The Sandman: Preludes & Nocturnes
The Sandman: The Dolls' House
The Sandman: Dream Country
The Sandman: Season of Mists
The Sandman: A Game of You
The Sandman: Fables & Reflections
The Sandman: Brief Lives
The Sandman: Worlds' End
The Sandman: The Kindly Ones
The Sandman: The Wake
Death: The High Cost of Living
Death: The Time of your Life
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"I'm always scared he's laughing at me. Behind his face."
-Delirium
"I'm sure we're all grateful for those priceless gems of wisdom, Mervyn."
-Lucien
"The uh suhsomething nasty in the mmm sub-basement says it er doesn't muhmuhmind berbeing underwater."
-Able
"S'Okay. I mean I liked it. It was like disneyland. I especially liked the swinging bit."
-Delirium
"I saw it was raining outside. Water. Or whatever it rains in dreams, anyway."
"Yes."
"You must be in a very bad mood."
"Must I?"
-Delirium and Dream
"All that apologizing.
You never apologized to me. You just act like you know stuff I don't know that makes everything you do okay."
-Delirium, of Dream
"Because I need something to take my mind off my recent misadventure, perhaps?
Because it has been a long time since I walked abroad.
And because I wish to."
"Very good, Lord."
-Dream and Lucien
"There are less then five hundred living humans who remember the human civilizations that predated the great lizards. (There were a few; fossil records are unreliable. Several of them lasted for millions of years.)"
-The Narrator
"You lived what anybody gets, Bernie. You got a lifetime. No more. No less.
You got a lifetime."
-Death
"Can I have a name?"
"Don't you have one? That's sad. Not having a name. I used to have one name, then I had to get another one.
If you don't have a name, what do people call you? I mean, do they just wave and smile, or jingle little silver bells or what?"
-A Receptionist (Marie) and Delirium
"I am honored. My house is honored. To have two of your illustrius family here, beneath my roof...
Words Truely fail me."
"Hi."
-Pharamond (Mr. Farrell) and Delirium
"Here. I found it. I knew it was going to be in the last place I looked for it, so I looked there first."
-Delirium
"Hmph. What the hell would you know? You're a dog."
-Destruction
"You know, Barnabas, there are those who claim that for unquestioning respect and eternal devotion, all one needs is a dog."
"Hey, schmuck, devotion you got. Perjury isn't in the job description."
-Destruction and Barnabas
"Darling? Did that man say something to you?"
"Yes, mommy."
"Oh. What did he say?"
"True things."
"Oh. Did he mention his name?"
"No. He probably hasn't got one."
-Mrs. Russell and her daughter, Chloe, of Dream
"So what I want to know is, when I'm asleep, do I really remember how to fly? And forget how when I wake up? Or am I just dreaming I can fly?"
"When you dream, sometimes you remember. When you wake, you always forget."
"But that's not fair..."
"No."
-Chloe Russell and Dream
"They are using reason as a tool. Reason. It is no more reliable a tool than instinct, myth or dream. But it has the potential to be far more dangerous, for them."
-Destruction
"Do they think that they can impale the soul of it on their knives? That if they cut deep enough they can extract its dreams, naked and writhing and screaming, from its head?"
-Dream
"Reason is a flawed tool at best, my brother."
-Dream
"The relationship between matter and light; the transformation, one to the other. I have been here before. After a while certain ideas become inevitable."
-Destruction, of the Nuclear Age
"Are not light and gross bodies intraconvertible? Alas, they are. And from that follows the flames...
The Big Bang. The Loud Explosions."
-Destruction, of the Atomic Bomb
"Reason was never an important part of my dominion. But certain conclusions become inescapable."
-Dream
"Why is that car making that noise, WHOO-OOP, WHOO-EE-OOP, and flashing its lights at us?"
"I have no idea. Perhaps the driver wishes to talk with you."
-Delirium and Dream, of (yep, you guessed it) a police car
"Matthew. When you were a man, were you able to drive a motor vehicle?"
"Could I? Hey, I killed myself drunk driving, didn't I? I mean, the first time."
