Spellbound Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Spellbound. Here they are! All 100 of them:

Whoa, I'm your girlfriend now?" Archer shrugged. "We've tried to kill each other, fought ghouls, and kissed a lot. I'm pretty sure we're married in some cultures.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
And the sweetest, spellbound feeling spilling from her heart.
Lauren Kate (Fallen (Fallen, #1))
Unending Love I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times... In life after life, in age after age, forever. My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs, That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms, In life after life, in age after age, forever. Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age old pain, It's ancient tale of being apart or together. As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge, Clad in the light of a pole-star, piercing the darkness of time. You become an image of what is remembered forever. You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount. At the heart of time, love of one for another. We have played along side millions of lovers, Shared in the same shy sweetness of meeting, the distressful tears of farewell, Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever. Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you The love of all man's days both past and forever: Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life. The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours - And the songs of every poet past and forever.
Rabindranath Tagore (Selected Poems)
Um...Mercer? Haven't seen you in nearly a month. I was expecting something like, 'Oh Cross, love of my heart, fire of my loins, how I've longed--
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
When I'm really into a novel, I'm seeing the world differently during that time— not just for the hour or so in the day when I get to read. I'm actually walking around in a haze, spellbound by the book and looking at everything through a different prism.
Colin Firth
She had sand in her mouth and between her toes, the briny wind raising goose bumps on her skin, and the sweetest, spellbound feeling spilling from her heart. She could, at that moment, have died for him.
Lauren Kate (Fallen (Fallen, #1))
No. Don't distract me with your sexy talk.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
So hologram means--" I finally said. "It means non-corporeal, yeah. Which sucks seeing as how there are a lot of very corporeal things I'd like to do with you right now.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
I think of Dr. Brulov in Spellbound: “My dear girl, you cannot keep bumping your head against reality and saying it is not there.
A.J. Finn (The Woman in the Window)
She was so cold, she probably farted ice cubes.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
Right. So no plans at all then?" Jenna frowned. "Other than rocking in the fetal position for a while?" "Yeah, I was thinking about taking one of those showers where you huddle in the corner fully clothed and cry," Archer offered.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
You know, I can see more than just the future or the past." "Really?" I asked, paging through through the papers in the file. "Can you also see the present? Because I can do that, too. Like, right now, I sense that I'm in a messy room with a total toolbox.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
It's hard to take someone seriously when they leave you a note saying, 'Your ugly.' My ugly what? The idiot didn't even know the difference between your and you're.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
The U.S. Postal Service should hire him for an ad campaign. If he were at the mailbox every time you sent a letter, no one would use email ever again.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
Do I look like a freaking fairy - tale princess to you?
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
He probably would've raised an eyebrow in that annoying/hot way he had, and made a dirty joke about Elodie possessing me.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
The Mole was bewitched, entranced, fascinated. By the side of the river he trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spellbound by exciting stories; and when tired at last, he sat on the bank, while the river still chattered on to him, a babbling procession of the best stories in the world, sent from the heart of the earth to be told at last to the insatiable sea.
Kenneth Grahame (The Wind in the Willows)
His voice was low, and I think he would've been hot if he weren't radiating that air of "I Am Super Evil--No, Really--And Not In The Sexy Way.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
You know, 'help me, Sophie Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
Okay, fine. But just so you know, following me into hell means you're all definitely the sidekicks.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
He had them as spellbound as a room full of Ewoks listening to C-3PO.
Cory Doctorow (Makers)
He turned his head and caught her with his eyes. She froze, locked by the intensity of his stare. His eyes were stark and cold, the concentrated green of pale jade. Outlined in smudged black kohl, those eyes focused on her, unblinking through the feathery strands of his jet black hair, and it was like being watched through a cage by a complacent and calculating cat. Discomfort welled in her, thick and black as an oil spring. Who was this guy and what was his royal problem? Her gaze flicked briefly to the small metal loop that hugged one corner of his bottom lip. He blinked once, then slowly lifted one hand and crooked a beckoning finger at her. Isobel hesitated but then as though spellbound to obey, she found herself leaning in. “What are you staring at?” he whispered.
