Gunslinger Quotes

Was it pretty? Your country ... your land?" "It was beautiful," the gunslinger said. "There were fields and forests and rivers and mists in the morning. But that's only pretty. My mother used to say that the only real beauty is order and love and light. ~ Stephen King

So for a moment the gunslinger merely stood inside the door, first amazed, then ironically amused. Here he was in a world which struck him dumb with fresh wonders seemingly at every step, a world where carriages flew trough the air and paper seemed as cheap as sand. And the newest wonder was simply that for these people, wonder had run out: here, in a place of miracles, he saw only dull faces and plodding bodies. ~ Stephen King

Are you a gunslinger, Roland? If you are, you better get ready. ~ Stephen King

I do not aim with my hand; he who aims with his hand has forgotten the face of his father.
I aim with my eye.
I do not shoot with my hand; he who shoots with his hand has forgotten the face of his father.
I shoot with my mind.
I do not kill with my gun; he who kills with his gun has forgotten the face of his father.
I kill with my heart. ~ Stephen King

Sure. Knock yourself out." "I don't understand you." "Do what you want." "Ah." The gunslinger nodded and lay back. Knock myself out, he thought. Knock. Myself out. ~ Stephen King

Jamie DeCurry had once proclaimed that Roland could shoot blindfolded, because he had eyes in his fingers. ~ Stephen King

TV is all about speed. TV is fast and furious. It's gunslinger territory. ~ Amy Sherman-Palladino

The gunslinger came awake from a confused dream which seemed to consist of a single image: that of the Sailor in the Tarot deck from which the man in black had dealt (or purported to deal) the gunslinger's own moaning future. ~ Stephen King

They were shooting far, and their accuracy suffered, but Nox didn't exactly have a lot of places to dance through the bullets. They came in number, like rain. You couldn't afford to get wet. ~ Dean F. Wilson

Their situation was becoming ever harder to deny: they were characters in someone's story. This whole world
~ Stephen King

Huh? What did I promise?"
"Fowevew," he said with a nod, like it was final.
"Exactly."
We stared at each other, and it reminded me of my first day, when he stared me down like a mute gunslinger. ~ Amber L. Johnson

I denied Discordia and regret nothing; I have spat into the bodiless eyes of the Crimson King and rejoice; I threw my lot with the gunslinger and the White and never once questioned the choice. ~ Stephen King

No," Roland said, "but it's a fair tale. Tell it to the end, please." Eddie did, finishing with the required They lived happily ever after, and the gunslinger nodded. "No one ever does live happily ever after, but we leave the children to find that out for themselves, don't we?" "Yeah," Jake said. ~ Stephen King

His hands had dropped to the worn butts of his guns. "Those do not open doors, gunslinger; those only close them forever. ~ Stephen King

May you find your Tower, Roland, and breach it, and may you climb to the top! ~ Stephen King

On the other side of Mid-World, Roland of Gilead, the last gunslinger, had drawn this divided woman to him and had created a third, who was far better, far stronger, than either of the previous two. ~ Stephen King

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed. ~ Stephen King

Death, but not for you, gunslinger. Never for you. You darkle. You tinct. May I be brutally frank? You go on. ~ Stephen King

The hands pulled him forward regardless. The hands of the Tower knew no mercy.

They were the hands of Gan, the hands of ka, and they knew no mercy.

He smelled alkali, bitter as tears. The desert beyond the door was white; blinding; waterless; without feature save for the faint, cloudy haze of the mountains which sketched themselves on the horizon. The smell beneath the alkali was that of the devil-grass which brought sweet dreams, nightmares, death.

But not for you, gunslinger. Never for you. You darkle. You tinct.

May I be brutally frank? You go on.

And each time you forget the last time. For you, each time is the first time. ~ Stephen King

a small few actually able to do those things of which men whisper - these few could call demons and the dead, could kill with a curse or heal with strange potions. One of these men had been a creature the gunslinger believed to be a demon himself, a creature that pretended to be a man and called itself Flagg. He had seen him only briefly, and that had been near the end, as chaos and the final crash approached his land. Hot on his heels had come two young men who looked desperate and yet grim, men named Dennis and Thomas. These three had crossed only a tiny part of what had been a confused and confusing time in the gunslinger's life, but he would never forget seeing Flagg change a man who had irritated him into a howling dog. He remembered that well enough. ~ Stephen King

Would you kill all your answers so easily, gunslinger? ~ Stephen King

Oy?" he asked. "Will you say goodbye?"
Oy looked at Roland, and for a moment the gunslinger wasn't sure he understood. Then the bumbler extended his neck and caressed the boy's cheek a last time with his tongue. "I, Ake," he said: Bye, Jake or I ache, it came to the same. ~ Stephen King