"I am not convinced that is any recommendation. However..."
-Dream and Matthew
"Delirium will drive. You will advise her. I am sure you will find the experience one of great interest and variety."
-Dream, to Matthew
"Friends, my sister? I thought we were family."
-Dream
"Of course she doesn't want visitors. She's in a snit."
-Death, of Delirium
"Um. Dream? Do you like me?"
"Yes...I suppose I must do, Delirium. You entertain me. And it distresses me to see you troubled."
-Delirium and Dream
"Leave me to cook, Barnabus. A culinary artist needs genius, inspiration and a dog-free kitchen"
"So you'll settle for one out of three, huh? Hee! He-he-he-he-heh!"
-Destruction and Barnabus
"Life, Brother? A strange way of describing our existence."
-Dream
"Well and all: and while you are prince of those symbols and shapes that mean other then what they seem, of metaphor and of allusion, my dominion is that which is, of actions and consequences and paths."
-Destiny
"There are things not in your book. There are paths outside this garden. You would do well to remember that."
-Delirium, to Destiny
"Coins have two sides."
-Delirium
"In Destiny's garden, it is always now."
-The Narrator
"What's a false move? Is it very different from a real one?"
-Delirium
Well, no. Not really. That was more in the way of a joke."
-Destruction
"Ah, yes. You must have grown on a particulary penetrating and incisive branch of the family tree."
-Barnabas, of Delirium
"I like airplanes. I like anywhere that isn't a proper place. I like in-betweens."
-Delirium
"Here you go, little sister. Greek coffee. Don't drink the sludge at the bottom of the cup. And don't drink the cup, either. Just the coffee."
-Destruction, to Delirium
"As this universe came into being, Destiny came with it, alone in the darkness.
Before the first living thing came into existence, our sister was there, waiting."
"And when the first living thing awoke to life, I was also there."
-Destruction and Dream
"Gods come, and Gods go. Mortals flicker and flash and fade. Worlds don't last; and stars and galaxies are transient, fleeting things that twinkle like fireflies and vanish into cold and dust.
But I can pretend."
-Destruction
"A two sided coin; Destruction is needed. Nothing new can exist without destroying the old."
-Destruction
"Our sister defines Life, just as Despair defines Hope, or Desire defines Hatred, or as Destiny defines Freedom."
"And what do I define, by this theory of yours?"
"Reality, perhaps?"
-Destruction and Dream, of the Endless
"Dream, my brother. You forget nothing you have interest in; you forget, instantly, those things you do not care to know."
-Destruction
"Life, like Time, is a journey through darkness."
-Destruction
"I can't look after a doggie."
"You misheard him. I get to look after you."
"Oh."
-Delirium and Barnabas
"Well, she shouldn't be allowed out off a leash. But I'll do what I can."
-Barnabas, of Delirium
"Desire was right. Also untrustworthy, acerbic, dangerous and cruel. But right."
-Destruction
"We do not always accomplish what we set out to do."
-Dream
"I think he was happy. I'm not worried about him anymore."
-Delirium, of Destruction
"Come on doggie. We're going to my place. It's very interesting. You'll like it, unless maybe you don't."
-Delirium, to Barnabas
"He's humiliated me. He's been rude and boorish. He's stuffy and stupid and thinks he knows everything. And there's just something about him that gets on my nerves.
But I can't help feeling sorry for him."
-Desire, of Dream
"You cannot seek Destruction and return unscathed."
-Despair
"I'm scared."
"So am I."
-Desire and Despair
"There were three Gods, or so the tale went, who wished to rule in Dream's domain; who planned to feed on Dreams and take all the power of Dreams for their own.
From the skull and spine of the oldest, Dream created his Helm.
From the tusks of the middle God, he carved a gate through which the commonalty of Dreams could travel; all the falsehoods and hopes and fears.
And from the horns of the youngest, he carved a gate that he reserved for True Dreams. This because he had some little regard for her, and had, perhaps, in some small measure, regretted the course of action he had found necessary.
But all this was long ago; and the truth of it all has not been told on this world."