Kelly Creagh (Nevermore (Nevermore, #1))
- I was a tired mess. My eyes didn't just have bags - they had five-piece luggage sets.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
The hand on my hair moved to my back, and I realized someone was singing softly. The voice was familiar, and something about it made my chest ache. Well, that was to be expected. Angels' songs would be awfully poignant. "'I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar, when I met you...'" the voice crooned. I frowned. Was that really an appropriate song for the Heavenly Host to be--
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
I longed to know what it felt like to have one person eclipse everything bad in your life - be a place of pure joy.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
Want to start a fairy-tale romance with me? BTW it might be doomed, k?
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
The lightbulb is gone," she said awed. "Emma, you said, 'Lights, begone' and you literally made the lights be gone." "How do I get them back?" I asked, panicked. "What's the opposite of begone? Regone?
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
I couldn't help it: Brendan was abs-olutely pec-tacular, horrible puns intended and very accurate.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
Oh, come on, Ash, that smells like a unicorn fart.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
She was famous, and she was insane. Her voice soared out over the audience, holding them spellbound and enraptured, delivering their hopes and fears tangled in chords and rhythm. They called her an angel, her voice a gift. She was famous, and she was a liar.
Dianne Sylvan (Queen of Shadows (Shadow World, #1))
What I was hungry for was sitting nonchalantly next to me on the couch.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
This guy had more lines than loose-leaf.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
Ostara, if one dies while in these othere states of consciousness, one dies indeed. this begs the question, are dreams truly only ever dreams?
Nancy Holder (Wicked 2: Legacy & Spellbound (Wicked, #3-4))
Tania, I was spellbound by you from the first moment I saw you. There I was, living my dissolute life, and war had just started. My entire base was in disarray, people were running around, closing accounts, taking money out, grabbing food out of stores, buying up the entire Gostiny Dvor, volunteering for the army, sending their kids to camp—” He broke off. “And in the middle of my chaos, there was you!” Alexander whispered passionately. “You were sitting alone on this bench, impossibly young, breathtakingly blonde and lovely, and you were eating ice cream with such abandon, such pleasure, such mystical delight that I could not believe my eyes. As if there were nothing else in the world on that summer Sunday.
Paullina Simons (The Bronze Horseman (The Bronze Horseman, #1))
Earth, Ashes to ashes and dust to dust in mother earth we place our trust and as we cycle through our years we water it with blood and tears...
Nancy Holder (Wicked 2: Legacy & Spellbound (Wicked, #3-4))
She often wondered how many people felt this way, spellbound by words, wishing to be tucked inside a book and forgotten there.
Etaf Rum (A Woman Is No Man)
Well I'll be honest...sometimes it's really hard-" "I know." I smirked, feeling saucy. "I can tell. I'm pretty much straddling you right now." "Really hard to stop, smart-ass," Brendan emphasized, giving me a playful squeeze before cocking an eyebrow at me.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
She often wondered how many people felt this way, spellbound by words, wishing to be tucked inside a book and forgotten there. How many people were hoping to find their story inside, desperate to understand. And yet Deya still felt alone in the end, no matter how many books she read, no matter how many tales she told herself.
Etaf Rum (A Woman Is No Man)
In the moment when that glass passed from his hand to mine, something sent up a high wild warning cry in the back of my mind. Persephone's irrevocable pomegranate seeds, Never take food from strangers; old stories where one sip or bite seals the spellbound walls forever, dissolves the road home into mist and blows it away on the wind.
Tana French (The Likeness (Dublin Murder Squad, #2))
And then, from behind me: "I thought about you. Every day." I froze, my hand still holding the canvas flap. Cal's voice was slightly hoarse as he continued. "Three weeks is a long time to wonder where someone is. All that time, I thought maybe I'd done the wrong thing, telling you to find the Brannicks. I turned around then. I wanted to make a joke, or say something sarcastic, anything that would cut the tension enveloping us. Instead, I said, "I thought about you, too.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
I gulped down a surge of terror. The demon had come out of the pendant like a Pokémon out of a poké ball. Beelzebub, I choose you!
Annette Marie (Demon Magic and a Martini (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #4))
I have a simple philosophy: Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches." by Alice Roosevelt Longworth
Claudy Conn (Spellbound (Legend, #1))
I got lost in my doodles, and started daydreaming.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
We’re allowed to have complicated feelings,” Arthur said softly. “You can be grateful for what you now have and still mourn a loss.
