"There's an opposite to Deja vu. They call it jamais vu. It's when you meet the same people or visit places, again and again, but each time is the first. Everybody is a stranger. Nothing is ever familiar."

"Her attention span is about a clock tick long, and you can shove her on to a more pleasant topic. You can guess this is how men have been handling Eva's hostility for her whole life. Just distract her. Get through the moment. Avoid confrontation. Run away."

"... if enough people looked at you, you'd never need anybody's attention ever again. That if someday you were caught, exposed and revealed enough, then you'd never be able to hide again. There'd be no difference between your public and your private lives."

"(about Colonial Dunsboro) We're all trapped. It's always 1734. All of us, we're stuck in the same time capsule, the same as those television shows where the same people are marooned on the same desert island for thirty seasons and never age or escape. They just wear more makeup. In a creepy way, those shows are maybe too authentic."

"...Because the moment this is over, we'll hate each other. The moment we find ourselves cold and sweating on the bathroom floor, the moment after we both come, we won't want to even look at each other. The only we person we'll hate more than each other is ourselves."

"The half-moon looks up at us, reflected in a silver pie tin of beer. [...] Denny drinks about half the beer and says, "This is how they drink beer in Europe, dude." Out of slug traps? "No, dude," Denny says. He hands me the pie tin and says "Flat and warm.""

"We can spend our lives letting the world tell us who we are. Sane or insane. Saints or sex addicts. Heros or victims. Letting history tell us how good or bad we are. Letting our past decide our future. Or we can decide for ourselves."

"It's creepy, but here we are, the Pilgrims, the crackpots of our time trying to establish our own alternative reality. To build a world out of rocks and chaos."

"Even after all that rushing around, where we've ended up is the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. And maybe knowing isn't the point."

"You gain power by pretending to be weak. By contrast, you make people feel so strong. You save people by letting them save you. All you have to do is be fragile and grateful. So stay the underdog... You're the proof of their courage. The proof they were a hero. Evidence of their success... You might be the one good deed, the deathbed memory that justifies their entire existence. [pg 50-51]"

"Sponges don't have bad days."

"Nobody can expect you to remember every near-death experience."

"(Insert word) isn't the right word, but it's the first word that comes to mind."

"I mean, I'm just tired of being wrong all the time just because I'm a guy."

"If I do not travel late I may not travel at all. -Mathurin"

"A lion is not to be slain by jackals."

"Much of command is the ability to take command."

"I have only a sword, but a strong man need wish for no more than this: a sword in the hand, a horse between his knees, and the woman he loves at the battle's end. ~Mathurin Kerbouchard"

"Any time is a time for thinking of women, and when they thrust the blade that takes my life I shall be thinking of women, or of a woman. If not, then death has come too late."

"I have been nothing, but there is tomorrow."

"A ship does not sail with yesterday's wind."

"A knife is sharpened on stone, steel is tempered by fire, but men must be sharpened by men."

"When one has lost his freedom it is always a long walk back."

"The weak can be terrible when they wish to appear strong, and he was such a man, darkly vengeful and unforgetting. If dying, he would strike out wickedly in all directions to injure all he could to his last breath.""

"So it ever is in moments of trial or decision. One is born alone, one dies alone, and usually faces the trials and tribulations alone."

"Escape you? You misunderstand the situation, Mahmound. It is you who shall not escape me."

"The dried leaves of autumn are lightly blown away, still more easily is the fortune of man destroyed."

"Honor is the thing, for he who is honorable needs no praise. He is secure with the knowledge of what he is, a decent human being first, all else after."

"To survive? What is that? A mouse lives, a fly lives, one flees in terror, another lives in filth. They exist, they are, but do they live?"

"Lie to a liar, for lies are his coin; steal from a thief, for that is easy; lay a trap for the trickster and catch him at the first attempt, but beware of an honest man."

"You are young, and honor rides with you, but honor is important only when dealing with honorable men."

"What can the will do when the heart commands?"

"Such are the amenities of social life, which oft makes a liar of the best of men. Never had I heard of Mas'ud Khan, nor had I any idea whether he was noble, splendid, or rich, but considering my problems, I hope he was all three."

"Deliver this man safely to Trebizond, or cut your own throat and sink your vessel. If he arrives not safely, we shall hunt you down and feed you, in small pieces, to the dogs. Do you understand?"

"If one plans to measure blows with a stranger, one had best judge the length of his arm."

"By the Gods! If it is a duel of wits you wish, you shall have it! I am sorry, Bardas. I could never fight an unarmed man."

"Ah, Beggar, you have come far since I tossed you a coin at the bazaar! Thank you, Bardas, it is true I have come far, yet I find you where you were, licking crumbs from the fingers of your superiors."

"Up to a point a man's life is shaped by environment, heredity, and movements and changes in the world about him; then there comes a time when it lies within his grasp to shape the clay of his life into the sort of thing he wishes to be. Only the weak blame parents, their race, their times, lack of good fortune, or the quirks of fate. Everyone has it within his power to say, this I am today, that I shall be tomorrow. The wish, however, must be implemented by deeds."

"I have observed that the steps of a man sound heavier when he is alone in the hall."

"I shall simply ask. Many things are not done simply because they are not attempted."

"If ever you become a hero to the mob, Phillip, remember this: Every man who cheers you carries in his belt the knife of an assassin."