-The Narrator
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"You need help, matey. You and that there young lady. That red stuff, that's blood that it. Meant to be on the inside, it is. Bad sign if it's not on the inside, that's what I say."
-The Hedgehog
"Cluracan, it is one to me whether you live or die. It is not one to your sister, and she serves me well and faithfully. I would n't see her needlessly distressed."
-Dream
"On the way down the stairs, I had a really invigorating sword-fight with the palace guard."
-Cluracan
"Women aren't unfaithful. It's people who are unfaithful. And men tend to get a lot more opportunity than women to mess about."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"What would ye ladies? It was ever thus. Men are unwise and curiously planned, they have their dreams and do not think on us what take the Golden Road to Samarkand."
-Jim
"It is past the hour when all well-meaning folks are safe in the arms of Mister Morpheus."
-Gunga Din (for want of a better name)
"Because life's not fair, I suppose. There, and that's profundity for you."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"His mother understood that names have power. Names do not define us, but they do influence us for good or ill, help to shape and form us."
-A Narrator
"In addition, many blind people regained their sight, deaf people regained their hearing and an uncountable number of organic or hysterical illnesses, some of them of a terminal anture, spontaneously vanished, never to return."
-A Narrator
"So what happens now?"
"Oh, different things to different people. It depends who you are. And you never get to learn what happens to anyone else."
-Prez Richards and Death
"He may go wherever he wants."
-Dream
"And I am the Prince of Stories. This boy is under my jurisdiction, not yours."
-Dream
"You owe my sister thanks. She drew my attention to your situation. But, no. You owe me nothing."
-Dream
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"All good things, eh? All good things...
Got to finish sometimes."
-The Crone
"And incidentally, Mervyn, this time remember that ice is customarily cold."
-Mervyn Pumpkinhead, quoting Dream
"I can remember the title, author and location of every book in this library, Matthew.
Every book that's ever been dreamed. Every book that's ever been imagined. Every book that's ever been lost.
Millions upon millions of them.
That's what I remember. It's my job. Other things...I forget sometimes."
-Lucien
"But the gulf between conception and execution is wide, and many things can happen on the way."
-Dream
"Honestly. Men."
-Eve, Mother of Man
"I will not play 'memory,' and I cannot be bothered to lie. Vonda's birthday will be far from happy.
However, I will play something appropriate enough, considering how this evening will end for you both."
-Lucifer Morningstar, Erstwhile Prince of Hell
"Ma'am, can we talk to the child's father?"
"Sure. You got an ouija baord with you?"
-Lyta Hall and Gordy Fellowes
"That was your Nemesis.
You've created your Nemesis."
-The Faerie Nuala
"You can be the ice maiden once more. La belle dame sans merci, eh?
How many young men killed themselves for love of you over the years, my sister. And how many simply paled and pined away for you?"
-The Faerie Cluracan
"I do not recommend revenge, It tends to have repercussions."
-Dream
"Honesty is a somewhat overrated virtue, Remiel."
-Lucifer Morningstar, Erstwhile Prince of Hell
"I was the captain of the Host of Heaven. Later I was the Adversary."
-Lucifer Morningstar, Erstwhile Prince of Hell
"But...don't they ever learn?"
"They can't. They're part of the story, just as I am."
-Lyta Hall and the Cat-lady
"I didn't say it was my fault. I said it was my responcibility. I know the difference."
-Rose Walker
"Eat that apple -- lose some of your mortality -- bit of warning -- word to the wise."
-Aegle, Erythia and Arethusa
"Are you satan?"
"Not bloody likely -- name of Geryon -- you are?"
-Lyta Hall and Aegle, Erythia and Arethusa
"Take apples, by all means -- I'm Guardian -- to be honest, don't give a toss who has them -- No one ever comes here."
-Aegle, Erythia and Arethusa
"Storms are coming"
-Dream
"Completeness is a virtue, Mervyn, is it not?"
-Dream
"It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes.
But the half-wit remains a half-wit and the emperor remains an emperor."