Allie Therin (Spellbound (Magic in Manhattan #1))
I go running in the park all the time. I guess I never looked up.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
I think that the law isn’t about words on paper. It’s about doing what’s right,
Larry Correia (Spellbound (Grimnoir Chronicles, #2))
She felt almost spellbound by him, as if he were a magnet pulling her to him.
Lisa Genova (Love Anthony)
I closed my eyes, imagining every feature of his face. He had greenish eyes that could challenge the ocean. He had this amazing way of smiling which could melt the toughest hearts. He was the epitome of perfection and a paragon of gentlemanly conduct. He was precious and gallant towards everyone. Probably, that’s why I was spellbound. For me, he was debonair. Boys like him shouldn’t be born. He didn’t belong here. He didn’t belong to me.
Pratibha Malav (If Tomorrow Comes (A Kind Of Commitment, #2))
I’m staring at him with my mouth open—again—as he tucks his shirt back in. When he’s finished, he takes a step closer to me. I stand perfectly still. His grin dies into a seductive curve of his lips that makes my knees feel funny. I’m completely spellbound and embarrassingly turned on when he bends to whisper in my ear. “You’d better close those lips before I’m tempted to kiss them and really give you something to be all hot and bothered about.” -Cash
M. Leighton (Down to You (The Bad Boys, #1))
She couldn't have told you whether it was because she was afraid, or because such a voice in the darkness seemed of necessity a boon; but she listened to him as she had never listened before; his words dropped deep into her soul.
Henry James (The Portrait of a Lady)
What's a girl to do when meeting The One means she's cursed to die a horrible death?
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
For there to be light, there must be darkness. For there to be joy, there must be sorrow. For there to be beauty, there must be the grotesque.
Penelope King (Witchy, Witchy (Spellbound Trilogy, #1))
speechless, castaway and wry a spellbound oddity am I my feet are locked upon the clay my gaze is locked upon the sky
Cecilia Dart-Thornton
The Moon is always there. A half blink of shadow, a crescent of an eyelash, opulent in fullness, spellbound in nothingness, and a friend.
Carolyn Riker (Blue Clouds: A Collection of Soul’s Creative Intelligence)
I cocked my fist back, remembering what Brendan had taught me. "Don't aim for your target. You'll have more of an impact that way." I was aiming for China.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
If you feel afraid of magic, then you've been enchanted.
Toba Beta (Betelgeuse Incident: Insiden Bait Al-Jauza)
It was worth a shot, and as the saying around here goes, you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.
Annette Marie (Three Mages and a Margarita (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #1))
Zak pulled me over to my one bar stool. Twenty minutes ago, I’d owned two bar stools, but the other one was in pieces. Poor stool. So much life to live, snatched away too soon by an angry sea serpent.
Annette Marie (Two Witches and a Whiskey (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #3))
Aaron slumped at a table, his head in his arms, while Kai and Ezra watched him sulk with the caring sympathy of close friends. Nah, just kidding. They looked entertained as hell, zero sympathy in their smirks.
Annette Marie (Three Mages and a Margarita (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #1))
Independence is an admirable trait, but it can be rooted in pride, insecurity, and fear as easily as it can stem from strength, confidence, and self-reliance. Be sure you know what drives yours.
Annette Marie (Dark Arts and a Daiquiri (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #2))
The better you do your job, the easier it looks. Timeline is important though, everyone remembers how well you did the job. Aspire to Exceed expectations. Plan your day. Its like sipping an Energy Drink . Simply simplify your Job – You yourself will be spellbound at your competence.
Gautam Mukhopadhyay (Rise to Eminence)
Love is a more powerful force than magic. You can trick the mind and even the heart, but never the soul. When a person is not free to love with their soul, that is not love and that is why a love spell can never truly work.
Nikki Jefford (Entangled (Spellbound, #1))
There’s a line between keeping secrets because the consequences of the truth scare you, and keeping secrets because you need to be beside someone when you share the truth.
Annette Marie (Lost Talismans and a Tequila (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #7))
You might be too drunk to magic.
Annette Marie (Dark Arts and a Daiquiri (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #2))
[Francesca] 'You really are a few biscuits short of breakfast.' His eyebrows furrowed in confusion. 'You're a few colors shy of a rainbow?' she offered. 'Not pulling a full wagon? Knitting with only one needle? All foam and no beer? Your cheese slid off the cracker? You couldn't pour water out of a boot with instructions on the heel?' [Nicodemus] 'All right. I get it.
