Nancy Springer Quotes

Conform, go crazy, or become an artist.

Confound my genteel upbringing! I could not think of any name foul enough to call him.

I hope that the kind reader recognises this as a despairing attempt at humour.

"One cannot be a mother without first being a person; family, husband, and children should not be allowed, as is so often the case, to steal a woman’s selfhood and her dreams." Mother to Sherlock, Mycroft, and Enola Holmes by author Nancy Springer

Yet one could speak truth and still be a villain

All the words I had prepared turned coward and fled my mind like conscripts deserting a battlefield.

To her, everything is beautiful in its own way, and everyone is a friend just waiting for her. And somehow it works for her.

what's life without a spice of stupidity

And I ought to stop dreaming about it and start doing it. Right now.

He would expect me to flee from him. Therefore, I would not. I would flee towards him.

The only way for me to be safe and free was to be - be what my name decreed me. Enola. Alone.

in the secret code of flowers, a rose of any sort signifies love.

Three mysteries are grasped by no man: The mistletoe green between earth and sky, The sadness in a maiden’s smile, The runes shaped by the changing moon.

Writing fiction has always, for me, been an alchemy of turning pain into poetry, ugliness into beauty. It has been a kind of redemption.

the greatest harm I could possibly suffer would be to lose my liberty, to be forced into a conventional life of domestic duties and matrimony.

To be a man, apparently, was to lack the ability to be a woman

If any decent woman's calling consisted of taking her proper place in society (husband and house, plus voice lessons and a piano in the drawing-room), then this particular woman-to-be prefers to remain indecent.

Nothing last forever except change

He was just a sixteen-year old boy who had been killed, a kid whose photo had been in the paper, a kid who would mostly be forgotten by the time the newspaper went into the garbage-yet he was the universe, all the dying, all the crying. He was everyone who had ever died young.

In the blue sky overhead, larks sang like my heart.

My dear sister... His dear sister. Those words - how oddly they affected me

We bastards are not to blame for any of it.

To be a man, apparently, was to lack the ability to be a woman.

I think,” he says at last, “that it is a great pity she will not trust in me.

To S.H. & M.H.: Rot. E.H.

Grinning with delight even as my heart ached—a familiar bittersweet feeling, that of enjoying affection from afar—I watched until they all went inside, the cab and the barouche drove away, and it became apparent that the moment of drama was over.

When looking to travel incognito, it's safest to travel as a widow. People are always anxious to avoid conversation about death. Widows scare them. And there's no better disguise than fear.

Stop it,' he whispered. Hid lidded eyes winced. His hands faltered up to cover his face. Dusty did not stop. 'If I'd known you-if I'd known you when you were alive, I think I would have loved you, too.' Dusty, please stop.' He could barely speak. I think I do love you.' Her voice had dropped to a whisper, because it was a truth like a silver sword. 'I think I do. I cry, too.

Once woman is made equal to man, she fancies herself his superior

Etty saw Rowan, daughter of Robin Hood, lifting her green kirtle, her brown braid lashing like a wildcat's tail as she tried to run.

Walking away barefoot on the soft loam, with mist rising in ribbons all around her, Etty tucked the year's first violets into her hair.

There is method to her madness!

Curiosity goes hand in hand with intellect, and intellect runs in the family.

I could not be corseted, either literally or figuratively, into any conventional feminine mould.

One cannot be a mother without first being a person; family, husband and children should not be allowed, as is so often the case, to steal a woman's selfhood and her dreams.

Death is a grisly King; Fate is his bride. Now quaintly I've chosen To serve at their table, To dance at their wedding…

Sorrow will turn to stone unless you weep. I thought it would come before this. Weep it out.

Fathers - half of anyone's life seemed to be about who fathered them.

I watched him until he disappeared between the forest trees—watched after him almost as if I knew that, through no fault of his own, I would not converse with him again for a long time.

Thread and cloth were ordinary – worse than ordinary; they were women’s affairs. But letters! Letters were for lords and kings. And something in me blazed fiery jealous and joyous at the thought: Why ever should they have what I did not?

She lay all too aware of how frost stiffened her hair, furred her blankets.

however, that most married women disappeared into the house every year

The bestowing of chrysanthemums indicates familial attachment and, by implication, affection.

I am a liar. All is not well. Not at all.

I had learned to trust the peculiar workings of my heart and mind

A talented artist who has unfortunately turned her energies to the cause of women’s so-called rights.