-Dream
"Not keen on their responcibilities as fathers, Gods."
-Stheno (I think), one of the Gorgons
"He killed my husband. He killed my son. I will not stay.
And I will have revenge."
-Lyta Hall
"I've been making a list of the things they don't teach you at school.
They don't teach you how to love somebody.
They don't teach you how to be famous.
They don't teach you how to be rich, or how to be poor.
They don't teach you how to walk away from someone you don't love any longer.
They don't teach you how to know what's going on in someone else's mind.
They don't teach what to say to someone who's dying.
They don't teach you anything worth knowing."
-Rose Walker
"And I am the Corinthian.
With me by your side you will be safe from all other harm, bird."
"And that's supposed to be re-assuring?"
-The Corinithian and Matthew
"There's a theory that for a human being to be killed by a God is the best thing that could possibly happen to the human under discussion.
It eliminates all questions of belief, while manifestly placing a human life at the service of a higher power. Where do you stand on this theory?"
-Loki, to Carla
"And do you know your tragedy, Carla?
It's that for all your goodwill, for all your willingness to help, you never knew what any of this was all about. What was going on."
-Loki, to Carla
"I am mother to Odin's stallion, Sleipnir.
I am father of Fenrir Sun-Eater,
and of Hel Half-rotted and
and of Jormungund the World-Serpent.
I am Loki Scar-Lip, Loki Skywalker, Loki Giant's Child, Loki Lie-Smith.
I am Loki, who is fire and wit and hate.
I am Loki, and I will be under an obligation to no-one."
-Loki
"Women are about waking, Rose.
As mothers, we wake them from nothingness to existence.
As maidens, we wake them to the joys and miseries of adulthood, wake them to the world of lust and responcibility.
And when there time's up, it's always us has to wash them for the last time, and we lay them out for the wake."
-The Kindly Ones, in one aspect
"It doesn't matter that you never find it. It's the dreams that keep you going."
-Rose Walker
"Are you a spider, who's spun a web of cunning and deceit and now waits patiently for his prey to come to him; or are you a deer, frozen by the lights of the hunter's flame, as disaster comes towards you?"
-Odin One-Eye, of Dream
"Let that be a lesson for me, Lyta, and for you too, if you can hear me: Nothing is harmless. Nothing is too cute and sweet to be dangerous. Nothing is safe."
-The Thessalian
"Let all that do ill take this precedent:
'Man may his Fate forsee, but not prevent!'
And of all axioms this shall win the prize,
'Tis better to be fortunate then wise."
-The Fortune Cookie
"Had he killed his won son, then it would be different. Then -- if we wished -- we could hound him; we could destroy his life and his world, hound him to the grave and beyond."
"I see. Well, I'm sorry I wasted your time."
"Daughter?
He did kill his own son."
-The Kindly Ones
"Gravely, the Lord of Dreams listened to each child plead and beg; and then, at the end, he drew a door in the air with his finger, and the children walked through it, into the rest of their story."
-The Narrator
"He had been asked to permit the sending of a dream to a teenaged girl in South Africa. With this dream to drive her, the girl would grow up to take charge of the country, to unite all divided factions; without it, she would become a nurse.
He came to his own decision, and relayed it to the Tribal Gods from whom the request had come. His decision brooked no argument, had no appeal."
-The Narrator, of Dream
"He spoke to the embryonic silicon dreams who clustered in a far ballroom, and whispered to them, briefly, about the other machines that had dreamed in the distant past."
-The Narrator, of Dream
"In a small park in Central Europe, he stopped to feed the pigeons, because it gave him pleasure so to do, although he stopped when it was pointed out to him that a sign said "Do not feed the pigeons."
-The Narrator, of Dream
"Our existence deforms the universe.
That's responcibility."
-Delirium
"I am honor-bound to warn you to stay on the path through the castle. Straying from the path could mean you destruction.
You killed my friend, woman.
Stray from the path."
-The Wyvern, A Guardian of the Gate
"I have a certain amount of faith and confidence in both of you. It would dissapoint me exceedingly to find that it had been misplaced."
