Quotes from Robin Hobb

other tales, the sailors reach a land of intelligent talking animals who find humans disgusting and rather stupid.

I lingered in the hinterlands of sleep. Sometimes I think there is more rest in that place between wakefulness and sleep than there is in true sleep. The mind walks in the twilight of both states, and finds the truths that are hidden alike by daylight and dreams.

What good is a life lived as if it made no difference at all to the great life of the world? A sadder thing I cannot imagine

Well, isn't that what all the world says of Bingtown? That if a man can imagine a thing, he can find it for sale here?" "And you've heard the rejoinder to that, haven't you? That no man can truly imagine being happy, and that's why happiness isn't for sale here.

What sort of person would cling to the hope that someone else would return to give meaning to her life? What sort of quivering parasite needed someone else to validate her existence?

No, Fitz, this is life. And no one has time not to think of such things. Each creature in the world should consider this thing, every moment of the heart's beating. Otherwise, what is the point of arising each day?

Be with the woman you love, while you can.

I fancied that if I sat very still, I could still feel the warmth of Molly's arms around me. I knew precisely where her cheek had touched mine. A very faint scent of her clung to my shirt from our brief embrace, and I agonized over whether to wear the shirt that day, to carry that scent with me, or to set it aside carefully in my clothing chest, to preserve it. I did not think it a foolish thing at all to care so much about that. Looking back, I smile, but it is at my wisdom, not my folly.

It's a hard way to learn, but I think that's how most of us learn about jealousy. It seems like a stupid way for anyone to feel, until someone makes you feel it.

if I fret about it, I shall have pre-judged myself to failure.

That destiny is not reserved for a few chosen ones. Each man has a destiny. Recognizing it and fulfilling it are the purpose of a man's life.

Hope, dashed too often, becomes the enemy. I heard her words and they did not make my heart leap with gladness. Instead I felt hot anger.

Death is always less painful and easier than life! You speak true. And yet we do not, day to day, choose death. Because ultimately, death is not the opposite of life, but the opposite of choice. Death is what you get when there are no choices left to make. Am I right?

If I gave Bee to Riddle and Nettle, I could undertake the Fool's vengeance. That traitorous thought made me want to vomit.

Perhaps knowledge should not be available to all. Perhaps it should be earned, parceled out from master to worthy student only, rather than committed to paper where anyone who chances upon it may claim it for himself.

Quando o único conforto que se pode obter é o sono, aceita-o. Deixar-te-á mais bem preparado para o que quer que venha em seguida.

C'était pénible d'être témoin d'une si terrible

Live with it. Many folk have to live with worse. Most of the time you're fine. You're not blind. You're not paralyzed. You've your wits, still. Stop defining yourself by what you can't do. Why don't you consider what you didn't lose?

In every building, in every garden, at every turn the visitor finds the austere beauty and simplicity of color and form that are the Mountain ideal. The overall impression that one carries away is of tranquillity and joy in the natural world. The chosen simplicity of life there may lead the visitor to question his own choice in life.

I have had a father. You were my father, and I will go on without one now. You need not worry for me, Da. In your own way, you have well provided for me.

E o que amastes, aquilo que ambos amastes verdadeiramente, não foi um ao outro. Foi a altura das vossas vidas. Foi a primavera dos vossos anos, e a vida a correr forte em vós, e a guerra à vossa parte e os vossos corpos fortes e perfeitos.

Where is the justice of fate, when a half-wit has in abundance and values not at all that which I so desperately lack?

How many doesn't matter after one," Chade had said. "We know what we are. Quantity makes you neither better nor worse.

One can ignore pain. But when the body invokes weakness, determination is useless.