Blake Charlton (Spellbound (Spellwright, #2))
The woods are never solitary– they are full of whispering, beckoning, friendly life. But the sea is a mighty soul, forever moaning of some great, unsharable sorrow which shuts it up into itself for all eternity. We can never pierce it’s infinite mystery– we may only wander, awed and spell-bound, on the outer fringe of it. The woods call us with a hundred voices, but the sea has one only– a mighty voice that drowns our souls in its majestic music. The woods are human, but the sea is of the company of the archangels.
L.M. Montgomery
What an amazing day," Bree said, stretching in her seat. "Thanks to me and my weather charm." I said lightly. Robbie and Hunter both looked at me in alarm. "You didn't," Said Robbie. "You didn't," Said Hunter. I was enjoying this. "Maybe I did, maybe I didn't." Hunter looked upset. "You can't be serious!" Cahn't, I thought. Cahn too.
Cate Tiernan (Spellbound (Sweep, #6))
He’s the safety net of my heart, the one protecting my moats and breathing fire. We’re impassioned and dazed and spellbound and he helped me find myself. He helped me accept the person I am. When I’m not so nice and when I’m my best version I can be.
V. Theia (Manhattan Sugar (From Manhattan #1))
Should Disappointment, parent of Despair, Strive for her son to seize my careless heart; When, like a cloud, he sits upon the air, Preparing on his spell-bound prey to dart: Chase him away, sweet Hope, with visage bright, And fright him as the morning frightens night!
John Keats
You know, I can see more than just the future or the past." "Really?" I asked, paging through the papers in the file. "Can you also see the present? Because I can do that, too. Like, right now, I see that I'm in a messy room with a total toolbox.
Rachel Hawkins (Spell Bound (Hex Hall, #3))
Being trapped thus is incredibly frustrating for me, and occasionally I take it out on others. Again, I apologize. Now, if you’d like, I can help you with what you’re seeking.” Knowing I’d probably regret it, I crossed the room and yanked the canvas off the mirror. As before, he was sitting on the table, smirking at me. “Jackass, jackass on the wall, where’s the info on Hex Hall?
Rachel Hawkins
Emma, but--" he began, and I shushed him. "No Emma buts except for the one I sit on.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
Since I was already talking nice and loud, several people turned, their expressions brightening with anticipation. Tori was about to humiliate someone again and they had front-row seats.
Annette Marie (Demon Magic and a Martini (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #4))
But a smell shivered him awake. It was a scent as old as the world. It was a hundred aromas of a thousand places. It was the tang of pine needles. It was the musk of sex. It was the muscular rot of mushrooms. It was the spice of oak. Meaty and redolent of soil and bark and herb. It was bats and husks and burrows and moss. It was solid and alive - so alive! And it was close. The vapors invaded Nicholas' nostrils and his hair rose to their roots. His eyes were as heavy as manhole covers, but he opened them. Through the dying calm inside him snaked a tremble of fear. The trees themselves seemed tense, waiting. The moonlight was a hard shell, sharp and ready to ready be struck and to ring like steel. A shadow moved. It poured like oil from between the tall trees and flowed across dark sandy dirt, lengthening into the middle of the ring. Trees seem to bend toward it, spellbound. A long, long shadow...
Stephen M. Irwin (The Dead Path)
Whoever lived in that apartment had a security gate, blinds that were closed and curtains drawn. It's probably darker in there than it is in Hollister.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellcaster (Spellbound, #2))
Snoopy is a mean word,” Ezra added. “You’re persistently inquisitive.
Annette Marie (Demon Magic and a Martini (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #4))
I like to think I’m a pretty chill person, but right now? I was fretting worse than a granny with her best china in a room of hyperactive toddlers.