Dream, or The Corinthian and Matthew
"Madam...I do not know your grievance, but I do wish that we could have talked about it before reosrting to violence...But then, if I have to die, I have lived an interesting life...and a varied one...And I...take with me the memories of all the things that have moved me...told me I was alive. The green play of sunlight through birch leaves...a kiss...once...on the cheek...from a friend...I suppose I had always hoped that I would die quietly, on my own...or that I would die for a reason. It occurs to me now... that only things that are truely unreasonable have reasons...perhpas only the inconse...quential need...consequences...Still, I do so rather wish i had happend another way...
Hoom..."
-Gilbert/Fiddler's Green
"To end the matter? To kill her, you mean? Mmm. I never understood your dislike of killing, when it was necessary."
-The Thessalian, to Dream
"I think you care about other people too much. It'll get you into trouble one day."
"Is that meant to be funny?"
-The Thessalian and Dream
"Your kind are so bounded by your idiot rules...
Except for your big sister. She does what she pleases. She's a cold bitch, that one."
-The Thessalian, of the Endless, and specifically Death
"I am the Puck, called Robin Goodfellow. I am a trickster, an antic prankster, a will o'the wisp.
'Things fall apart, the center cannot hold, mere anarchy is loose upon the world.'
That's me. Ex-jester to the King of Faerie."
-The Puck
"We burned away most of his mortality, you know. Not all of it. But another few days, another few fires, and we would have had it all."
-The Puck
"They say I'm har, and I am hard. They sy I'm a bastard, and I'll tell you what. I am a bastard. A hard, tough bastard. A tough, hard bastard with a pumpkin for a head."
-Mervyn Pumpkin-head
"So the Lady Nuala is making the best of unwelcome circumstances, which is, in an eggshell, the story of Lady Nuala's life so far."
-The Faerie Nuala
"And who would that be, asking for my name? And would you be? Friend or foe?"
"I am the Corinthian. I travel towards the castle of his darkness, the Lord Morpheus of the Endless."
-Cain and the Corinthian
"Do you think that love is a gift? Like a bauble or a trinket? Something I can reach into a pouch and present to you?"
-Dream
"On reflection, while I cannot give you the thing itself, I could give you a dream of my love."
"I already have that, my Lord."
-Dream and the Faerie Nuala
"As the events happen, the conflicting Destinies will merge into a whole"
-A Destiny
"Cause and effect will jostle, unable to tell quite which came first."
-A Destiny
"Gentlemen?"
-Dream
"My Lord! I am the murderer here! I have a contract! My poor brother had a contract! I was the first murderer! I have certain rights and privileges."
-Cain
"Rules and responcibilities: these are the ties that bind us.
We do what we do, because of who we are. If we did otherwise, we would not be ourselves.
I will do what I have to do.
And I will do what I must."
-Dream
"I'm honestly kinda sorry I asked."
-Matthew, upon being told the Truth
"Penny for your thoughts."
"You have no pennies, Matthew."
-Matthew and Dream
"I don't get this shit. I really don't. I mean, you're Dream of the Endless. One of the seven head honchos who've controlled the whole show from the begining of time.
And you're scared of some kind of -- I don't know, they aren't even Goddesses -- that nobody even remembers anymore.
I mean, why don't you wave your hand and make them go *poof*?"
"Because there are rules. And because they are part of something far huger and older than simple godesses and bounded and empowered by rules, as I am."
-Matthew and Dream
"A penny for your thoughts, Matthew."
"What am I gonna do with a penny?"
-Dream and Matthew
"You're a strange one, my brother. I don't kow anyone who can be so completely straightforward, and so utterly devious at the same time."
-Death, of Dream
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"And it came to pass that a messanger was sent out to each member of the family."
-The Narrator
"And there are some powers that no one, not even the Endless, seeks to enquire into too deeply."
-The Narrator
"One for sorrow, Two for sorrow,
Three for sorrow, Four for for for...
I don't know, but I'm all bored of sorrow,
Five for three, two, one,
Six for gold,
Seven for a magpie who tells me where to go..."
