Novelists From England

"In fact, making up a spiteful lie has become respectable. Today's "jesters" are outright public nuisances."

"Love and death are gritty subjects. Their appropriate handling by poets does not require myrtle petals and violets."

"He wore the purple; it was his entitlement. With it he had neither wreath nor jewels. For him the best adornment of rank was acute native intelligence."

"The new "humour", if you can call it that, is pure malicious gossip. Instead of making a genuine point, it's now good enough to repeat any ribald story without a thought for whether it's even true."

"Smartness always helps in gaining access to the houses of the wealthy. Anyone with a clean face is acceptable to thugs."

"Even the impetuous Helena Justina was an advocate of traditional family councils. However, every Roman matron knows that domestic councils were devised by our foremothers purely so the views of the matron of a household may prevail."

"Sometimes you run away by yourself purely so someone who cares will come to find you. Half the time nobody does. That's the tragedy of life."

"Stick with it, Xanthus. There are fortunes to be made out of bristle for a man with deft hands."

"But mere technical details can be worked out any time. All a hero needs is grit."

"The world is full of people slandering their birthplaces, as if they really believe that small-town life is different elsewhere."

"Justice never paid a poor man's bills."

"Petronius would take his free bread buns and run. I happened to know that since Petro had been elected to the watch he had never cast a vote. He believed a man on a public salary should be impartial. I didn’t agree but I admired him being so stubborn in his eccentricities. Aufidius Crispus would be an unusual politician if he had allowed for such morality in the voters he was courting."

"I had been right in the first place. Getting involved with politicians is complete stupidity."

"You're not bloody Aristophanes, and the people who are paying for tickets are not educated Athenians. We're acting for turnips who only come to talk to their cousins and fart. We have to give them a lot of action and low-level jokes, but you can leave all that to us on stage. We know what's required. Your job is to hone the basic framework and remember the simple motto: short speeches, short lines, short words."

"Marcus! I thought you must have been developing other interests, but I never expected to find you with your arms locked round a fish..."

"The plumber plodded along in silence, like a man who has learned to be polite to lunatics through dealing with civil engineers."

"He listened with the mild demeanour of a man who had waited eight years for his town council to draw up a specification for emergency repairs."

"I would rather see Rome ruled by a man who once had to ask his accountant tricky questions before his steward could pay the butcher’s bill than by some mad limb like Nero, who was brought up believing himself the son and the grandson of gods, and who thought wearing the purple gave him free rein to indulge his personal vanities, execute real talent, bankrupt the Treasury, burn half of Rome – and bore the living daylights out of paying customers in theatres!"

"You could tell those two had been married by the way that she ignored him."

"She called me a rat.” “Oh yes, I gathered you two were very close!"

"We marched him to the turfy shack where he lived with his parents and while the youth sulked Petronius Longus put the whole moral issue in succinct terms to them: Ollia’s father was a legionary veteran who had served in Egypt and Syria for over twenty years until he left with double pay, three medals, and a diploma that made Ollia legitimate; he now ran a boxers’ training school where he was famous for his high-minded attitude and his fighters were notorious for their loyalty to him… The old fisherman was a toothless, hapless, faithless cove you would not trust too near you with a filleting knife, but whether from fear or simple cunning he co-operated eagerly. The lad agreed to marry the girl and since Silvia would never abandon Ollia here, we decided that the fisherboy had to come back with us to Rome. His relations looked impressed by this result. We accepted it as the best we could achieve."

"Senator, don't let your judgement be warped by one heady moment."

"Communicating wit is a lonely art. It demands an independent soul."

"Popular men who laugh at your jokes pose a threat which blatant villains can never command."

"Some men are born lucky. Others are born Marcus Didius Falco."

"In my experience, men who sit in corners are the ones to watch."

"It struck me there might be a reason why Helena Justina whipped along at such a cracking pace: she did not want to be stuck in the wilderness with my corpse. I thanked Jove for her ruthless good sense. I did not want my corpse to be stuck with her in any case."

"I like my women in a few wisps of drapery: then I can hope for a chance to remove the wisps. If they start out with nothing I tend to get depressed because either they have just stripped off for someone else or, in my line of work, they are usually dead."

"'How old now?' 'Thirty. Downhill to the dark boat across the Styx. Probably be sick over the side in Charon's ferry too…'"

"Emperors must make their own rules."

