
scotland
stephen
|
Susanna Clarke |
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eec2bf5
|
When he awoke it was dawn. Or something like dawn. The light was watery, dim and incomparably sad. Vast, grey, gloomy hills rose up all around them and in between the hills there was a wide expanse of black bog. Stephen had never seen a landscape so calculated to reduce the onlooker to utter despair in an instant. "This is one of your kingdoms, I suppose, sir?" he said. "My kingdoms?" exclaimed the gentleman in surprize. "Oh, no! This is Sc..
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mr-norrell
thistle-down-hair
jonathan-strange
scotland
stephen
|
Susanna Clarke |
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2847acd
|
There is nothing else in magic but the wild thought of the bird as it casts itself into the void. There is no creature upon the earth with such potential for magic. Even the least of them may fly straight out of this world and come by chance to the Other Lands. Where does the wind come from that blows upon your face, that fans the pages of your book? Where the harum-scarum magic of small wild creatures meets the magic of Man, where the lang..
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magic
nature
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Susanna Clarke |
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b0cc1a0
|
Magic, madam, is like wine and, if you are not used to it, it will make you drunk.
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Susanna Clarke |
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42e4ef5
|
Woods were ringed with a colour so soft, so subtle that it could scarcely be said to be a colour at all. It was more the of a colour - as if the trees were dreaming green dreams or thinking green thoughts.
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Susanna Clarke |
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262038a
|
It may be laid down as a general rule that if a man begins to sing, no one will take any notice of his song except his fellow human beings. This is true even if his song is surpassingly beautiful. Other men may be in raptures at his skill, but the rest of creation is, by and large, unmoved. Perhaps a cat or a dog may look at him; his horse, if it is an exceptionally intelligent beast, may pause in cropping the grass, but that is the extent ..
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nature
|
Susanna Clarke |
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414c95e
|
Well, I suppose one ought not to employ a magician and then complain that he does not behave like other people.
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Susanna Clarke |
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6e34397
|
He gave her his heart. She took it and placed it quietly in the pocket of her gown. No one observed what she did.
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Susanna Clarke |
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bc1fb8a
|
It [Ashfair House] was an old fashioned house--the sort of house in fact, as Strange expressed it, which a lady in a novel might like to be persecuted in.
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damsel-in-distress
2004
jonathan-strange
house
stereotype
|
Susanna Clarke |
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3b6db53
|
What nobility of feeling! To sacrifice your own pleasure to preserve the comfort of others! It is a thing, I confess, that would never occur to me.
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Susanna Clarke |
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336d66b
|
It is also true that his hair had a reddish tinge and, as everybody knows, no one with red hair can ever truly be said to be handsome.
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Susanna Clarke |
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5708e1b
|
I have been quite put out of temper this morning and someone ought to die for it.
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murder
temper
|
Susanna Clarke |
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5f16e7a
|
The governess was not much liked in the village. She was too tall, too fond of books, too grave, and, a curious thing, never smiled unless there was something to smile at.
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Susanna Clarke |
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f5976d2
|
Mr Norrell determined to establish himself in London with all possible haste. "You must get a house, Childermass," he said. "Get me a house that says to those that visit it that magic is a respectable profession - no less than Law and a great deal more so than Medicine." Childermass inquired drily if Mr Norrell wished him to seek out architecture expressive of the proposition that magic was as respectable as the Church? Mr Norrell (who knew..
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Susanna Clarke |
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45326db
|
You mean to say he became mad deliberately?' ...Nothing is more likely,' said the duke.
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Susanna Clarke |
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4330b15
|
Not long, not long my father said Not long shall you be ours The Raven King knows all too well Which are the fairest flowers. The priest was all too worldly Though he prayed and rang his bell The Raven King three candles lit The priest said it was well Her arms were all too feeble Though she claimed to love me so The Raven King stretched out his hand She sighed and let me go The land is all too shallow It is painted on the sky And trembles ..
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Susanna Clarke |
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a2a8ab5
|
It is curious and we magicians collect curiosities, you know.
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Susanna Clarke |
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69e95fd
|
It is these black clothes," said Strange. "I am like a leftover piece of funeral, condemned to walk about the Town, frightening people into thinking of their own mortality."
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Susanna Clarke |
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e9e7393
|
But when the fairy sang the whole world listened to him. Stephen felt clouds pause in their passing; he felt sleeping hills shift and murmur; he felt cold mists dance. He understood for the first time that the world is not dumb at all, but merely waiting for someone to speak to it in a language it understands. In the fairy's song the earth recognized the names by which it called itself.
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Susanna Clarke |
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dff137c
|
I mean that two of any thing is a most uncomfortable number. One may do as he pleases. Six may get along well enough. But two must always struggle for mastery. Two must always watch each other. The eyes of all the world will be on two, uncertain which of them to follow.
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Susanna Clarke |
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ee0c252
|
After two hours it stopped raining and in the same moment the spell broke, which Peroquet and the Admiral and Captain Jumeau knew by a curious twist of their senses, as if they had tasted a string quartet, or been, for a moment, deafened by the sight of colour blue.
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Susanna Clarke |
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cfc9d53
|
The land is all too shallow It is painted on the sky And trembles like the wind-shook rain When the Raven King passed by
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|
Susanna Clarke |
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69c27d6
|
Yet it is true--skin can mean a great deal. Mine means that any man may strike me in a public place and never fear the consequences. It means that my friends do not always like to be seen with me in the street. It means that no matter how many books I read, or languages I master, I will never be anything but a curiosity--like a talking pig or a mathematical horse.
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racism
|
Susanna Clarke |
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55f2dec
|
Some time later there was a knock at his door. He was surprised to find it was now evening and the room was quite dark. The knock sounded again. The landlord was at the door. The landlord began to talk, but Strange could not understand him. This was because the man had a pineapple in his mouth. How he had managed to cram the whole thing in there, Strange could not imagine. Green, spiky leaves emerged slowly out of his mouth and then were su..
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humor
pineapple
|
Susanna Clarke |
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00bcd5f
|
The very shapes of the trees were like frozen screams.
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simile
screams
|
Susanna Clarke |
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1ea80b4
|
She even learnt the language of a strange country which Senior Cosetti had been told some people believed still existed, although no-one in the world could say where it was. The name of this country was Wales.
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wales
welsh
|
Susanna Clarke |
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1b47d0f
|
I know magicians and I know magic and I say this: all magicians lie and this one more than most.
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Susanna Clarke |
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2dd0d97
|
Ha!' said the tall man drily. 'He was in high luck. Rich old uncles who die are in shockingly short supply.
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|
Susanna Clarke |