-Delirium
"Our brother is dead."
-Destiny
"Eblis O'Shaughnessy: You were created and gifted by five of the Endless, but you can neither Dream nor, ultimately, Destroy, and that shall be your triumph and that shall be your tragedy."
-Destiny
"You'll need a light to see with, down there. Delirium, give the man something to light his way."
"Eblis O'Shaughnessy, Have a jellyfish, Eblis O'Shaughnessy."
-Desire and Delirium
"My letter of commission -- originally drawn up before the dawn of time, as reissued in April of 1989..."
-Cain
"I can leave you alone, if that is what you wish. But for how long? A day? A week? A hundred years?"
-Eve, Mother of Man
"Young man, I am dead. I was killed, in what, for ma at least, were fairly unpleasant circumstances.
It hurt. It was deeply upsetting, and painful.
However, it happend. I am dead.
If you bring me back to life, my death will have no meaning. I had a fine existence. I was a good place. I spent a little time walking in the waking world. I even fell in love, once, a little.
I lived a good life and it ended.
Would you take that away from me?"
-Gilbert/Fiddler's Green
"And the angel Duma, (who is not excatly fallen, more toppled, perhaps, or even tumbled), invokes a door to the Dreaming, and walks through it."
-The Narrator
"They are the family."
-The Lady Bast, of the Endless
"All fings considered, 'e was a funny old bastard. Never quite as hoity-toity as 'e made 'imself art to be, if you ask me."
-Mad Hettie, of Dream
"And then 'e'd turn ter go on his way, and 'e'd wish me pleasant dreams, and I'd say ter him, well, sonny-jim, that's rarver up ter you, isn't it?
He liked that. I could see 'e liked that."
-Mad Hettie, of Dream
"Before I died, I told me many things..."
-Dream, of Dream
"The Dream-King sent to the Queen of all Gryphons for the Noblest and Bravest of her subjects and, after certain contests of strength and wit, the honor fell to me. I hope I can be as valiant as the gryphon who came before me."
-The Gryphon
"Odd? As odd as the dreams where I'm a newsreader..."
-Clark Kent
"The one I hate is where I'm just an actor on a strange television version of my life."
-Clark Kent
"Sometimes I get an idea in my head, you know? Like all the stuff you've done before...I once worked out I'd spent over six years all told, just pissing. Six years of piss.
That's a lot of piss.
Lot of piss under the bridge."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"Nobody was close to your brother. Not unless you're talking about astronomical distances...y'know...the sun is close to Alpha Centauri...
He...He wasn't very good at close."
-Matthew, of Dream
"The people moved as if their every move were foreordained, as if they had no true will of their own.
As if their every action were written long ago, in a book."
-The Narrator
"But I see things as they are, and as they were, and as they will be.
And he was the Lord of the things that are not, and were not, and will never be..."
-Destiny, of Dream
"I cared for him very much. he was so wise; He seemed so certain of the rightness of his actions. And I, who do nothing but doubt, admired that in him."
-Despair, of Dream
And the angel Duma's tear, crystalline and clear, filled the vision of each of the onlookers.
Reflected in it, they saw mercy, and miracles, and the knowledge that every thing that is, has a purpose, and that the purpose, somehow, included every one of them... on a deep and personal level."
-The Narrator
"I was always a bit scared of him. But I'm not scared of him anymore. I'm a bit sad of him instead."
-Delirium, of Dream
It's astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself into, if one works at it.
And astonishing how much trouble one can get oneself out of, if one simply assumes that everything will, somehow or other, work out for the best."
-Destruction
"You sought vengeance, Lyta. But that is a road that has no ending."
-Dream
"For a start, we never even noticed the Renaissance. The Renaissance was a load of bloody italians poncing around claiming to be the golden age of the Greeks come around again."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"When I first met you I thought you were gay."
"Why? 'cos I'm English?"
"Uh-uh. Because you seemed to know so many people who were dead."
