Best 95 quotes of Bernard Cornwell on MyQuotes

Bernard Cornwell

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    Bernard Cornwell

    And yes, there's a simplicity to writing books because you're not a member of a team, so you make all the decisions yourself instead of deferring to a committee.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    At risk of sounding foully pompous I think that writers' groups are probably very useful at the beginning of a writing career.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Because there could not be peace, not while two tribes shared one land. One tribe must win. Even the nailed god cannot change that truth. And I was a warrior, and in a world at war the warrior must be cruel.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Book tours and research provide a lot of travel - too much, I sometimes think, but we do take vacations.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    But when you have order, you don't need Gods. When everything is well ordered and disciplined then nothing is unexpected. If you understand everything,' I said carefully, 'then there's no room left for magic. It's only when you're lost and frightened and in the dark that you call on the Gods, and they like us to call on them. It makes them feel powerful, and that's why they like us to live in chaos.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I do understand that you can look into someone’s eyes,” I heard myself saying, “and suddenly know that life will be impossible without them. Know that their voice can make your heart miss a beat and that their company is all your happiness can ever desire and that their absence will leave your soul alone, bereft and lost.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I know nothing about producing TV drama and any involvement on my part is liable to prove an obstacle to the producers, so I prefer to be a cheerleader and let them get on with it.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I'm fortunate that the books sell, but even more fortunate to live in Chatham, to be very happily married and to have, on the whole, a fairly clear conscience.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I sometimes wonder what would have happened if the first book had not sold... doesn't bear thinking about, but I suppose we'd have made it work somehow.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Latin! The language of God! Or perhaps He speaks Hebrew? I suppose that's more likely and it will make things rather awkward in heaven, won't it? Will we all have to learn Hebrew?

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Life is a jest of the Gods and there is no justice. You must learn to laugh… or else you'll weep yourself to death.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Looking back, of course, it was irresponsible, mad, forlorn, idiotic, but if you don't take chances then you'll never have a winning hand, and I've no regrets.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Love is a dangerous thing. It comes in disguise to change our life... Lust is the deceiver. Lust wrenches our lives until nothing matters except the one we think we love, and under that deceptive spell we kill for them, give all for them, and then, when we have what we have wanted, we discover that it is all an illusion and nothing is there. Lust is a voyage to nowhere, to an empty land, but some men just love such voyages and never care about the destination. Love is a voyage too, a voyage with no destination except death, but a voyage of bliss.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Madness ends sometimes. The Gods decree it, not man.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Of course some days are easier than others, but my worst day is better than being in most humdrum occupations.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Only a fool wants war, but once a war starts then it cannot be fought half-heartedly. It cannot even be fought with regret, but must be waged with a savage joy in defeating the enemy, and it is that savage joy that inspires our bards to write their greatest songs about love and war.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    ‎Our ancestors took this land. They took it and made it and held it. We do not give up what our ancestors gave us. They came across the sea and they fought here, and they built here and they're buried here. This is our land, mixed with our blood, strengthened with our bone. Ours!

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Pride makes a man, it drives him, it is the shield wall around his reputation... Men die, they said, but reputation does not die.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Research is a lifelong occupation so it's hard to factor it in, but I reckon most books take 5 months from start to finish.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Television is a young person's medium.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    The bards sing of love, they celebrate slaughter, they extol kings and flatter queens, but were I a poet I would write in praise of friendship.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    The existence of tricks does not imply the absence of magic.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Then you start another book and suddenly the galley proofs of the last one come in and you have to wrench your attention away from what you're writing and try to remember what you were thinking when you wrote the previous one.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    There are seasons of our lives when nothing seems to be happening, when no smoke betrays a burned town or homestead and few tears are shed for the newly dead. I have learned not to trust those times, because if the world is at peace then it means someone is planning war.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    We don't build,' I said to my son, 'we just destroy.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    We make children and wealth and amass land and build halls and assemble armies and give great feasts, but only one thing survives us. Reputation.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    What I mean by that is that the point of life, as I see it, is not to write books or scale mountains or sail oceans, but to achieve happiness, and preferably an unselfish happiness.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Writing is a solitary occupation.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Wyrd bith ful araed (Fate is inexorable).