Annette Marie (Three Mages and a Margarita (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #1))
...It's not that she has not tried to improve her condition before acknowledging its hopelessness. (Oh, come on, let's get the hell out of this, and get into the first person.) I have sought, by study, to better my form and make myself Society's Darling. You see, I had been fed, in my youth, a lot of old wives' tales about the way men would instantly forsake a beautiful woman to flock about a brilliant one. It is but fair to say that, after getting out in the world, I had never seen this happen, but I thought that maybe I might be the girl to start the vogue. I would become brilliant. I would sparkle. I would hold whole dinner tables spellbound. I would have throngs fighting to come within hearing distance of me while the weakest, elbowed mercilessly to the outskirts, would cry "What did she say?" or "Oh, please ask her to tell it again." That's what I would do. Oh I could just hear myself." -Review of the books, Favorite Jokes of Famous People, by Bruce Barton; The Technique of the Love Affair by "A Gentlewoman." (Actually by Doris Langley Moore.) Review title: Wallflower's Lament; November 17, 1928.
Dorothy Parker (Constant Reader: 2)
you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.
Annette Marie (Three Mages and a Margarita (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #1))
No, he wasn't like them at all. And even though my experience with the opposite sex was pitifully non-existent, this was someone I wanted to know. Someone I needed to know. Someone I needed to have know me.
Penelope King (Witchy, Witchy (Spellbound Trilogy, #1))
Gut instincts were supposed to be the most trustworthy and it was in her gut where she felt the butterflies. The heart had its purpose as a blood pumping muscle, but love...love blossomed and sparked through the body - originating from the gut.
Nikki Jefford (Entangled (Spellbound, #1))
The leaves did not stir on the trees, cicadas twanged, and the monotonous muffled sound of the sea that rose from below spoke of the peace, the eternal sleep awaiting us. So it rumbled below when there was no Yalta, no Oreanda here; so it rumbles now, and it will rumble as indifferently and as hollowly when we are no more. And in this constancy, in this complete indifference to the life and death of each of us, there lies, perhaps a pledge of our eternal salvation, of the unceasing advance of life upon earth, of unceasing movement towards perfection. Sitting beside a young woman who in the dawn seemed so lovely, Gurov, soothed and spellbound by these magical surroundings - the sea, the mountains, the clouds, the wide sky - thought how everything is really beautiful in this world when one reflects: everything except what we think or do ourselves when we forget the higher aims of life and our own human dignity.
Anton Chekhov (The Lady With the Little Dog and Other Stories, 1896-1904)
He smiled. I was unprepared for my reaction to the most potent weapon Haden had in his arsenal—a real smile, one that reached his eyes. One genuine emotion was enough to unravel my life from the security of everything I’d ever known. For seventeen years, I’d tried to live Father’s way. Each step measured, my words carefully chosen. In his fortress of fears, I grew up—but not strong. I yearned to replace the hole in his heart left by my mother, so my life never belonged to me. My own heart was my weakest muscle, never exercised, never even flexed. Suddenly, I understood that it still miraculously worked. And it was full. So full it felt like rays of sunshine were bursting through my chest, poking out of me in radiant splendor. Haden spellbound me and life changed to Technicolor. In his smile, I felt the bindings that tethered my spirit rip away.
Gwen Hayes (Falling Under (Falling Under, #1))
I wasn’t exactly a stranger to feeling like a princess—if you meant the princess in the first half of the fairy tale. Cinderella as a scullery maid. Snow White with the wicked stepmother. But I wasn’t used to what life was like after you meet the prince, after the slipper fits, after the kiss wakes you from your slumber. It would take some getting used to.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
All my life, I've been trying to fill an emptiness inside. But that emptiness...I've built myself around it. Filling it in would be like filling in the empty space within a cathedral.
Blake Charlton (Spellbound (Spellwright, #2))
Holden . . .,” she said, giving him a look. “Everything fucking hurts,” he admitted, wincing. When he looked at her face, though, it was impossible not to grin. “Except my heart.” He paused, spellbound by the sight of her so close. “But even my heart hurts a little.” His eyes dropped to her lips, and he watched as they tilted up a little. “Why’s that?” “Because I missed all of this. I missed ten years of . . . You . . . are so beautiful.
Katy Regnery (Never Let You Go (A Modern Fairytale, #2))
Look up, you whose gaze is fixed on this earth, who are spellbound by the little events and changes on the face of the earth. Look up to these words, you who have turned away from heaven disappointed. Look up, you whose eyes are heavy with tears and who are heavy and who are crying over the fact that the earth has gracelessly torn us away. Look up, you who, burdened with guilt, cannot lift your eyes. Look up, your redemption is drawing near. something different from what you see daily will happen. Just be aware, be watchful, wait just another short moment. Wait and something quite new will break over you: God will come.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (God Is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas)
She was about the single nicest human being he’d ever met, but she’d kill anybody she considered a bad man faster than a farmwife would wring the neck of a chicken. With Faye, once you crossed a certain line, your life was worth nothing.