For Ellid born of Eitha had a face like a flower for loveliness and a body like a doe for grace; her mind was steadfast as a sword and her spirit was bright as its skylit blade. Cuin

Chance Duv knows!" She spoke lightly. "Folk have always told me that the night is full of all manner of evil." "Ay, even so," Bevan said heavily, "but it is the same evil that is in the day—evil of men. Look there!

Horses sweat, you know, and men perspire, whereas ladies glow. I am sure I looked all of a glow also. Indeed, I could feel all-of-a-glow trickling down my sides beneath my corset, the steel ribs of which jabbed me under the arms most annoyingly.

Dimly, with her burning heart more than her mind, she began to understand why she had always liked gay men. They suffered, were persecuted, they were outsiders in a world where studbuck male heteros held all the power, they did not count, they were Other – the way women were.

Dear Thomas, on his knees to me, pleading. And his pain smote me to the core of my heart, and I saw: Mother of misery, I had done this to him. Cernunnos had tried to warn me. I was not whole, not ready, he had said. Ongwynn had tried to warn me. All powers above and below, even the sweet lady mother of us all, had tried. This moment was the one that Lady water had tried to show me…. Yet I whispered, “I cannot.

Over the top of the hill a knight came riding. At first I saw only his helmeted head, bent, but even then I knew him and began to run toward him. A knight riding a weary horse, a battered knight with one arm in a sling, his shield hanging from his saddle. Its device, a single heart-shaped green leaf with a violet blossom. As I ran toward him he lifted his head, and his eyes smiled at me the warmest blue the world has ever known.

From Chapter 11 "Rainy Day Puppy" ("The Missing Tulip Bulbs"): The next few days were hard on the family. It rained. It was cold. Winter had returned. The puppy grew and gained energy equal to a neutron bomb. He bounced and chewed and barked. Everyone was exhausted, except for the puppy. -

I’m after a mugger,” said Scout. “A hugger?” said Clyde. He was a little deaf. “I would imagine you receive plenty of hugs. They probably come to you. Why would you have to go after them?” “NO!” said Ike. “MMMMugger, you nitwit.” He made m-m-m-m noises with his lips.

Will there be cheese?" asked Chisolm.

See?” said Scout to Benne who tried to melt into the ground by becoming very flat. “See what happens when you don’t listen? When you go off and do whatever and you have no idea what you’re doing?” “Yes,” agreed Chisolm sternly, frowning at Benne. “Yes, it’s very clear what happens,” said Zap. “Yes,” agreed Zip. “You get a purple fire-breathing dragon that has no idea how to fly instead of a cynical mule.

ABCDE FGHIJ KLMNO PQRST UVWXYZ And each part has five letters, except the last; but Z is used so seldom that it can be lumped together with Y. I then wrote my real message to Mum,

Face Guy of Gisbourne? Not likely, not anytime soon, thank you very much.

La noche de la ciudad no tenía el brillo de la luna o de las estrellas; solo algunos retazos de luz amarillenta procedente de los escaparates se reflejaban en el pavimento, tornando la oscuridad todavía más negra.

for I could no longer think of him as lord, viscount, duke’s son; he was my comrade now

emphatically. “But even so, I don’t suppose we would have

mostly naked, in a very different area than that whence they came. For this reason, few such children were allowed upon the street without the accompaniment of a guardian-servant. “For her clothing? The Duquessa is not a child!” To the contrary, I thought; she seemed quite childlike in many ways, but Sherlock laughed heartily. “Most far-fetched.

utterly still—except that my fingers tightened around my dagger hilt—and make no sound. Meanwhile, footfalls pounded up a nearby staircase. “The villain!” continued the shrieker. “She broke in ’ere! My ’ot’ouse!” “Flora, calm yourself.” Pertelote’s weary voice. “She’s long gone.” Would that it were so.

I looked up ivy in The Meanings of Flowers. The clinging vine stood for “fidelity.

So he found it a relief and a delight to be treated with something less than royal respect. Meg’s shafts of wit were never cruel, and she aimed them most often at herself. Trevyn had seen her with the wolves; he knew her courage. Her merciless honesty concerning her own shortcomings was a different kind of courage, he thought, and he admired her for it.

one cannot be a mother without first being a person; family, husband, and children should not be allowed, as is so often the case, to steal a woman’s selfhood and her dreams. I considered that, if I were not true to myself, then all the mothering I could give you would have been falsehood

It is quite a bad idea to go to sleep with wet hair, for it dries into the most extraordinary kinks and serpentines; one can go about for days looking like Medusa.

