Elspeth Quotes

They [zebras] looked like highly varnished animated toys. ~ Elspeth Huxley

The kissed surprised him because it had been so long since he'd kissed anyone but Elspeth. It surprised Valentina because she had hardly ever kissed anyone that way - to her, kissing had always been more theoretical than physical. Afterwards she stood with her eyes closed, lips parted, face tilted. Robert thought, She's going to break my heart and I'm going to let her. ~ Audrey Niffenegger

The Beatties were always arguing, it gave them an interest in life ... ~ Elspeth Huxley

Now that Janet and Frances were older, Grandpa would let them visit him in his study, where the parrot lived. Grandpa came from a long line of parrot-keeping men, and Polly's predecessor, a white cockatoo, had fought with Wellington's armies in the Napoleonic Wars. Janet's father's earliest memories were of the astonishing oaths known to this bird, who was then a hundred and two years old and spoke in ripe gamey accents long since gone from the world of men. Grandpa believed that there must be a fair number of such long-lived birds in Scotland - even perhaps in England - and it would have been a fine thing to have them all gathered in a great dining hall, invoking ghostly midshipmen and dragoons, violent drinkers and merry rhymesters, perhaps even occasionally a lady of refinement. This, he said, would afford a historical experience of rare value; indeed, ancient parrots should be fêted and cultivated as true archivists. ~ Elspeth Barker

When the present stung her, she sought her antidote in the future, which was as sure to hold achievement as the dying flower to hold the fruit when its petals wither. ~ Elspeth Huxley

Elspeth had the joyous task of breaking the news to the rest of the Council. There was no such accord among the political leaders of Valdemar as there was among her military leaders.
Lord Gartheser was speechless with outrage and shock; Bard Hyron was dazed. Lady Kester and Lady Cathan, still seething over Orthallen's accusations of complicity with the slavers, were surprised, but not altogether unhappy. Father Aldon had closeted himself in the tiny chapel of the Keep; Lord Gildas was with him. Healer Myrim made no attempt to conceal the fact that Orthallen's treachery had not surprised her. Nor did she conceal that his demise gave her a certain grim satisfaction. But then, she might well be forgiven such uncharitable thoughts; she was one of the four Healers who were tending Talia's wounds.
Once the bare bones had been told to the Councillors as a group, Elspeth went to each of these Councillors in turn, privately. She gave a simple explanation of what had occurred, but would answer no questions. Questions, she told them, must wait until Talia had recovered enough to tell them all more. ~ Mercedes Lackey

To deceive gracefully is the very essence of social life. One must start by deceiving oneself, and make a lifelong practice of deceiving others; if one does it well enough, in time one might even become an artist, the greatest illusionists of all. ~ Elspeth Huxley

Older Explorers went to seek the source of rivers and to map their tributaries. Today one seeks the source of human conduct and tries to map the course of history....There are no problems in AFrica. For Problems have solutions, and the enigmas of human behaviour can never be solved. ~ Elspeth Huxley

Africa is cruel ... it takes your heart and grinds it into powdered stone - and no-one minds ~ Elspeth Huxley

Only man is not content to leave things as they are but must always be changing them, and when he has done so, is seldom satisfied with the result. ~ Elspeth Huxley

How much does one imagine, how much observe? One can no more separate those functions than divide light from air, or wetness from water. ~ Elspeth Huxley

One of the stock Sydney jokes is of the census-taker who enquires: 'How many children have you, ma'am?' 'Two living and three in Melbourne.' ~ Elspeth Huxley

Elspeth stood in the sun, letting it pour through her, watching the Kitten sleep. I want you. Elspeth felt depressed. She had never thought of herself as someone who would kill a beautiful white kitten while it napped. But apparently she was that sort of person. Don't you worry, Kitten. I'll put you right back. ~ Audrey Niffenegger

You must be ready to stay up late to follow it, to begin your conversation with the owl and end it with the cock. ~ Elspeth Marr

Tilly was downcast; as with all perfectionists, it was the detail others might not notice that destroyed for her the pleasure of achievement. ~ Elspeth Huxley

The great point about money was to convert it as quickly as possible into something you could use or enjoy. ~ Elspeth Huxley

You're Gideon's friend."
I laughed. Gideon's friend, of course. "Only because his mother pays me to hang out with him."
"Can she pay me?" Elspeth asked.
Iris, moving into the room, rolled her eyes at her sister. ~ Bethany Frenette

