Brent Weeks Quotes

Do you know what punishments I've endured for my crimes, my sins? None. I am proof of the absurdity of men's most treasured abstractions. A just universe wouldn't tolerate my existence.

..because the only kind of love I have to offer is stupid and blind and so deep and powerful that I feel like I'm cracking just to hold it in.

Assassination is an art, milord. And I am the city's most accomplished artist.

Relationships are ropes. Love is a noose. - Durzo Blint

Why is it, my shadow-striding friend, that we don't fear dreams? We lose consciousness, lose control, things happen with no apparent logic and abiding by no apparent rules.... We don't fear dreams, but we do fear madness, and death terrifies us.

You might want to think twice before you try to use a man's conscience against him. It may turn out he doesn't have one.

Love is a fragile, corruptible thing. And yet I have seen it evince a curious strength. It is beyond any comprehension Love is a weakness that once in a great while triumphs over strength.

A man’s greatest treasures are his illusions - Durzo Blint

The perfect killer has no friends. Only targets.

Words were another sword for the man who wielded them well.

king: "You're...you're shit! You shitting, shitting shit!" "Your Majesty," Durzo said gravely. "A man of your stature's cursing vocabulary ought to extend beyond a tedious reiteration of the excreta that fills the void between his ears.

You'd be surprised at what you'd do to stay alive.

Moments of beauty sustain us through hours of ugliness.

What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does about the book.

Love is not a whim. Love is not a flower that fades with a few fleeting years. Love is a choice wedded to action, my husband, and I choose you, and I will choose you every day for the rest of my life.

Life is empty. Life is worthless. When we take a life, we aren't taking anything of value.- Durzo Blint

I'm not dreaming this, am I?" he asked. Dehvi lifted an eyebrow. "There's only one way to know for sure," he said. What's that?" Go piss in the woods. If you feel wet and warm afterward, wake up.

The truth is, everyone likes to look down on someone. If your favorites are all avant-garde writers who throw in Sanskrit and German, you can look down on everyone. If your favorites are all Oprah Book Club books, you can at least look down on mystery readers. Mystery readers have sci-fi readers. Sci-fi can look down on fantasy. And yes, fantasy readers have their own snobbishness. I’ll bet this, though: in a hundred years, people will be writing a lot more dissertations on Harry Potter than on John Updike. Look, Charles Dickens wrote popular fiction. Shakespeare wrote popular fiction—until he wrote his sonnets, desperate to show the literati of his day that he was real artist. Edgar Allan Poe tied himself in knots because no one realized he was a genius. The core of the problem is how we want to define “literature”. The Latin root simply means “letters”. Those letters are either delivered—they connect with an audience—or they don’t. For some, that audience is a few thousand college professors and some critics. For others, its twenty million women desperate for romance in their lives. Those connections happen because the books successfully communicate something real about the human experience. Sure, there are trashy books that do really well, but that’s because there are trashy facets of humanity. What people value in their books—and thus what they count as literature—really tells you more about them than it does about the book.

Why did women always believe that talking about a problem would fix it? Some issues were corpses. Hot air made them fester and rot and spread their disease to everything else. Better to bury it and move on.

Dying well is easy,it only takes a moment of courage. It’s living well that I couldn’t do. What’s death compared to that.

A wet boy has a deader, an assassin has a target, because assassins sometimes miss.

If you are not free to say no, your yes is meaningless.

How can one love the light and live in darkness?

A few months ago you assassinated a man who called himself a god; now you're going after a goddess in truth. Unless you can figure out a way to kill continents, after this you're going to have to retire.

You will find no answers here, just choices.

There's no guarantee that justice will win out or that a noble sacrifice will make any difference. But when it does, there's something that still swells my chest. There's magic in that.... It tells me that's the way things are supposed to be.

Life is meaningless, when we take a life we take nothing of value.

It's better that the innocent should live than that the guilty die

Evil is simple and empty. Evil has no mysterious depths. We stare into a dark hole and fill it with our fears, but it is only a hole.

Bewildered as he might be, sometimes a man's highest calling is simply to stand, and hug.

Delusional people tend to believe in what they're doing.

You’ll come with us,” she said. “Sure,” Gavin said. “It wasn’t a request.” “Yes it was,” Gavin said. “When you don’t have power to compel obedience, by definition you’re making a request.