Larry Correia (Spellbound (Grimnoir Chronicles, #2))
Aw,” I said, “look at this guy. He’s never even seen a girl before.” Fenton’s gaze jerked from my chest to my face, confusion twisting his eyebrows. “What?” “Only a basement-dwelling loser would stare like that.” “What?” I looked sadly at Aaron. “And he’s deaf too! Poor thing.
Annette Marie (Demon Magic and a Martini (The Guild Codex: Spellbound, #4))
His kiss was fierce, desperate, and slow, drugging. A shudder passed through me, warming my body from the inside out. All my defenses dissolved. We started making out again and I let Trent slip his hand inside my top. This time, when he kissed me, something inside me awoke and a shudder warmed my skin. Our kisses got more passionate and hotter. His fingers slid over my bra, and a turbulent ache burned through my body.
Sherry J. Soule (Beautifully Broken (Spellbound Prodigies #1))
But one moment stood out to me, as I sat beneath a dark sky full of stars and retold a moment from the Lord of the Rings. Trick memory. It was just one conversation in a three-hour long film in a quartet of movies, but I’ve always remembered it. “And Gandalf paused, and spoke. He looked at Pippin with a smile, and said ‘End? No, the journey doesn’t end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.’ And Pippin said, ‘What? Gandalf? See what?’” I look around. My audience is spellbound. I take a breath. “‘White shores, and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise.’” As I finish speaking, I look up, about to finish the scene and describe the Rohirrim coming to Gondor’s aid.
Pirateaba (Fae and Fare (The Wandering Inn, #2))
This all seemed quaint and amusing, but as the book moved through to the modern day, nothing changed. People still fell to the influence of persuasion techniques, especially when they broadcast information about themselves that allowed identification of their personality type--their true name, basically--and the attack vectors for these techniques were primarily aural and visual. But no one thought of this as magic. It was just falling for a good line or being distracted or clever marketing. Even the words were the same. People still got fascinated and charmed, spellbound and amazed, they forgot themselves, and were carried away. They just didn't think there was anything magical about that anymore.
Max Barry (Lexicon)
I first met Winston Churchill in the early summer of 1906 at a dinner party to which I went as a very young girl. Our hostess was Lady Wemyss and I remember that Arthur Balfour, George Wyndman, Hilaire Belloc and Charles Whibley were among the guests… I found myself sitting next to this young man who seemed to me quite different from any other young man I had ever met. For a long time he seemed sunk in abstraction. Then he appeared to become suddenly aware of my existence. He turned on me a lowering gaze and asked me abruptly how old I was. I replied that I was nineteen. “And I,” he said despairingly, “am thirty-two already. Younger than anyone else who counts, though, “he added, as if to comfort himself. Then savagely: “Curse ruthless time! Curse our mortality. How cruelly short is this allotted span for all we must cram into it!” And he burst forth into an eloquent diatribe on the shortness of human life, the immensity of possible human accomplishment—a theme so well exploited by the poets, prophets, and philosophers of all ages that it might seem difficult to invest it with new and startling significance. Yet for me he did so, in a torrent of magnificent language which appeared to be both effortless and inexhaustible and ended up with the words I shall always remember: “We are all worms. But I do believe that I am a glow worm.” By this time I was convinced of it—and my conviction remained unshaken throughout the years that followed. Later he asked me whether I thought that words had a magic and music quite independent of their meaning. I said I certainly thought so, and I quoted as a classic though familiar instance the first lines that came into my head. Charm’d magic casements, opening on the foam Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn. His eyes blazed with excitement. “Say that again,” he said, “say it again—it is marvelous!” “But I objected, “You know these lines. You know the ‘Ode to a Nightengale.’ ” He had apparently never read or heard of it before (I must, however, add that next time I met him he had not learned not merely this but all of the odes to Keats by heart—and he recited them quite mercilessly from start to finish, not sparing me a syllable). Finding that he liked poetry, I quoted to him from one of my own favorite poets, Blake. He listened avidly, repeating some lines to himself with varying emphases and stresses, then added meditatively: “I never knew that old Admiral had found so much time to write such good poetry.” I was astounded that he, with his acute susceptibility to words and power of using them, should have left such tracts of English literature entirely unexplored. But however it happened he had lost nothing by it, when he approached books it was “with a