-Guenevere and Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"Drunk? Me? I'm not yet in the Land of the Drunk. But I can see it without a telescope, if you get me drift, my fuzzy little friend."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"And if some wight who fancies himself a minstrel looks like he's coming me-wards to play a gladsome melody, then head him off before he gets here or I'm liable to shove his lute where the sun don't shine."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"You know me, Hob Gadling. You were a friend of my brother's."
"I...I've known a lot of people, girlie."
"You used to meet him for a drink once a century."
-Death and Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"He was the King of Dreams, you know."
"Yeah. I figured that bit out, eventually."
-Death and Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"They will come back, come back again,
As long as the red earth rolls.
He never wasted a tree or leaf.
Why should He squander souls."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling, quoting Kipling
"Most of the olden days happend in the rain. They don't tell you that in the history books."
-Robert 'Hob' Gadling
"We are who we choose to be," sang the goldfinch..."
-The Exile
"Also, I hope."
-The Guide
"I am no demon, honorable Master Li."
-Dream
Thus I have a request of you: a prayer, if you will, from one who knows that, while the Gods listen to and answer all prayers, it is not unheard-of for the answer to be "No."
-The Exile
"Omnia mutantur, Nihil interit"
-A Roman Centurian
"I have no liking for prisons, Master Li. Sometimes I suspect that we build our traps ourselves, then we back into them, pretending amazement the while.
That this is the way of life, from the All-Highest down to the meanest creature in creation...
But whether this is the case of no, it is still a worthy thing to open cages.
It is still a virtuous act to free the imprisoned."
-Dream
"One day, I know, I must smash the emerald.
But that day can wait."
-Dream
"If you change your mind...tell the kitten. He will tell me."
-Dream
"Only the phoenix arises but does not descend.
And everything changes.
And nothing is truely lost."
-The Exile
"What win I, If I gain the thing I seek?
A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy.
Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week?
Or sells eternity to get a toy?"
-William Shakespeare
"It is not given to any man to know what would have happened."
-Dream
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"I'm not a bleeding witch. But you don't get to yer two hundred and fiftieth birthday without learning a thing or two, little miss clever-boots."
-Mad Hettie
"I can see the problem. There's a refrigerator on your legs."
-Didi (Death)
"I said, don't apples taste great? I mean the way they taste, and the texture, and the way when you chew them they kind of crunch and the juice runs out in your mouth. Isn't it amazing?"
-Didi (Death)
"Well, it's no harder to be nice than it is to be creepy. And it's much more fun."
-Didi (Death)
"Have you met the goldfish? The big orange one is Slim, the little yellow one's called Wandsworth."
-Didi (Death)
"That's just the universe's way of making me feel more comfortable. Technically right now I'm out three hours old."
-Didi (Death)
"There's this thing they have in french: l'esprit d'escalier. The spirit of the stairway. I don't thing we have a word for it in English. It means, well, the clever things to say that you only think to yourself when you're on the way out. All the cool stuff you wish you'd said at the time."
-Sexton Furnival
"You don't reach a ripe old age without knowing a trick or two. Anyway, it's traditional, hidin' yer heart...Mayhap I placed it in a duck egg, inside a duck, inside a well, in a castle, on an island, surrounded by a lake of fire, guarded by a hundred dragons each larger and more ferocious than the last."
"And maybe you didn't?"
"Well, it's been a long time, lovely. Me mind goes wanderin'."
-Mad Hettie and Didi (Death)
"Sexton, Is the chemical aftertaste the reason why people eat hot dogs? Or is it some kind of bonus?"
-Didi (Death)
"Anyway, as my older brother would say, certain destinations are inevitable."
-Didi (Death), of Destiny (I assume)
"If I tell you something, Theo, the correct responce is "Thank you, teacher," or even "I am unworthy to have been granted that crumb of wisdom, Teacher." There are other responces - properly servile ones - that would be equally as appropriate. I will permit you to come up with them as the occasion sees fit. "So," however, is nowhere on the list."
-The Eremite
"Uh. Is your hair really that color?"
"Sweet child. Nobody's hair is really this color."
-Sexton and The Girl in Gloves
"A woman's age is her own affair."
