79 quotes
Honour is a luxury, when someone is trying in earnest to kill you.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
Only a fool sees plots where there are none.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
We are all dying, just at different speeds.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
Usually he is the soul of courtesy. But if you cannot speak truth at a beheading, when can you speak it?
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
The king laughs. “Why would I trust a man with my business, if he could not manage his own?”
Wolf Hall (2009)
You see how, my Lord, by the time my councillors proclaimed me, they had already started lying to me. As soon as you are king, nobody tells you the truth.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
Truth can break the gates down, truth can howl in the street; unless truth is pleasing, personable and easy to like, she is condemned to stay whimpering at the back door.
Bring Up the Bodies (2012)
“Majesty, was it not an honest mistake?”
“Women are the beginning of all mistakes. Read any of the divines, and they will tell you.”
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
He would like Wolsey to come in so they could have a game of chess: though you should never play chess with a prelate, they always have a pawn in their sleeves.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
The moment is fleeting. But insight cannot be taken back. You cannot return to the moment you were in before.
Wolf Hall (2009)
There cannot be new things in England. There can be old things freshly presented or new things that pretend to be old.
Wolf Hall (2009)
It is the absence of facts that frightens people: the gap you open, into which they pour their fears, fantasies, desires.
Treason can be construed from any scrap of paper, if the will is there. A syllable will do it. The power is in the hands of the reader, not the writer.
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
Why do I feel I have heard this story before? She has a flock of monks and priests about her, who directed the people’s eyes heavenward while picking their pockets.
Wolf Hall (2009)
“Their abbots will curse you.”
“Curses with me have none effect, because I give them no credit. They may curse till they combust.”
The Mirror & the Light (2020)
We don’t have to invite pain in, he thinks. It’s waiting for us: sooner rather than later.
Wolf Hall (2009)
The all-consuming passion of Wolsey for Wolsey was hot enough to scorch all England.
Wolf Hall (2009)
“I have never understood where the line is drawn, between sacrifice and self-slaughter.”
“Christ drew it.”
“You don’t see anything wrong with the comparison?”
Wolf Hall (2009)
The ladies of Italy, seemingly carefree, wore constructions of iron beneath their silks. It took infinite patience, not just in negotiation, to get them out of their clothes.
Wolf Hall (2009)
Riding beneath dark trees at the close of that first day’s travel, they sing; it lifts the tired heart, and dispels spirits lurking in the verges; never underestimate the superstition of the average Englishman.
Bring Up the Bodies (2012)