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    Bernard Cornwell

    You'll call me damned Jew, a Christ murderer, a secret worshipper of pigs and a kidnapper of Christian children. How absurd! Who would want to kidnap children, Christian or otherwise? Vile things. The only mercy of children is that they grow up, as my son has but then, tragically, they beget more children. We do not learn life's lessons.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    You won't regret the men you never killed, but you will regret the women you passed up.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Acho que o Santo Graal é um sonho que os homens têm, um sonho de que é possível tornar o mundo perfeito. Se ele existisse, todos nós teríamos sabido que o sonho não pode se transformar em realidade.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    All you need to know, boy," Finan growled, "is that Lord Uhtred's side is the one that wins.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    A lord who does not distribute wealth is a lord who will lose the allegiance of his men,

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    Bernard Cornwell

    And I looked,' Pyrlig said to me, 'and I saw a pale horse, and the rider's name was death.' I just stared in amazement. 'It's in the gospel book,' he explained sheepishly, 'and it just cam to mind.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    An enemy sees his attackers laughing? It is better than all the insults. A man who laughs as he goes into battle is a man who has confidence, and a man with confidence is terrifying to an enemy. “For the whore!” I shouted.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    An English man-at-arms had his helmet split open and his skull with it, so that he rode wavering from the fight, blood pouring down his mail coat. His horse stopped a few paces from the turmoil and the man-at-arms slowly, so slowly, bent forward and then slumped down from his saddle. One foot was trapped in a stirrup as he died but his horse did not seem to notice. It just went on cropping the grass.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    A sad, plangent music. In the British camp, Sharpe thought, they would be singing, but no one was singing here.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Harlequin, probably derived from the old French Hellequin: a troop of the devil’s horsemen.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Do you ever read the scriptures?" "Every day," I said enthusiastically, "not a moment passes that I don't have a quick read of Ieremias or dip into Ezekiel." She smiled, amused. "What a barbarian you are!

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Dreams are like songs. Their task is not to offer an exact image of the world, but a suggestion of it.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Eppure sono convinto che Artù sarebbe rimasto in Dumnonia, se avesse ricevuto ciò che desiderava, ossia la gratitudine. Era un uomo orgoglioso e sapeva bene ciò che aveva fatto per il nostro regno, ma era stato ricompensato con astio e malcontento. Erano stati i cristiani a rompere per primi la pace, ma poi, dopo i fuochi di Mai Dun, gli stessi pagani si erano rivoltati contro di lui. Artù aveva dato alla Dumnonia la giustizia, aveva riconquistato gran parte delle Terre Perdute, aveva reso sicure le nuove frontiere e governato con onestà; ma per ricompensa era stato deriso come il Nemico di Dio.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    É um poema triste, e portanto um poema verdadeiro. Wyrd bið ful ãræd, diz ele. O destino é inexorável. E wyn eal gedreas. Toda alegria morreu.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Father Hobbe, his cassock skirts hitched up to his waist, was fighting with a quarterstaff, ramming the pole into French faces. ‘In the name of the Father,’ he shouted, and a Frenchman reeled back with a pulped eye, ‘and of the Son,’ Father Hobbe snarled as he broke a man’s nose, ‘and of the Holy Ghost!

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Folk tell their children that success lies in working hard and being thrifty, but that is as much nonsense as supposing that a badger, a fox and a wolf could build a church. The way to wealth is to become a Christian bishop or a monastery's abbot and thus be imbued with heaven's permission to lie, cheat and steal your way to luxury.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    Gods fight, Ragnar went on earnestly, and some win, some lose. The Christian god is losing. Otherwise why would we be here? Why would we be winning? The gods reward us if we give them respect, but the Christian god doesn't help his people, does he? They weep rivers of tears for him, they pray to him, they give him their silver, & we come along & slaughter them! Their god is pathetic. If he had any real power then we wouldn't be here, would we?

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    Bernard Cornwell

    He had always thought there was an answer to all life's mysteries in the stars, yet whenever he stared at them the answer slipped out of his grasp... But he had to think now, and he stared at the smoke-dimmed stars in the hope that they would help him, but all they did was go on shining.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    He has a mouth, lord," Gerbruht said. "I envy him," I said. "Envy him, lord?" "Most of us have to lower our trews to shit.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I could tell you tales of priestly behavior that would make you shudder.

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    Bernard Cornwell

    I forget your name," I said. "Most people spew shit from their arse," he retorted, "you manage it with your mouth." "Your mother gave birth through her arse," I said, "and you still reek of her shit.