My question is, do you believe in an evil possessed of its own purity? or does every act intend some good?...

When you don't know what to do, do what's right and do what's in front of you. But not necessarily what's right in front of you.

Do you know why you feel destined for something greater?” “Why?” Kip asked, quiet, hopeful. “Because you’re an arrogant little shit.

The perfect killer has no conscience.

You don't need to like reality, only be strong enough to face it

The God gives simpler problems to lesser men.

If you looked busy, you could get away with almost anything.

Maybe when you were born on the top of the mountain you could pretend the mountain didn't matter, but those who climbed it and those born at its base who could never climb at all knew differently.

We are the stories we tell about ourselves. But when those stories are lies, we are the most surprised of all.

Will covers a multitude of flaws, just as love covers a multitude of sins.

Your Majesty,” Durzo said gravely. “A man of your stature’s cursing vocabulary ought to extend beyond a tedious reiteration of the excreta that fills the void between his ears.” - Durzo Blint

Let me make this real simple. You will not break me. The hole will not break me. I will not break. I will not be broken.

You have to be a little bad to make history.

This world has only two kinds of people: villains and smiling villains.

Put on some armor. Just remember what's armor and what's you, so when it's time to take it off, you can.

Elene gasped and sat up. "Kylar Thaddeus Stern!" Kylar giggled. "Thaddeus? That's a good one. I knew a Thaddeus once." "So did I. He was a blind idiot." "Really?" Kylar said, his eyes dancing. "The one I knew was famous for his gigantic-" "Kylar!" Elene interrupted, motioning toward Uly. "His gigantic what?" Uly asked. "Now you did it." Elene said, "His gigantic what, Kyler?" "Feet. And you know what they say about big feet." He winked lasciviously at Elene. "What?" Uly asked. "Big Shoes," Kylar said.

Assassination is an art, milord, and I am the city’s most accomplished artist - Durzo Blint

Light cannot be chained.

And what fun is it being a genius if no one appreciates you?

...if reality is hard and flat and unjust, then it's better to adjust to what really is than to complain that it isn't what you wish. That was what made me lose faith..... But having lost it, soon I doubted my lack of faith. There were niggling hints of meaning everywhere.

Sometimes to love is easy, but to accept love is hard.

The master who fears the choices his people will make enough to take those choices away isn't worth serving.

We become the masks we wear.

Just because it's a dream doesn't mean it's a lie.

The perfect killer has no identity.

If you worry about what everyone is trying to do, you become a spectator and not a player.

A wolf can be a wolfhound, son, but it can never be a lapdog.

What happens if you do nothing, nothing, there's a price and a terrible freedom to that

Truth doesn't depend on your belief in it.

If embarrassment were a muscle, I'd be huge.

Might doesn’t make right. Might makes reality.

What happens when you strip away all the masks a man wears and you find not a face beneath them but nothing at all?

I regretted that I hadn't turned myself into the kind of man that you could be with. That it wouldn't be just for me to be with you, even if you wanted me. Our lives started in the same shit hole, Elene, but somehow you've turned into you, and I've turned into this. I don't like what I've done. I don't like who I've become. You don't deserve a fairy tale? I don't deserve another chance, but I'm asking you for one. You're afraid that love is too risky? I've seen what happens when you don't risk it. [...] I'm willing to risk it to see the world through your eyes.

Dad, one of my first memories is of sharing my worry with you about the space shuttle poking holes in the atmosphere and letting out all of Earth's air.

one doesn't interrupt a beautiful girl unless one is going to be funny.

Love is a madness. Love is Failer - Durzo Blint

Life is empty. Life is meaningless. When we take a life, we arn't taking anything of value. Wetboys are killers. Thats all we do. Thats all we are. There are no poets in the bitter business.

I was a bad child. Fortunately, I’ve come a long way since then. Now I’m a bad man.

That's the burden of leadership, Logan: making the choice when none of the choices are good.

This is why there are few prophets. We end up dead a lot. The truth is offensive to men who love darkness.

Dangerous knowledge is often hidden under ponderous grammar and obscurantist vocabulary.

There's a divinity that shapes beauty from our rough hewn lives.

It was no true prayer to beg forgiveness while choosing to sin.

when you deal with human beings, never count on logic or consistency.

Hope is the great deceiver. Hope is the piper who leads us sleepy to our slaughter.

Look at your mistakes long enough to learn from them, then put them behind you.

