Quotes from Cornelia Funke

If I were to be made a knight," said the Wart, staring dreamily into the fire, "I should … pray to God to let me encounter all the evil in the world in my own person, so that if I conquered there would be none left, and, if I were defeated, I would be the one to suffer for it." "That would be extremely presumptuous of you," said Merlin, "and you would be conquered, and you would suffer for it." T. H. White, The Sword in the Stone

Faber sniffed the book. "Do you know that books smell like nutmeg or some spice from a foreign land? I loved to smell them when I was a boy." Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

Was there any more wretched existence than the life of a writer who had run out of words?

You think this is a trap, then?" the Count asked. "I always think everything is a trap until proven otherwise," the Prince answered. "Which is why I'm still alive." William Goldman, The Princess Bride

A longing for books was nothing compared with what you could feel for human beings. The books told you about that feeling. The books spoke of love, and it was wonderful to listen to them, but they were not substitute for love itself.

If anyone would ever bring back the words, he supposed it would be the children.

Un lettore non vede veramente i personaggi di una storia. Li sente.

They are shooting The Thief Lord in Venice at the moment.

Fear kills everything. Your mind, your heart, your imagination.

Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you secruity and friendship and didn't ask for anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly.

I always wanted to ride a dragon myself, so I decided to do this for a year in my imagination.

Stories never really end...even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don't end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page.

The world was a terrible place, cruel, pitiless, dark as a bad dream. Not a good place to live. Only in books could you find pity, comfort, happiness - and love. Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly.

Stories never really end...even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don't end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page.

Isn't it odd how much fatter a book gets when you've read it several times?" Mo had said..."As if something were left between the pages every time you read it. Feelings, thoughts, sounds, smells...and then, when you look at the book again many years later, you find yourself there, too, a slightly younger self, slightly different, as if the book had preserved you like a pressed flower...both strange and familiar.

Books have to be heavy because the whole world's inside them.

So what? All writers are lunatics!

Which of us has not felt that the character we are reading in the printed page is more real than the person standing beside us?

The world was a terrible place, cruel, pitiless, dark as a bad dream. Not a good place to live. Only in books could you find pity, comfort, happiness - and love. Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly.

Because fear kills everything," Mo had once told her. "Your mind, your heart, your imagination.

Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask for anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly. Love, truth, beauty, wisdom and consolation against death. Who had said that? Someone else who loved books.

The sea always filled her with longing, though for what she was never sure.

It's a good idea to have your own books with you in a strange place

Women were different, no doubt about it. Men broke so much more quickly. Grief didn't break women. Instead it wore them down, it hollowed them out very slowly.