You should fear me too, Mr. Waist Gunner, with your burn. What a silly thing - waist gunner. You gun from the waist?" She struck a pose, holding her hands in the shape of guns at her waist, face screwed into a scowl that all enemies should fear. She looked like a grandma gunslinger at the O.K. Corral. ~ Tracy Groot

Below the waterbag were his guns,finely weighted to his hand. The two belts crisscrossed above his crotch. The holsters were oiled too deeply for even this Philistine sun to crack. The stocks of the guns were sandalwood, yellow and finely grained. The holsters were tied down with
raw hide cord, and they swung heavily against his hips. The brass casings of the cartridges looped into the gun belts twinkled and flashed and heliographed in the sun. The leather made subtle
creaking noises. The guns themselves made no noise. ~ Stephen King

What a paragon of virtue you are, gunslinger! the man in black laughed. ~ Stephen King

Death, but not for you, gunslinger. ~ Stephen King

Time is a thief of memory ~ Stephen King

A large praying mantis was performing ablutions on the springy stem of the kid's cowlick. The gunslinger snorted laughter-the first in gods knew how long-and set the fire and went after water. ~ Stephen King

Do you believe in an afterlife?" the gunslinger asked him as Brown dropped three ears of hot corn onto his plate.
Brown nodded. "I think this is it. ~ Stephen King

The gunslinger said, "I used to think the most terrible thing would be to reach the Dark Tower and find the top room empty. The God of all universes either dead or nonexistent in the first place. But now ... suppose there is someone there, Eddie? Someone in charge who turns out to be ... " He couldn't finish.
Eddie could. "Someone who turns out to be just another bumhug? Is that it? God not dead but feeble-minded and malicious? ~ Stephen King

When I first started, I wasn't really into movies that much unless it was an action-packed gunslinger with naked women here and there. ~ Josh Duhamel

They had discovered one could grow as hungry for light as for food. ~ Stephen King

for the first time in months or years the gunslinger could see real, living green. ~ Stephen King

Are you kidding? If Archer McLovelyArms wants you to spend the whole weekend, you go, girl. Get you some."
She snorted. "His name's Cody Rey."
I quirked an eyebrow, even though she wasn't there, and for the first time in the entire conversation, banter didn't feel forced.
"You sure he's an archer? Sounds more like a gunslinger. Just what exactly is he packing? ~ Amelia C. Gormley

When the sun was fully up, the gunslinger moved on west. He would find another horse eventually, or a mule, but for now he was content to walk. All that day he was haunted by a ringing, singing sound in his ears, a sound like bells. Several times he stopped and looked around, sure he would see a dark following shape flowing over the ground, chasing after as the shadows of our best and worst memories chase after, but no shape was ever there. He was alone in the low hill country west of Eluria. Quite alone. ~ Stephen King

Mona was half ninja, half gunslinger, popping off charge after charge into the blue creatures. ~ Eoin Colfer

The Tower. He would come to the Dark Tower and there he would sing their names; there he would sing their names; there he would sing all their names. The sun stained the east a dusky rose, and at last Roland, no longer the last gunslinger but one of the last three, slept and dreamed his angry dreams through which there ran only that one soothing blue thread: There I will sing all their names! ~ Stephen King

His father used to tell him that you can't eat principles. And no, you couldn't. But you could live by them. ~ Dean F. Wilson

Nox didn't say a word. He waited, counting the seconds in his mind. Sometimes you counted bullets and sometimes you counted time. Either one could kill you. ~ Dean F. Wilson

The gunslinger waited for the time of the drawing and dreamed his long dreams of the Dark Tower, to which he would some day come at dusk and approach, winding his horn, to do some unimaginable final battle. ~ Stephen King

And still the hands did their trick, like over-eager dogs that want to do their rolling - over trick for you not once or twice but all night. ~ Stephen King

If you didn't have your guns, you still had your mouth. Of course, you had to be careful how you fired that off. ~ Dean F. Wilson

She stared at the bullwhip coiled Indiana Jones-style at his narrow waist, then at the black-handled dagger sheathed on his right hip. An obsidian rapier
Fae-forged and unbreakable
almost merged with one of the taped seams that ran down the sides of his pants. He even wore a dagger gunslinger-style at his hip. Dear Goddess, the man was a walking arsenal, but he was sexy as hell. ~ Kryssie Fortune

Listen to me, maggots. Listen for your lives, for that's what it could mean some day. You never see all that you see. One of the things they send you to me for is to show you what you don't see in what you see
what you don't see when you're scared, or fighting or running or fucking. No man sees al that he sees, but before you're gunslinger
those of you who don't go west, that is,
you'll see more in one single glance than some men see in a lifetime. And some of what you don't see in that glance you'll see afterwards, in the eye of your memory
if you live long enough to remember, that is. Because the difference between seeing and not seeing can be the difference between the living and dying. ~ Stephen King