hungry, empty mind and with fairly srong jaws, and what I got I *bit*.” And his ear for the beauty of language needed no tuning fork. Until the end of dinner I listened to him spellbound. I can remember thinking: This is what people mean when they talk of seeing stars. That is what I am doing now. I do not to this day know who was on my other side. Good manners, social obligation, duty—all had gone with the wind. I was transfixed, transported into a new element. I knew only that I had seen a great light. I recognized it as the light of genius… I cannot attempt to analyze, still less transmit, the light of genius. But I will try to set down, as I remember them, some of the differences which struck me between him and all the others, young and old, whom I have known. First and foremost he was incalculable. He ran true to no form. There lurked in his every thought and world the ambush of the unexpected. I felt also that the impact of life, ideas and even words upon his mind, was not only vivid and immediate, but direct. Between him and them there was no shock absorber of vicarious thought or precedent gleaned either from books or other minds. His relationship wit
Violet Bonham Carter
Willed introversion, in fact, is one of the classic implements of creative genius and can be employed as a deliberate device. It drives the psychic energies into depth and activates the lost continent of unconscious infantile and archetypal images. The result, of course, may be a disintegration of consciousness more or less complete (neurosis, psychosis: the plight of spellbound Daphne); but on the other hand, if the personality is able to absorb and integrate the new forces, there will be experienced an almost superhuman degree of self-consciousness and masterful control. This is a basic principle of the Indian disciplines of yoga. It has been the way, also, of many creative spirits in the West.25 It cannot be described, quite, as an answer to any specific call. Rather, it is a deliberate, terrific refusal to respond to anything but the deepest, highest, richest answer to the as yet unknown demand of some waiting void within: a kind of total strike, or rejection of the offered terms of life, as a result of which some power of transformation carries the problem to a plane of new magnitudes, where it is suddenly and finally resolved.
Joseph Campbell (The Hero With a Thousand Faces)
Regret crossing the street for me, soldier?” Taking her hand into both of his, Alexander said, “Tania, I was spellbound by you from the first moment I saw you. There I was, living my dissolute life, and war had just started. My entire base was in disarray, people were running around, closing accounts, taking money out, grabbing food out of stores, buying up the entire Gostiny Dvor, volunteering for the army, sending their kids to camp—” He broke off. “And in the middle of my chaos, there was you!” Alexander whispered passionately. “You were sitting alone on this bench, impossibly young, breathtakingly blonde and lovely, and you were eating ice cream with such abandon, such pleasure, such mystical delight that I could not believe my eyes. As if there were nothing else in the world on that summer Sunday. I give you this so that if you ever need strength in the future and I’m not there, you don’t have to look far. You, with your high-heeled red sandals, in your sublime dress, eating ice cream before war, before going who knows where to find who knows what, and yet never having any doubt that you would find it. That’s what I crossed the street for, Tatiana. Because I believed that you would find it. I believed in you.
Paullina Simons (The Bronze Horseman (The Bronze Horseman, #1))
Sometimes a family was a mischievous magical boss, her magical rival turned friend, a magical girl who used to be a babysitter and now was like an older sister, and the person you didn't understand in the beginning but liked so much now. And sometimes it was arguments and sometimes it was hugs and sometimes it was banding together to fight a morally corrupt government body and sometimes it was just existing in the same space together as friends. But whatever this family was right now, whatever it was going to be, and however it would turn out, it was mine. And I knew that I belonged.
F.T. Lukens (Spell Bound)
On one side, across the channel, stretched the silvery sand shore of the bar; on the other extended a long, curving beach of red cliffs, rising steeply from the pebbled coves. It was a shore that knew the magic and mystery of storm and star. There is a great solitude about such a shore. The woods are never solitary-they are full of whispering, beckoning, friendly life. But the sea is a mighty soul, forever moaning of some great, unshareable sorrow, which shuts it up into itself for all eternity. We can never pierce its infinite mystery-We may only wander, awed and spell-bound, on the outer fringe of it. The woods call to us with a hundred voices, but the sea has one only-a mighty voice that drowns our souls in its majestic music. The woods are human, but the sea is in the company of the archangels.