Little Robin had been brought by Lord Orthallen - although he had the feeling that his lord did not realize it. The boy was a part of his household, though Orthallen seemed to have long since forgotten the fact; and when the order came to pack up the household and move to the Border, Robin found himself in the tail of the baggage train, with no small bewilderment. He'd been at a loss in the encampment, wandering about until someone had seen him and realized that a small child had no place in a camp preparing for warfare. So he was sent packing; first off with Elspeth, then pressed into service by the Healers. They'd set him to fetching and carrying for Dirk, thinking that the child was far too young to be able to pick anything up from the casual talk around him, and that Dirk wouldn't think to interrogate a child as young as he.
They were wrong on both counts.
Robin was very much aware of what was going on - not surprising, since it concerned his adored Talia. He was worried sick, and longing for an adult to talk to. And Dirk was kind and gentle with him - and had he but known it, desperate enough for news to have questioned the rats in the walls if he thought it would get him anywhere.

Dirk knew all about Robin and his adoration of Talia. If anyone knew where she was being kept and what her condition was, that boy would.
Dirk bided his time. Eventually the Healers stopped overseeing his every waking moment. Finally there came a point when they began ~ Mercedes Lackey

She bent and placed a single daisy upon the grave. A simple white daisy. The plainest of flowers, perhaps the purest, Elspeth thought. It had cost next to nothing at all, and perhaps that was the point. She wasn't being cheap. She was being symbolic. In her mind, Andrea deserved only the unstained purity of the simplest of daisies, a daisy that was unsoiled by a wealth that couldn't find the money to have claimed her soul. ~ J.R. Tompkins

Even her name seemed empty, as though it had detached itself from her and was floating untethered in his mind. How am I supposed to live without you? It was not a matter of the body; his body would carry on as usual. The problem was located in the word how: he would live, but without Elspeth the flavour, the manner, the method of living were lost to him. He would have to relearn solitude. ~ Audrey Niffenegger

Good, strong knickers underneath your nightgown will inhibit access to the fertile crescent. ~ Elspeth Marr

On her first day of school a small group of children, led by the always-catty Sofia Jean Fleener, began needling her about her pudgy arms and her overly round face. When she replied with a lispy, "Thticks and thtones may break my boneth," Sofia Jean pounced upon that as well, and Elspeth did what many children might do in that situation. She cried.

The next day, the teasing began anew, but this time Elspeth did not cry. Instead, she made a split-second decision to punch Sofia Jean firmly in the solar plexus, while the other children looked on in horror. This time Sofia Jean was the one doing all the crying, and Elspeth decided right then and there that she much preferred this result to the previous day's outcome. ~ Gerry Swallow

Lust was no surprise. Present a man who'd not known a woman in a while with the sight of a naked one, and there was no power on earth that could restrain his cock from rising.
But the tenderness in his chest nearly knocked him down. He longed to hold her, to whisper endearments, to kiss away her fears and offer her the protection of his body as well as its need.
"Elspeth," he said reverently, as if her name were a prayer.
That broke the spell. She covered herself, one arm across her breasts, the other hand protectively splayed between her legs.
He continued to look at her, drinking in her exposed skin, all rosy and fresh. It would be like silk under his touch. His hands would know every inch of her.
She snatched up the remains of the velvet skirt and held it before her, but her neat calves and ankles were still bare to his gaze.
"How long have you been there?" she demanded.
"Long enough. ~ Connie Mason

I guess we both lose the bet. What bet Thomas asked entering the room.
Boxers or briefs Jeanne Louise answered. I was betting boxers and Elspeth thought briefs. Instead he went commando!!
So be warned ladies, don't assume they are wearing any undies!! ~ Lynsay Sands

The pioneer kills what he loves. ~ Elspeth Huxley

[ ... vastly different peoples live and work side by side but rarely come together, like the arms of an egg beater that] whirled independently and never touched, so that perhaps one arm never knew the other was there; yet they were together, turned by the same handle, and the cake was mixed by both. ~ Elspeth Huxley

The absorbed, disapproving regard of the middle-aged woman for her own face disappeared as he came up. ('The Snow Heart') ~ Elspeth Davie

She looked up at him, her eyes enormous. He noticed they were hazel, the sort that picked up whatever hue was near. Now they were the same shade of green as the moss ringing the cavern. ~ Connie Mason

He had never realized, while Elspeth was alive, the extent to which a thing had not completely happened until he told her about it. ~ Audrey Niffenegger

English tradition debars from dinner-table conversation almost all topics that might interest the conversers and insists upon strict adherence to banalities. ~ Elspeth Huxley

I'm starved." -Juli
"How can you be starved? You just ate a huge bowl of popcorn." -Elspeth
"Popcorn isn't food, it's popcorn." -Vicki ~ Lynsay Sands