Quotes from David Peace

For the first time my prayers were not for me but for everyone else, that all of those things in my notebooks, on all of those tapes, in all of those envelopes and bags in my room, that none of them were true, that the dead were alive and the lost were found, and that all of those lives could be lived anew.

How you harangue referees. How you fall over when you've not been touched. How you make a meal out of every tackle to try and get the other player booked. How you protest when you have nothing to fucking protest about –

I pulled myself up on my elbows and lay on my belly staring down into hell. There below me in the basin of Hunslet Carr, just 500 yards beneath me, was my England on the morning of Sunday 15 December in the year of Our Lord 1974, looking a thousand years younger and none the better.

The future, like the past, is written. It cannot be changed, but it can help to heal the wounds of the present.

There is always doubt and always fear. There is always trouble, always tension. Tension and trouble; fear and doubt; war, war, war and then, right on cue- As if by magic, here come Leeds, Leeds, Leeds.

Back at the house, first things first. Phone the office. Nothing. No news being bad news for the Kemplays and Clare, good news for me.

I prayed for my mother and sister, for my uncles and aunts, for the friends I'd had, both good and bad, and last for my father wherever he was, Amen.

We all laughed and I remembered back when I thought I could live forever, back when I wanted to, back before I knew what a curse it really was.

In the dug-out, on the bench. The Anfield bench. Bill stared out at the players of Liverpool Football Club on the pitch. The Anfield pitch. In the sun, the players of Liverpool Football Club shining. In the sun, in their kits. Their red shirts, their white shorts. And their white socks. And in the dug-out, on the bench. The Anfield bench. Bill heard the whistle blow, Bill heard the crowd roar. The Anfield crowd.

I lit my last cigarette and said my little prayers. Clare, here's one for you. Susan, here's one for you. Jeanette, here's one for you. Paula, they're all for you. And the unborn. I sat there, singing along to The Little Drummer Boy, with those far off days, those days of grace, coming down. Waiting for the blue lights. Ninety miles an hour.

Back in my muddy clothes at the door of my room, swallowing pills and lighting cigarettes, wanting to sleep but not wanting to dream, thinking this'll be the day that I die, pictures of Paula waving bye bye.

I wanted to sleep for a thousand years, to wake up when them and their like were gone, when I didn't have their dirty black ink on my fingers, in my blood.

Because there is no fucking consolation- No consolation for not winning- That's irreplaceable.

Bill did not believe in luck. Bad luck or good. Bill knew it was never a matter of luck, never a question of luck. Bill knew luck was just another excuse for failure.

Reckless talk costs lives.

Never had the urge to deliver us from evil?" "No, never" "Devil triumphs when good men do nowt

Devil triumphs when good men do nowt

Times change, faces change but the doubt remains, the fear remains-

And remember, Liverpool reserves are not just any team. Liverpool reserves are the second-best team in the land, son. The only team better than the Liverpool reserve team is the Liverpool first team.

For the first time my prayers were not for me but for everyone else, that the dead were alive and the lost were found, and that all those lives could be lived anew.

Johnny Watters bends down, sponge in his hand, tongue in your ear, he whispers, "How shall we live, Brian? How shall we live?

There will always be times when we get beaten, said Bill Shankly. There will always be times when we lose. But the important thing is what we take away from that beating, what we learn when we lose. Because we'll always learn more from a loss than a win. So remember that and learn that, lads.

The smell of blood. The smell of sweat. The smell of tears. The smell of Algipan. You want to smell these smells for the rest of your life.

They hate me" I tell him. "Despise me. And they'll hate you too. Despise you. But we'll be here long after they're all gone.