Don't feel sorry for yourself. Make do. ~ Stephen King

At first everything went according to plan and they called it ka. When things began going wrong and the dying started, they called that ka, too. Ka, the gunslinger could have told them, was often the last thing you had to rise above. ~ Stephen King

Shall there be truth between us, as two men? Not as friends, but as enemies and equals? ~ Stephen King

and for the first time in months or years the gunslinger could see real, living green. Grass, ~ Stephen King

We say it's a modern American Western - two gunslingers who ride into town, fight the bad guys, kiss the girl and ride out into the sunset again. And we were always talking from the very beginning that if you're going to have cowboys, they need a trusty horse.
- Eric Kripke on the decision to add the Impala ~ Eric Kripke

The woman who preaches has poison religion. Let the respectable ones go ~ Stephen King

Hey gunslinger... nice shot. ~ James O'Barr

The Coilhunter wasn't much of a talker. He liked to keep things short and sweet, just like the lives of criminals. Well, the short bit anyway. ~ Dean F. Wilson

She looked at her right hand, where the index finger was cut to a stump. Some said she lost it in an accident, when she was playing soldier with a live grenade. Others said she was taught a lesson by the law, and they took her trigger finger to make her keep on learning. Those were the lessons the Coilhunter liked. Why, he was quite the teacher himself. ~ Dean F. Wilson

The gunslinger occasionally moaned with the wind. The stars were as indifferent to this as they were to wars, crucifixions, resurrections. ~ Stephen King

There will be water if God wills it. ~ Stephen King

The warden always seems to know which book to bring. When the sun is gunslinger blue, the warden brings a western. When rain slates against the towers and the world has gone hopeless with gray, it is Bible stories. When the halls ring with the cries of riot and the bars of my own cell rattle with pain, the warden drops a soft book on the floor, solace in its pages: the collected poems of Walt Whitman. And oh, my favorites, like the tastes of childhood. Every few months the warden passes me The White Dawn, and for a few precious days I traverse the open heavens on hard-packed moonlit snow and see the blue splashing arctic lights, and I fill my belly with frozen seal meat and laugh with my Inuit friends. ~ Rene Denfeld

Therein lay the root of the problem.
Sharing was not in his nature, but nature would have to adapt. Ali
needed this kid. Finn was a modern day gunslinger. Deep down he
fucking hated it, but his girl needed this one nice and close.
Preferably wrapped around her finger and deeply concerned about
her health and happiness.Every goddamn minute of every goddamn day would be best.
Daniel did not want to share her. Not with the kid, not with anyone,
not even a little. He knew it would work, this insane idea of going
halves, he just didn't want it to. He had only recently found her and
she was his. But he couldn't keep her safe on his own, a fact that bit
deep and hard and hung on as a pit bul would. How the hell to
convince her? What Ali wanted and what would keep her safe and
alive would likely be at odds in this case. She'd accused him of
being pushy a time or two. His girl had no real idea how far he'd go
to protect her. ~ Kylie Scott

I walked the length of the ward, towards the exit with what I imagined to be the stoic, dignified stride of a gunslinger walking away from his last fight, determined to make it outside before I broke into a million pieces, I almost made it too. ~ Rob Grimes

The man in black fled across the dessert and the gunslinger followed. ~ Stephen King

I understood it," the boy said. "It was a game, wasn't it? Do grown men always have to play games? Does everything have to be an excuse for another kind of game? Do any men grow up or do they only come of age?"
"You don't know everything," the gunslinger said, trying to hold his slow anger.
"No. But I know what I am to you."
"And what is that?" The gunslinger asked tightly.
"A poker chip. ~ Stephen King

What seems solid to us is actually only a loose net held together by gravity. Everything in the Universe denies 'nothing'. To suggest an ending is the one absurdity -The Man in Black from Stephen King's The Gunslinger ~ Stephen King

I know these days it sounds a little odd, but American governments are very fearful of European reaction. They were afraid we would be considered gunslingers. ~ Michael Scheuer

You hang your heroes. That way they'll never disappoint you.' It also brought to mind his own retort: 'But what about your enemies? What about the
villains? What do we do with those? ~ Dean F. Wilson

Few if any seemed to have grasped the Principle of Reality; new knowledge leads always to yet more awesome mysteries. Greater physiological knowledge of the brain makes the existence of the soul less possible yet more probable by the nature of the search. ~ Stephen King

The marriage between the fantasy and the Westerns is that thing of, if people think you're the best gunslinger around, they're going to come looking for you. ~ Kieran Bew

An old gunslinger once told me that you never draw a gun unless you intend to use it, and you never - ever - tell someone you are going to draw your gun. You just do it. ~ Michael Scott

This is going to sound strange, but I really didn't think I would pass 30. I don't know why or whatever, I just didn't. That's a very weird thing to say, I'm sorry. I don't know. Maybe it's because I was drinking so much as a youth. ~ Kristin Davis

He taught me if you kill what you love, you're damned." "I am damned already," Roland said calmly. "But per-haps even the damned may be saved."