"I asked why Grumio had had to turn to lesser things.'No call. In my father or grandfather's day all I would have needed in life were my cloak and shoes, my flask and strigil, a cup and knife to take to dinner, and a small wallet for my earnings. Everyone who could find the wherewithal would eagerly ask a wandering jokesmith in.' 'Sounds just like being a vagrant philosopher!' 'A cynic,' he agreed readily. 'Exactly. Most cynics are witty and all clowns are cynical. Meet us on the road, and who could tell the difference?’ 'Me, I hope! I'm a good Roman. I'd take a five-mile detour to avoid a philosopher.'"

"He had the kind of personality that makes you think a boy will grow up to be a public torturer."

"I despise women who rely on men entirely for their own existence."

"A wise partner does not come between her man and his best friend."

"No woman who builds a career on hard work and talent will ever compliment a much younger one who uses the shallow gift of her looks."

"Do we think Locusta is still alive?” “If so, she would have to be about two hundred.” “Sipping at the Fountain of Youth?” “No, I think she was killed in the Year of the Four Emperors.” “Poison?” “Natural causes—execution.” “Did she train up apprentices?” “Yes, but the old crafts are dying. No one wants to be bothered. These days you can’t find suppliers with the expertise, however big a bribe you offer."

"[Y]ou would think happy wedding guests would tuck in with gusto—yet ... [i]t’s mourners at funerals who scoff.” “Because this is food as human comfort, plus respect for the national gods. We are one with our ancestors and one with our fellow mourners."

"Sometimes information you barely noticed consciously comes back to you of its own accord."

"There comes a point for a nut-lover, Quintus thought, where funeral food is worth taking a risk, even when you are dining with a megalomaniac who wants to kill you."

"Think of tonight as having a real purpose. Yes, it is dining with the dead in order to be at one with our ancestors, but at the same time, a good scoff in shared company provides solace for the unhappy, it anneals the internal stress of bereavement, it helps the living along the path of their recovery from grief.” “That’s a useful motto for a caterer!"

"Curiosity is a terrible inducement."

"They were not beggars; well, not in the usual sense. They were Christians, who wanted not just my nephews' money but their souls."

"Their work was undercover—yet their existence unconcealed. That is how fear works."

"God sends meat and the devil sends cooks."

"I vowed I would bring you solace in time of need. Please don't make me break my vows."

"Author E.L. James has often insisted that “Fifty Shades of Grey” is wildly popular not because of its titillating trappings of transgression, but because it tells a simple love story for the ages. But this is a romance for a particular kind of age — a time of growing inequality. The social order is breaking up and leaving massive human wreckage in its wake. Dreams of love turn into fantasies of power — who has it and what they can do to those who don’t have it."

"I solemnly vow that I will safeguard and hold dear and deep in my heart our union and you...I promise to love you faithfully, forsaking all others, through the good times and the bad, in sickness and health, regardless of where life takes us. I will protect you, trust you, and respect you. I will share your joys and sorrows and comfort you in times of need. I promise to cherish you and uphold your hopes and dreams and keep you safe at my side. All that is mine is now yours. I give you my hand, my heart, and my love from this moment on for as long as we both shall live."

"You really have to let me fight my own battles. You can't constantly second-guess me and try to protect me. It's stifling, Christian. I'll never flourish with your incessant interference. I need some freedom. I wouldn't dream of meddling in your affairs. ...if we are to have any hope of a future together, you have to trust me and trust my judgment. Yes, I'll get it wrong sometimes--I'll make mistakes, but I have to learn. ...I know you want to control everything, and I understand why, but you can't. It's an impossible goal...you have to learn to let go."

"I give you my solemn vow to be your faithful partner in sickness and in health, to stand by your side in good times and in bad, to share your joy as well as your sorrow...I promise to love you unconditionally, to support you in your goals and dreams, to honor and respect you, to laugh with you and cry with you, to share my hopes and dreams with you, and bring you solace in times of need... And to cherish you for as long as we both shall live."

"“Kristin, nothing ever does change.” I jerked a thumb back at the crowd outside. “You’ll always have morons like that, swallowing belief patterns whole so they don’t have to think for themselves. You’ll always have people like Kawahara and the Bancrofts to push their buttons and cash in on the program. People like you to make sure the game runs smoothly and the rules don’t get broken too often. And when the Meths want to break the rules themselves, they’ll send people like Trepp and me to do it. That’s the truth, Kristin. It’s been the truth since I was born a hundred and fifty years ago, and from what I read in the history books, it’s never been any different. Better get used to it.”"