Magician Trilogy Quotes

One magician demanded I show him an image of the love of his life. I rustled up a mirror.

So what were you [Sonea] and Dorrien discussing before?' Akkarin asked. She turned to regard him. 'Discussing?' 'Outside the farmhouse when I was buying the food.' 'Oh. Then. Nothing.' He smiled and nodded. 'Nothing. Amazing subject, that one. Produces such fascinating reactions in people.

Akkarin: I watched the first woman I loved die. I dont think I can survive losing the second. Sonea: I love you too.

It is said, in Imardin, that the wind has a soul, and that it wails through the narrow streets because it is grieved by what it finds there.

There's always a bit of truth in each rumour, the trouble is finding out which bit. - Tayend

How am I going to make friends with these people if all I can think of is how easy it would be to rob them?

He had given her too much. He had given her everything.



Great. She shook her head. Not only am I having conversations with myself, but now I'm refusing to talk to me. This has got to be the first sign of madness.

Cery: So, Hem, tell me why I shouldn't see how many holes I need to make before you start leaking money?

Nodding, Cery strode to the door and stepped through. Though the burly guards eyes him suspiciously, Cery smiled back. Never make enemies of someone's lackeys, his father had taught him. Better still, make them like you a lot.

It was impossible to imagine the aloof, dignified, powerful High Lord living as, of all things, a slave.

I did not know I was to be outdone by a little magic boy and his tricks,” he said. “I salute you, magician.” He swept her a bow from horseback. Vasya did not return the bow. “To small minds,” she told him, spine very straight, “any skill must look like sorcery.

Your supposed to drink wine, my friend, not breathe it.

The last young lady I met stabbed me. You know I’m cursed when it comes to women.

Ranel had said that the murderer wore a ring with a red gemstone. Looking at Akkarin's hands, she was almost disappointed to see they were bare. Not even a mark to hint that a ring might have been worn regularly. His fingers were long and elegant, yet masculine...

Believe me. There was nothing good in always being second place. Next to you, I may as well have been invisible - at least when it came to the ladies. If I'd known, we'd both end up as bachelors, I wouldn't have been so jealous of you.' 'Jealous?' Akkarin's smile faded. He turned away to stare at the horizon. 'No. Don't be jealous.

Most people would not open a door unless they knew what lay beyond, and even if they opened the door by mistake, they would find an uninteresting room beyond.

But right now it’s a friend’s love.

It is said, in Imardin, that the wind has a soul, and that it wails through the narrow city streets because it is grieved by what it finds there.

But as I witnessed what Dakova was capable of, I cared less about what the Guild did and didn't allow. He did not need black magic to perform evil. I saw him do things with his bare hands that I will never forget.

Find where the sound ends and silence begins. Then exist in that moment, for there will you find your secret centre of being, the perfect place of peace within yourself.

It was a day-by-day record of a Guild much younger and smaller than the current one. After several pages, she had grown fond of the record-keeper, who clearly admired the people he was writing about.

En ocasiones, revelar la medida justa de la verdad era mejor que mentir descaradamente.

A friend. Cery’s shoulders drooped. Closing his eyes, he let out a long sigh.

They won’t catch you,” he told her. “And even if they do, I’ll get you back. I promise you that.

Kyralia estaria muy bien gobernada, si gobernar fuera un delito

I suppose if Akkarin came to rescue you all the time, people would say you weren't a good choice. The novices are all jealous of you, not realising that they would be in the same situation if they were the High Lord's favourite, even if they are from the Houses. Any novice he chose would be a target. Always expected to prove themselves.

No solo mantengo conversaciones conmigo misma, sino que me niego a hablar conmigo. Deben de ser los primeros síntomas de la locura.

That’s who attacked us?” Balkan muttered. “She’s barely more than a child.” “A small package with a big surprise inside,” Sarrin said dryly.

Gossip has a lifespan, that speculation eventually becomes old news, and is forgotten." - Rothen

Heroes tend to gain improbable strength when their tale is told over and over again.

A magician four centuries ago described his magic as a constant companion. It can be a helpful friend, he said, or a deadly adversary.

There are three things you will learn from tonight: even the most powerful Thief has limitations, it pays to have friends in high places, and there are some things best left to magicians.” - Cery

The most important attribute of a magician is knowledge.” He paused, then looked at each of the novices who had spoken in turn. “Without it his strength is useless, he has nothing to be skilled or talented in, despite his best intentions.