L.M. Montgomery (Anne's House of Dreams (Anne of Green Gables, #5))
Everybody must pity Desdemona, but I cannot bring myself to like her. Her determination to marry Othello – it was she who virtually did the proposing – seems the romantic crush of a silly schoolgirl rather than a mature affection; it is Othello’s adventures, so unlike the civilian life she knows, which captivate her rather than Othello as a person. He may not have practiced witchcraft, but, in fact, she is spellbound. Then, she seems more aware than is agreeable of the honor she has done Othello by becoming his wife. […] Before Cassio speaks to her, she has already discussed him with her husband and learned that he is to be reinstated as soon as it is opportune. A sensible wife would have told Cassio this and left matters alone. In continuing to badger Othello, she betrays a desire to prove to herself and to Cassio that she can make her husband do as she pleases. […] Though her relationship with Cassio is perfectly innocent, one cannot but share Iago’s doubts as to the durability of the marriage. It is worth noting that, in the willow-song scene with Emilia, she speaks with admiration of Ludovico and then turns to the topic of adultery. Of course, she discusses this in general terms and is shocked by Emilia’s attitude, but she does discuss the subject and she does listen to what Emilia has to say about husbands and wives. It is as if she had suddenly realized that she had made a mésalliance and that the sort of man she ought to have married was someone of her own class and color like Ludovico. Given a few more years of Othello and of Emilia’s influence and she might well, one feels, have taken a lover.
W.H. Auden (The Dyer's Hand and Other Essays)
When by my solitary hearth I sit, And hateful thoughts enwrap my soul in gloom; When no fair dreams before my "mind's eye" flit, And the bare heath of life presents no bloom; Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed, And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head. Whene'er I wander, at the fall of night, Where woven boughs shut out the moon's bright ray, Should sad Despondency my musings fright, And frown, to drive fair Cheerfulness away, Peep with the moon-beams through the leafy roof, And keep that fiend Despondence far aloof. Should Disappointment, parent of Despair, Strive for her son to seize my careless heart; When, like a cloud, he sits upon the air, Preparing on his spell-bound prey to dart: Chace him away, sweet Hope, with visage bright, And fright him as the morning frightens night! Whene'er the fate of those I hold most dear Tells to my fearful breast a tale of sorrow, O bright-eyed Hope, my morbid fancy cheer; Let me awhile thy sweetest comforts borrow: Thy heaven-born radiance around me shed, And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head! Should e'er unhappy love my bosom pain, From cruel parents, or relentless fair; O let me think it is not quite in vain To sigh out sonnets to the midnight air! Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed. And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head! In the long vista of the years to roll, Let me not see our country's honour fade: O let me see our land retain her soul, Her pride, her freedom; and not freedom's shade. From thy bright eyes unusual brightness shed-- Beneath thy pinions canopy my head! Let me not see the patriot's high bequest, Great Liberty! how great in plain attire! With the base purple of a court oppress'd, Bowing her head, and ready to expire: But let me see thee stoop from heaven on wings That fill the skies with silver glitterings! And as, in sparkling majesty, a star Gilds the bright summit of some gloomy cloud; Brightening the half veil'd face of heaven afar: So, when dark thoughts my boding spirit shroud, Sweet Hope, celestial influence round me shed, Waving thy silver pinions o'er my head. - To Hope
John Keats (The Complete Poems)
Nature’s particular gift to the walker, through the semi-mechanical act of walking — a gift no other form of exercise seems to transmit in the same high degree — is to set the mind jogging, to make it garrulous, exalted, a little mad maybe — certainly creative and suprasensitive, until at last it really seems to be outside of you and as if it were talking to you whilst you are talking back to it. Then everything gradually seems to join in, sun and the wind, the white road and the dusty hedges, the spirit of the season, whichever that may be, the friendly old earth that is pushing life firth of every sort under your feet or spell-bound in a death-like winter trance, till you walk in the midst of a blessed company, immersed in a dream-talk far transcending any possible human conversation. Time enough, later, for that…; here and now, the mind has shaken off its harness, is snorting and kicking up heels like a colt in a meadow.
Kenneth Grahame