The Girl in Gloves
"You really are a child. You know, ennui is insufficient reason to commit suicide."
-The Girl in Gloves
"I...had a friend who was badly abused, sexually, between the ages of 12 and 15, by her father, and by five of her father's friends. The family fiction was that she - my friend - liked hunting, which was why her father would take off with her and his buddies on their camping trips. They...They made her do a lot of things she didn't like. Her father was the mayor of the town in question, and one of the five friends was police chief. There was no one she could go to. And one day it all got too much. And she got her daddy's big old hunting knife, and she locked herself in the bathroom, and she started to slice. And when she woke up in the hospital with bandages all down her arms, she was...somehow...still glad to be alive."
-The Girl in Gloves
"I liked the Little Mermaid more. I mean, even though they'd given it a happy ending. My brother - one of my brothers anyway - he's kind of a purist about these things. But I don't see why she has to lose her soul and die and everything."
-Didi (Death), of Dream (I assume)
Listen: "One day in every century death takes on mortal flesh, better to comprehend what the lives she takes must feel like, to taste the bitter tang of mortality: And this is the price she must pay for being the divider of the living from all that has gone before, all that must come after."
-Didi (Death)
"Well, I'm putting down marbles on the floor so that when he comes in, if we're really lucky he'll fall down and break his neck and we'll get away."
"Sexton! Someone could hurt themselves."
"Didi."
"Yeah. Okay. Sorry."
-Sexton and Didi
"But she is Death! Her touch is Death. Her flesh is corruption and her eyes breed maggots...But she will not triumph! I have her sigil! I shall conquer death and bend her to my bidding!"
-The Eremite
"If you're really Death...what happens when people dies? I mean, do you believe in Heaven and Hell and that stuff? Or reincarnation? Or Nirvana? Or do we blink out like light bulbs?"
"If I was really Death, do you think I'd tell you?"
"I don't know what you're going to do. If a hundred penguins came down Broadway and did a little dance with you I don't think I'd even blink."
"Sexton? You know, underneath you're pretty okay."
-Sexton and Didi. As usual.
"I mean, it would be really neat if Death was somebody, and not just nothing, or pain, or blackness. And it would be really good if Death could be somebody like Didi. Somebody funny, and friendly, and nice. And maybe just a tiny bit crazy."
-Sexton
"Ah, she's a deep one, and that's no mistake...Still, of all that lot, she's ther only one I'd give sixpence for."
-Mad Hettie, of Death
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"This is New York, love. Everybody's jewish in New York. It's compulsory."
-Larry
"He looks good in a tux. And is Buddist, I am assured, if that makes a difference."
-Larry
"I am surrounded by butterflies. I am light as a dream. And I wish I was a butterfly. If I was a butterfly I wouldn't be running away from anything..."
-Foxglove (Donna Cavanagh)
"Probably how he would have wanted to go. Just out like that. Me, I want to be squashed by a bull elephant at the moment of orgasm while sandwiched between two or three agile greased nubian virgins..."
-Boris
"Well, the Buddha said that a journey of a thousand miles begin with a single step."
"So you're proposing...we walk?"
-Vito and Foxglove
"Nobody's creepy from the inside, Hazel. Some of them are sad, and some of them hurt, and some of them think they're the only real thing in the whole world. But they're not creepy."
-Death
"You can do anything if you are who I think you are."
-Hazel (to Death)
"If you two don't shut up, I will shoot you both and plead self-defence."
-Foxglove
"Is this our transport?"
"Looks like it. Maybe Death has a sense of humour."
"Mmm. You can't read a newspaper these days without noticing that."
-Boris and Foxglove
"Look, at the risk of sounding really stupid, I do not believe that Death is some cute goette. I don't believe Death's a person.
Death's Nothing.
Death's a Void.
Death's playing a C chord on a fender strat which unfortunately happpens to be live.
It's doing a line of something which you were assured was grade-A best bolivian, and which turns out to be pure rat poison.
It's fucking the wrong person, the wrong way, and watching your mind and body waste away.
That's what Death is."
-Boris