Idealists mature badly. If they can't outgrow their idealism, they become hypocrites or blind.

This is how tyrants fall. By destroying their people, they destroy themselves.

You damn fool. You realize, even if all your assumptions are correct-even then, you still have to steal the world's most coveted sword from the world's safest place then be pursued by the ultimate hunter until you reach the heart of an enemy country in the middle of a war in which any side will happily kill you as a traitor, a spy, a wytch, or all three?" "I thought you'd like it.

The truth was, Azoth hated Azoth. Azoth was a coward, passive, weak, afraid, disloyal. Azoth had hesitated. Master Blint didn’t know it, but the poisons on the needle had killed Azoth. He was Kylar now, and Kylar would be everything Azoth hadn’t dared to be.

If I tell you a secret can you keep it quiet? “Well, I can. I’m not so sure about Doll Girl.

There was a nice dilemma. How does one interject into a polite conversation, "By the way, in case you're ever interested, I do have a penise."?

You got potential, Kip. And you know what potential means? he replied. “Ain’t done nothing yet.

After a while, with nothing to lose, I'll only able to win.

In suffering, we find the true measure of our strength.

It is better to suffer evil than to do evil.

To be a man is to bring together that which you should be and that which you are. Deception is darkness.

When you have lived either a very short time or a very long time—if you’ve lived well—you will be able to love easily, too. Broken hearts have fresh places to bond with new faces.

I am Sa’kagé a lord of shadows. I claim the shadows that the Shadow may not. I am the strong arm of deliverance. I am Shadowstrider. I am the Scales of Justice. I am He-Who-Guards-Unseen. I am Shadowslayer. I am Nameless. The coranti shall not go unpunished. My way is hard but I serve unbroken. In ignobility nobility. In shame honor. In darkness light. I will do justice and love mercy. Until the king returns I shall not lay my burden down.” --(Durzo Blint to Jorses Alkestes, quoted to Skylar at the edge of Ezra's Forest.)

Her nudity is her armor. It blinded the drooling fools. They couldn't see anything else while they saw her body.

An oath you only keep when it's convenient isn't an oath at all.

Strength is a choice, courage is a habit: Andross Guile

Durzo pulled out a gold Gunder from his pouch. Crowns Roth wins, Castles I lose. He flipped the coin. It bounced on the table and, impossibly, landed on edge. There´s always another choice, Kylar said.

Don’t judge a man by what he says his ideals are, judge him by what he does. Look at what the Color Prince has done. They’re wrong, Teia. They’re liars and murderers. It doesn’t mean everything we do is right. It doesn’t mean our house doesn’t need a thorough cleaning. I just don’t think we need to burn it to the ground to do it.

I’ll spend my life training just for the moment I have my chance at you. I’ll wait until you think I’ve forgotten today. I’ll wait until you think it was just a dumb guild rat’s threat. After I’m a master, you’ll jump at shadows for a while. But after you jump a dozen times and I’m not there, you won’t jump just once, and that’s when I’ll be there. I don’t care if you kill me at the same time. I’ll trade my life for yours.

Some say, ‘Who you are is what you do.’ They’re wrong, but not all wrong. What you do forms who you are. Then who you are forms what you do. It’s a vicious cycle, or a virtuous one, depending. One act doesn’t undo all of who you are, but a thousand acts make you who you are. So it’s simple, though not easy: stop creating the wrong you.

Life is nothing in itself. It’s a place marker that proves who’s winning, and we are the winners. We are always the winners. There is nothing but the winning. Even winning means nothing. We win because it’s an insult to lose. The ends don’t justify the means. The means don’t justify the ends. There is no one to justify to. There is no justice.” ~ Durzo Blint

That pain you feel," Master Blint said almost gently, "is the pain of abandoning a delusion. The delusion is meaning, Kylar. There is no higher purpose. There are no gods. No arbiters of right and wrong. I don't ask you to like reality. I only ask you to be strong enough to face it. There is nothing beyond this. There is only the perfection we attain by becoming weapons, as strong and merciless as a sword. There is no essential good in living. Life is nothing in itself. It's a place marker that proves who's winning, and we are the winners. We are always the winners. There is nothing by the winning. Even winning means nothing. We win because it's an insult to lose. The ends don't justify the means. The means don't justify the ends. There is no one to justify to. There is no justification.