18 quotes
Wasn't that their natural right, to know the truth so as to be able to let the truth lead them to do good or evil, as they chose?
Red Prophet (1988)
She can't help her red skin, and she isn't heathen. In fact, she's a Baptist, which is almost like being Christian, only louder.
Red Prophet (1988)
What a silly god, he makes everybody born bad to go to burning hell. Why so mad? All his fault!
Red Prophet (1988)
When both parties are lying and they both know the other party's lying, it comes powerful close to being the same thing as telling the truth.
Red Prophet (1988)
Very bad thing, killing little boy. But maybe Red man knows about whisky-Red, very thirsty, making crazy. Not like killing man to take his house or his woman or his land, like White man all the time.
Red Prophet (1988)
Lolla-Wossiky is left like a White man then. Cut off from the land. Ground crunching underfoot. Branches snagging. Roots tripping. Animals running away.
Red Prophet (1988)
We don't admit it to ourselves, not until the very moment of death, but in that moment, we see all life before us and we understand how we chose, every day of our lives, the manner of our death.
Red Prophet (1988)
“I want to know how many years I got.”
“Many,” said Ta-Kumsaw. “Or few. All that matters is what you do with however many years you have.”
Red Prophet (1988)
He didn't know if he had the right or not. Didn't know if he was taking like a Red man, just what the land offered, or stealing like a White man, murdering whatever it pleased him to kill.
Red Prophet (1988)
The fear of death in the one place was not as strong as another kind of fear, the fear of a world gone crazy, a place where anything could happen, where nothing could be trusted, where nothing was certain. A terrible place.
Red Prophet (1988)
What the White man had won with so much blood and dishonesty was not the living land of the Red man, but the corpse of that land. It was decay that the White man won. It would turn to dust in his hands, Alvin knew it.
Red Prophet (1988)
We've seen the worst that men can do, pa, and been the worst that men can be. But that don't mean that someday we won't see the best, too. And if we can never be perfect after this, well, we can still be pretty good, can't we?
Red Prophet (1988)
No, no, no, Hooch told himself silently. Getting even don't amount to nothing in this world. Getting even only gets you behind. The best revenge is to get rich enough to make them all call you sir, that's how you get even with these boys.
Red Prophet (1988)
The funny thing was, you see, that Mike Fink didn't think of himself as a murderer. He thought of life as a contest, and dying was what happened to those who came out second best, but it wasn't the same as murder, it was a fair fight.
Red Prophet (1988)
As he had so many times before, Taleswapper addressed a few silent words to God, which always came down to this question: Why do you put us to so much trouble, when it all comes to naught in the end?...And, as usual, God had nothing much to say to Taleswapper when his questioning was done.
Red Prophet (1988)
Men like Jackson were so upright and honest-seeming, but Hooch knew that there wasn't no such thing as a good man, just a man who wasn't bought yet, or wasn't in deep enough trouble, or didn't have the guts to reach out and take what he wanted. That's all that virtue ever boiled down to, so far as Hooch ever saw in his life.
Red Prophet (1988)
At night in his own bed, Alvin listened to the distant greensong, still warm and beautiful, still bright and hopeful even though the forest was getting so sparse, even though the future was so dim. Cause there's no fear of future in the song of life, just the ever-joyful present moment. That's all I want right now, thought Alvin. The present moment, which is good enough.
Red Prophet (1988)
Road poured out into a place of meadows and a few White man's buildings. Lots of wagons. Horses posted and tied, grazing on the meadow grass. Sounds of metal hammers ringing, chopping of axes in the wood, screech of saws going back and forth, all kinds of White-man forest-killing sounds. A White man's town.
Red Prophet (1988)