Chop chop. I'm literally losing the will to live." —Eliot

He had always believed that robes and swords did not go together well. There were already too many ways a magician could harm another person. Why add a non-magical one to the list?

Of course there are risks – there are risks to everything a magician does.” - Lorkin

so, he

If it’s hard to like what one isn’t good at, will I like it more when I am better at it?” - Sonea

But consider what he would have done to you, Sonea. One day you may have to kill for your freedom.” Faren lifted an eyebrow. “Have you thought about that?

Teadmatus ei ole vabandus.

You need a good memory to use the library. How else do you find a book again after you’ve read it?” - Tayend

I’m beginning to sound like a novice repeating formulas,” he muttered to Dannyl irritably. “Perhaps you should write a report on your progress every evening and nail it to your door.

I’ve replaced Takan, she thought suddenly. The former slave had followed Akkarin out of Sachaka and become his faithful servant. Now she was following Akkarin into Sachaka. What was it about him that inspired such devotion?

Sonea era más cínica. Había observado que las mujeres solían pasar por alto cuando estaban enamoradas porque, en algún momento, el amor tendía a desvanecerse. Era mejor casarse con un hombre que te gustara y en quien confiaras

You have made a difference, Rothen,” she protested. “I’d have never become a magician if it were not for you. And what is this talk of your life ending? It’s going to be years – decades – before you need to start planning a gravestone to outdazzle everyone else’s.

You took your time getting here, Ambassador,” he said. “Don’t blame me. You Elynes should have built your city closer to the library.” “Now there’s a good idea. I’ll suggest it to the King next time I attend court.” “You never attend court.” “That’s right.” Tayend smiled.

Biogenesis is in the first place psychogenesis. This truth was never more manifest than on Mars, where noosphere preceded biosphere-the layer of thought first enwrapping the silent planet from afar, inhabiting it with stories and plans and dreams, until the moment when John stepped out and said Here we are-from which point of ignition the green force spread like wildfire, until the whole planet was pulsing with viriditas. It was as if the planet itself had felt something missing, and at the tap of mind against rock, noosphere against lithosphere, the absent biosphere had sprung into the gap with the startling suddenness of a magician's paper flower

Sylphid was beginning to play professionally, and she was subbing as second harpist in the orchestra at Radio City Music Hall. She was called pretty regularly, once or twice a week, and she’d also got a job playing at a fancy restaurant in the East Sixties on Friday night. Ira would drive her from the Village up to the restaurant with her harp and then go and pick her and the harp up when she finished. He had the station wagon, and he’d pull up in front of the house and go inside and have to carry it down the stairs. The harp is in its felt cover, and Ira puts one hand on the column and one hand in the sound hole at the back and he lifts it up, lays the harp on a mattress they keep in the station wagon, and drives Sylphid and the harp uptown to the restaurant. At the restaurant he takes the harp out of the car and, big radio star that he is, he carries it inside. At ten-thirty, when the restaurant is finished serving dinner and Sylphid’s ready to come back to the Village, he goes around to pick her up and the whole operation is repeated. Every Friday. He hated the physical imposition that it was—those things weigh about eighty pounds—but he did it. I remember that in the hospital, when he had cracked up, he said to me, ‘She married me to carry her daughter’s harp! That’s why the woman married me! To haul that fucking harp!’ “On those Friday night trips, Ira found he could talk to Sylphid in ways he couldn’t when Eve was around. He’d ask her about being a movie star’s child. He’d say to her, ‘When you were a little girl, when did it dawn on you that something was up, that this wasn’t the way everyone grew up?’ She told him it was when the tour buses went up and down their street in Beverly Hills. She said she never saw her parents’ movies until she was a teenager. Her parents were trying to keep her normal and so they downplayed those movies around the house. Even the rich kid’s life in Beverly Hills with the other movie stars’ kids seemed normal enough until the tour buses stopped in front of her house and she could hear the tour guide saying, ‘This is Carlton Pennington’s house, where he lives with his wife, Eve Frame.’ “She told him about the production that birthday parties were for the movie stars’ kids—clowns, magicians, ponies, puppet shows, and every child attended by a nanny in a white nurse’s uniform. At the dining table, behind every child would be a nanny. The Penningtons had their own screening room and they ran movies. Kids would come over. Fifteen, twenty kids.

And now we are going to put our Jimmy Choo so far up your ass, your going to taste next season.