At the next street-lamp, she sees a woman with painted lips and smudged eyes waiting in a doorway. A hansom cab drives up, stops, and a man in a tail coat and a shining silk top-hat gets out. Even though the woman in the doorway wears a low-cut evening gown that might once have belonged to a lady of the gentleman’s social class, the black-clad watcher does not think the gentleman is here to go dancing. She sees the prostitute’s haggard eyes, haunted with fear no matter how much her red-smeared lips smile. One like her was recently found dead a few streets away, slit wide open. Averting her gaze, the searcher in black walks on. An unshaven man lounging against a wall winks at her. “Missus, what yer doing all alone? Don’t yer want some company?” If he were a gentleman, he would not have spoken to her without being introduced. Ignoring him, she hastens past. She must speak to no one. She does not belong here. The knowledge does not trouble her, for she has never belonged anywhere. And in a sense she has always been alone. But her heart is not without pain as she scans the shadows, for she has no home now, she is a stranger in the world’s

I desire this boat to rock. I demand, nay, I COMMAND, this boat to rock." And rock it did.

They changed, like the wind changes, and we let them be. Sometimes the falcon returns to the falconer. Sometimes not.

Rowan–I mean–is that truly your name?" "Yes. It is now." It was her true name. She wanted him always to call her Rowan.

I like rowan trees," he said softly. "They're slim and small, but they're tough and they'll grow anywhere. They take root in stony soil. They're a mystic tree. Diviners use rowan to find precious metal. And they are beautiful." He looked at her, his blue eyes serious for once, telling her without words that he found her beautiful also. "They make good firewood, too," Ro said, trying to lighten the moment.

Perhaps King Lothe did not with to be caught between two sorceresses. Perhaps he did not wish to give in to Morgan. Perhaps he favored Nyneve. Perhaps he planned a game of his own.I do not know, for I could not ask him.

Get down from your horse, coward, and fight!" "Thank you for the kind offer," I told him, "but I think not." I turned my back on him and rode away. I was to grow accustomed to being called a coward.

Falcons whip through the air, their pointed wings blur with speed, they scorn slow game...They scud high and drop like stones, like thunderbolts, they strike so hard that a dove becomes a puff of feathers floating to the earth like snow.

Había descubierto que montar en bici me permitía pensar sin preocuparme de que alguien se percatara de mis muecas y expresiones.

Wait.” The word shot out of me, perilous. And still I could not look at him, for the tears I held back were more dangerous still. I stooped and plucked a violet from the grass, purple blossom and heart-shaped leaves and all. He had once said that my eyes were like violets at midnight, darkest green, darkest poryphry. I offered to him the little rag of a flower and whispered, “A knight needs a token.” My voice trembled only a little.

Bless Thomas, he understood at once; he smiled. I will never forget that smile, brave and warm an innocent and—No. I must not see the rest. Must not see the yearning, the longing, the desire.

That was the day I most remember, now that I fly over battlefields and the screams of dying men echo up to me as fate falls like soot from my gray wings.

It started small, as such fates often do.

Wielki Sherlock Holmes pyta mnie o przemyślenia? Niestety, nie mogłam mu nic zaoferować. Byłam, bądź co bądź, dziewczyną o minimalnej objętości czaszki.

Pan Mycroft to, pan Mycroft tamto, pan Mycroft może iść się wypchać.

don’t know where she’s gone,” I said, and to my own surprise—for I had not wept until that moment—I burst into tears. • • • Further mention of Mum, then, was put off until we sat in the hired brougham, with my bicycle strapped on behind, swaying along towards Kineford. “We are a pair of thoughtless brutes,” Sherlock had observed to Mycroft at one point, while providing me with a large, very starchy handkerchief hardly comforting to the nose. I am sure they thought

of nature, which I most definitely was not. “So, Enola,” asked Mycroft gruffly after a while, “are you feeling well enough to tell us what has happened?” I did so, but there was little to add to what they already knew. Mum had left home early on Tuesday morning and had not returned since. No, she had left me no message or explanation of any sort. No, there was no reason to think she might have taken ill; her health was excellent. No, there had been no word of her from anyone. No, in answer to Sherlock’s questions, there had been no bloodstains, no footprints, no signs of forced entry, and I did not know