Without remorse she gave good-bye to her fantasies. They'd served their purpose, they'd awoken her heart to its potential. But as far as using them as a template for her life .

Find out what people want to do, then tell them to do it. They'll think you're a genius.

If you forget your lines, you had better mumble with conviction.

She'd stood by that creed. No softness, because the world wasn't soft; lots of laughter, because if you were in on the joke, the joke couldn't be on you; And no wanting what you couldn't take, because the world never gave.
Or so she'd thought.

Conscience is like a pet: If you spoil it by too much attention it'll start yipping at the most inopportune times.

Give me a strong back, over a soft heart.

Charm is getting people to say yes without ever having to ask them a question.

Pain is the only reward for clinging to impossible dreams. (Harry Braxton).

Etiquette, Seward had once told Jamison, was all that mattered. Ideologies waxed and waned, religions developed and eroded, political parties rose and fell from power. Only courtesy remained one of the few things valued by all civilized men.

The lower your decolletage, the less the need for conversation.

She clutched the train ticket tighter and waited for the sense of escape to come over her as it had a dozen times before, that heady sensation of having just scooted through the clanging gate, of eluding the thrown net. It didn't come. She was running again, but she wasn't escaping. She'd been chased to ground a long, long time ago.

There are moments on stage when everything comes together. Then the kid in the front row coughs.

You are my country, Desdemona. ... My Egypt. My hot, harrowing desert and my cool, verdant Nile, infinitely lovely and unfathomable and sustaining.

As a gentleman- assuming you still have some pretensions in that direction- of honor- again, perhaps presumptuous, but still supposing your passing acquaintance with the concept- it is your duty- I won't even trouble to speculate here, but remain naively hopeful- to protect those under your care.

My attraction to her is doubtless based on my sudden immersion into the absolute foreign company of women, a chronological receptiveness, and certain chemicals in the body. He scowled. And her eyes.

I am no good without you, Ginesse, he said. I spent a lifetime alone, but I never understood loneliness until I was away from you. I never understood happiness until I saw you again.

Love shouldn't be comfortable.

You can figure out what the villain fears by his choice of weapons.

She'd stood by that creed. No softness, because the world wasn't soft; lots of laughter, because if you were in on the joke, the joke couldn't be on you; And no wanting what you couldn't take, because the world never gave. Or so she'd thought.

An intelligent lady, a little too mature for recklessness, a little too young for caution.