She ruminated, again, on the eternal return, the widening gyre, that seemed to govern human history. There is a tide in the affairs of men. A slack tide, that heaves up wrack and slime and rotting seaweed and deposits them on the sand, like a cat leaving the corpse of a rat on your doorstep. Then it slinks back in search of more.

There’s something Lorlen said I had to tell you.

«Nii et head aega õigupoolest ei olegi?» Dorrien muigas. «Ei.»

«Teil on vägi, millega end kaitsta, seega pole tapmisele ainsatki vabandust, ükskõik, mida teie ründaja ka ei kavatseks — isegi kui ründaja on võlur.»

Mööda koridori tõtates püüdis Rothen Vinara kutse põhjusele mitte mõelda. Peagi saab ta selle niigi teada.

«Mida te ennist Dorrieniga arutasite?» küsis Akkarin. Sonea vaatas talle otsa. «Arutasime?» «Seal talu juures, kui mina toitu ostmas käisin.» «Oh. Ah siis. Ei midagi.» Akkarin muigas ja noogutas. «Ei midagi. Päris hämmastav jututeema. Tekitab inimestes nii põnevaid reaktsioone.»

«Jah,» lausus mees vaikselt. Ta peatus ja pööras pea kõrvale. «Ma armastasin teda.» Sonea pilgutas üllatunult silmi. Akkarin ja orjatüdruk? Akkarin oli teda armastanud? Akkarin oli armastanud kedagi teist? Sonea tundis üha kasvavat ebakindlust ja pahameelt, mis peagi asendusid süütundega. Kas ta oli tõesti armukade juba aastaid tagasi surnud tüdruku pärast? See oli naeruväärne.

For a long time Eliot had had the theory that in Janet’s mind everybody was as judgmental of her as she was of them, and if that was true then the world must be a pretty scary place for her. No wonder she liked it out there by herself.

You can’t just decide to be happy.” “No, you can’t. But you can sure as hell decide to be miserable. Is that what you want?

It was still possible that five years from now, when they were more or less over their post-traumatic stress disorder, they’d all get a big kick out of getting together and talking about it.

by which I mean he ran his ship into it.” Quentin wondered if there was a joke to be made about “founder” and “founder.” If there was it had probably already made the rounds of the Outer Island.

He was sarcastic and spookily smart and, on some level, basically a kind person who just needed a ton of therapy and maybe some mood-altering drugs. Something to selectively inhibit the voracious reuptake of serotonin that was obviously going on inside his skull 24-7.

Plum got up at eight the next morning, late by her standards, but instead of rejuvenating her brain the extra sleep had just made it all muzzy. It had smeared all those clear thoughts she was supposed to be having all over the inside of her skull. Her depressive tendency, the flip side of her manic streak, was stirring. Why were they even doing this? it wanted to know. What a waste of time, of effort. Of pencils. Plum needed to get moving, but she was having trouble attaching meanings to things; the meanings kept peeling off like old stickers.

Some chalk and a Google search didn’t make me a magician — but it sure as hell might make me a corpse.

It’s over!

The room had the seedy, humiliated look of a bar seen in direct sunlight, sticky and thoroughly initialed by knife- and claw-wielding patrons. The floor was paved with old round millstones lightly covered with a scattering of straw, the chinks between them filled in with packed dirt. Neither

What is the point of magic if we can't fix real problems?

What is the point of magic if we can't use it to fix real problems?

The physical sciences, good and innocent in themselves, had already, even in Ransom’s own time, begun to be warped, had been subtly manoeuvred in a certain direction. Despair of objective truth had been increasingly insinuated into the scientists; indifference to it, and a concentration upon mere power, had been the result. Babble about the élan vital and flirtations with pan-psychism were bidding fair to restore the Anima Mundi of the magicians. Dreams of the far future destiny of man were dragging up from its shallow and unquiet grave the old dream of Man as God. The very experiences of the dissecting room and the pathological laboratory were breeding a conviction that the stifling of all deep-set repugnances was the first essential for progress.

If there was any magic in this world that was not magic, it was wine

When he was younger it seemed like the only time he wasn’t afraid was when he was angry. He’d been so full of fear and self-doubt that the only way he could think of to be strong was to attack the world around him.