"Are you going to get all of us killed?" Roland said nothing.

Eddie seized the rags of Roland's shirt. "Are you going to get her killed?" "We all die in time," the gunslinger said. "It's not just the world that moves on." He looked squarely at Eddie, his faded blue eyes almost the color of slate in this light. "But we will be magnificent." He paused. "There's more than a world to win, Eddie. I would not risk you and her - I would not have allowed the boy to die - if that was all there was."

"What are you talking about?"

"Everything there is," the gunslinger said calmly. "We are going to go, Eddie. We are going to fight. We are going to be hurt. And in the end we will stand." Now it was Eddie who said nothing. He could think of nothing to say. Roland gently grasped Eddie's arm. "Even the damned love," he said. ~ Stephen King

That was the trouble with explaining with words. If you explained with gunpowder, people listened. ~ Dean F. Wilson

What's that mean?" Eddie asked. "I hate it when you start up with your Zen Buddhist shit, Roland." "It means I don't know," Roland said. "Who is this man Zen Buddhist? Is he wise like me?" Eddie looked at Roland for a long, long time before deciding the gunslinger was making one of his rare jokes. "Ah, get outta here ... ~ Stephen King

Take the dead from the dead, the old proverb said; only a corpse may speak true prophecy. ~ Stephen King

You do look a little pale," the army woman said. "I thought maybe it was air sickness."
"Pure hunger"
She gave him a professional smile. "I'll see what I can rustle up."
Russel? the gunslinger thought dazedly. In his own world 'to russel' was a slang verb meaning to take a woman by force. Never mind, food would come. ~ Stephen King

The gunslinger turned his eyes up to the faces in the leaves. A play was being enacted there for his amusement Worlds rose and fell before him. Empires were built across shining sands where forever machines toiled in abstract electronic frenzies. Empires declined and fell. Wheels that had spun like silent liquid moved more slowly, began to squeak, began to scream, stopped. Sand choked the stainless steel gutters of concentric streets below dark skies full of stars like beds of cold jewels. And through it all, a dying wind of change blew, bringing with it the cinnamon smell of late October. The gunslinger watched as the world moved on. ~ Stephen King

For Gilead and the Calla!" he roared. "Now, gunslingers! Now, you Sisters of Oriza! Now, now! Kill them! No Quarter! Kill them all! ~ Stephen King

We see in part, and thus is the mirror of prophecy darkened." There are other worlds, gunslinger, and other demons. These waters are deep. Watch for the doorways. Watch for the roses and the unfound doorways. ~ Stephen King

Do you see how little it all matters? How quickly and easily I can take it all away, should I choose to do so? Beware, gunslinger! Beware, shaman! The abyss is all around you. You float or fall into it at my whim. ~ Stephen King

You're fortunate I've already beaten someone else to death today, gunslinger. I have a schedule to keep. ~ John Jackson Miller

Why am I here?" Jake asked. "Why did I forget everything from before?" "Because the man in black has drawn you here," the gunslinger said. "And because of the Tower. The Tower stands at a kind of . . . power-nexus. In time." "I don't understand that! ~ Stephen King

This is a place of death, he thought, and not just here. All these rooms. Every floor.

Yes, gunslinger, whispered the Voice of the Tower. But only because your life has made it so. ~ Stephen King

She wanted to savor him slowly like a lemon cream pie on a lazy summer day. One bite at a time. ~ Sandra Jones

The truth was loose: I was the son of a son of a bitch, an ancestral prodigy born to clobber my way through loathsome dungheaps of idiot labor. My genes were cocked and loaded. I was a meteor, a gunslinger, a switchblade boomerang hurled from the pecker dribblets of my forefathers' untainted jalopy seed. I was Al Kaline peggin' home a beebee from the right field corner. I was Picasso applyin' the final masterstroke to his frenzied Guernica. I was Wilson Pickett stompin' up the stairway of the Midnight Hour. I was one blazin' tomahawk of m-fuggin' eel snot. Graceful and indomitable. Methodical and brain-dead. The quintessential shoprat. The Rivethead. ~ Ben Hamper

Beg your pardon,' the gunslinger said. 'I was wool-gathering. ~ Stephen King

The boy who became a man progressed from darkness and unlearning to light and responsibility. ~ Stephen King

I've always taken that as my guiding principle and the rest is just set dressing. You can have dragons in it, or aliens and starships, or a western about a gunslinger, or even literary fiction, and ultimately you're still writing about the human heart in conflict with itself. ~ George R R Martin