It would seem they have need of you. Why don’t you

Find them? That I did,’ cried Riose. His lips were stiff as he spoke. It seemed to require effort to refrain from grinding molars. ‘Patrician, they are not magicians; they are devils. It is as far from belief as the outer nebulae from here. Conceive it! It is a world the size of a handkerchief, of a fingernail; with resources so petty, power so minute, a population so microscopic as would never suffice the most backward worlds of the dusty prefects of the Dark Stars. Yet with that, a people so proud and ambitious as to dream quietly and methodically of Galactic rule. ‘Why, they are so sure of themselves that they do not even hurry. They move slowly, phlegmatically; they speak of necessary centuries. They swallow worlds at leisure; creep through systems with dawdling complacence. ‘And they succeed. There is no one to stop them. They have built up a filthy trading community that curls its tentacles about the systems further than their toy ships dare reach. For parsecs, their Traders – which is what their agents call themselves

No, Pug. There are many ways to love someone. Sometimes we want love so much, we’re not too choosy about who we love. Other times we make love such a pure and noble thing, no poor human can ever meet our vision. But for the most part, love is a recognition, an opportunity to say, “There is something about you I cherish.” It doesn’t entail marriage, or even physical love.

In the act of violating their supposed victim, they surrender their soul to the magician’s power.

Now he had answers, but they weren’t doing what answers were supposed to do: they weren’t making things simpler or easier. They weren’t helping.

His molten anger and grief were cooling into a glossy protective coating, a hard transparent lacquer of uncaring. If he couldn’t go back, he would just have to do things differently going forward. He felt how infinitely safer and more sound this attitude was. The trick was just not wanting anything. That was power. That was courage: the courage not to love anyone or hope for anything.

His heart felt like it was burning with relief and regret, the emotions melting and running together and turning into bright, hot, white light. “The thing is,” he said. “I’d hate to cut out right before bonus season.

We shall now seek that which we shall not find. —Sir Thomas Malory, Le Morte D’Arthur

We should to do it,” he said. “Today of all days.” “We’re accepting congratulations for doing nothing.” “We’re reassuring the people of continuity in the face of tragedy.

He liked one tapestry in particular that depicted a marvelously appointed griffin frozen in the act of putting a company of foot soldiers to flight. It was supposed to symbolize the triumph of some group of long-dead people over some other group of long-dead people whom nobody had liked, but for some reason the griffin had cocked its head to one side in the midst of its rampage and was gazing directly out of its woven universe at the viewer as if to say, yes, granted, I’m good at this. But is it really the best use of my time?

You know her parents are lawyers? Entertainment lawyers. Fantastically rich, huge house in Brentwood, working all the time, no discernible emotional life whatsoever.

But you could tell she was bursting with some terrible secret. And she had those things that one likes about magicians: she was disgustingly bright and rather sad and slightly askew. To tell you the truth I think one of the things we liked about her was that she reminded us of you.

You never got a particularly nautically rigorous look at the Swift, but you nonetheless came away with a powerful impression of it: it was a plucky but cozy little vessel, elegant to look at but game in a fight, with sleek lines and glowing yellow portholes through which one glimpsed snug, shipshape cabins.

She’d broken her staff and drowned her book and sworn off magic forever.

She was especially confident when it came to pointing out other people’s mistakes. Not that she was a know-it-all—it didn’t seem to be an ego thing with her. She just assumed that everybody shared her desire for everybody to be clear on everything, and she’d expect you to do the same for her.

At that moment, when he should have been most lucidly present, he had no idea whether he was lying or telling the truth.

Tis a wise thing to know what is wanted, and wiser still to know when ’tis achieved,’ said Dolgan. ‘True. And still wiser to know when it is unachievable, for then striving is folly.

That was the thing about the world: it wasn’t that things were harder than you thought they were going to be, it was that they were hard in ways that you didn’t expect. To

she wanted a book to do to her what books did: take away the world, slide it aside for a little bit, and let her please, please just be somewhere and somebody else.

Rothen tundis talle kaasa. Ükskõik, millist nõu ta tüdrukule ka annab, kindlasti on masendav ja segadusseajav leida end äkitselt õpilaste väikesest, piiratud ja väiklasest maailmast.

The Magicians is to Harry Potter as a shot of Irish whiskey is to a glass of weak tea. Solidly rooted in the traditions of both fantasy and mainstream literary fiction, the novel tips its hat to Oz and Narnia as well as to Harry, but don’t mistake this for a children’s book. Grossman’s sensibilities are thoroughly adult, his narrative dark and dangerous and full of twists. Hogwarts was never like this.