Intrigue Quotes

It isn't about the looks; gorgeous women get dumped every day. It isn't about intelligence. Women of all types, from brilliant women to women with the IQ equivalent of plant life, pull it off every day. It's about mystery and learning how to create intrigue. ~ Sherry Argov

Every house has a story. Ours is a ghost story. It's also a lie. And now that yet another person has died within these walls, it's finally time to tell the truth. ~ Riley Sager

It is the deep, salty stickiness of food that intrigues me more than any other quality. ~ Nigel Slater

The terror is trapped inside of him and paralyzes him. He closes his eyes again and tries to drown out the scream - but it keeps ringing and ringing and ringing in his ears. ~ Suneeta Misra

Look at the orators in our republics; as long as they are poor, both state and people can only praise their uprightness; but once they are fattened on the public funds, they conceive a hatred for justice, plan intrigues against the people and attack the democracy. ~ Aristophanes

I guess what inspires me most is the desire to draw out feelings that feel best expressed on the written page by really good authors, and I'm not a really good author. I feel like my job as a filmmaker is to eff the ineffable, to take feelings that only poets could describe with words and try to project them on the screen for viewers to feel. I don't think I've succeeded once but in the act of trying I've come up with all these other results which sometimes intrigue me. ~ Guy Maddin

That for me is what intrigues me the most about feature films. It's not like the little kind of esoteric projects that you and your friends get but how do you make something that has a universal appeal. Those are the movies that intrigue me the most. ~ Casey Neistat

I read a lot of social history. If I'm in an art gallery and a picture intrigues me, I immediately write down the title and I google it. I do a lot of googling and looking out for good stories. I can almost smell them sometimes. ~ Emma Donoghue

Charles McCarry is the best modern writer on the subject of intrigue - by the breadth of Alan Furst, by the fathom of Eric Ambler, by any measure. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

When there are tiers of meaning in an ad it intrigues the audience and they look for it again and again. ~ William Shatner

Nine people had died today. And it didn't matter what the FBI had thought of her actions. Her career as a negotiator had ended before it had even begun. ~ Elizabeth Heiter

My daughter, people are only used to seeing the glorified in a story, because a story is only a tiny, tiny piece of a person's life. Legends, sacred writings, they're all like that. But I assure you, dear child, every one of those people up there on that wall felt like, thought like, and suffered like you! ~ Darryl Steven Markowitz

Arrgh, my dad's here to pick me up. How can he be so insensitive to intrigue? ~ John Allison

People frequently bore me, sometimes amuse me, most often irritate me, but rarely intrigue me. ~ Jeaniene Frost

All that comes to pass is as familiar and well known as the rose in spring, and the grape in summer. Of like fashion are sickness, death, calumny, intrigue, and all that gladdens or saddens the foolish. ~ Marcus Aurelius

Recent global challenges suggest the themes in "The RISING SEDITION" foreshadow fiction becoming reality!! RT ~ Richard Trevae

He also had deep brown eyes, light brown skin and an infectious grin, even in the middle of a grueling SWAT workout. In short, exactly her type. If only he wasn't a teammate, making him off-limits. And if only she didn't have baggage from her past that weighed more than he did. ~ Elizabeth Heiter

Going out there and promoting myself socially doesn't really intrigue me. I'd much rather have my work do it for me. ~ Ryan Kwanten

I know many souls that toss and whirl and pass, but none there are that intrigue me more than the Souls of White Folk. Of them I am singularly clairvoyant. I see in and through them. I view them from unusual points of vantage. Not as a foreigner do I come, for I am native, not foreign, bone of their thought and flesh of their language. Mine is not the knowledge of the traveler or the colonial composite of dear memories, words and wonder. Nor yet is my knowledge that which servants have of masters, or mass of class, or capitalist of artisan. Rather I see these souls undressed and from the back and side. I see the working of their entrails. I know their thoughts and they know that I know. This knowledge makes them now embarrassed, now furious. They deny my right to live and be and call me misbirth! My word is to them mere bitterness and my soul, pessimism. And yet as they preach and strut and shout and threaten, crouching as they clutch at rags of facts and fancies to hide their nakedness, they go twisting, flying by my tired eyes and I see them ever stripped, - ugly, human. ~ W.E.B. Du Bois

The histories and tragedies of Shakespeare that Lincoln loved most dealt with themes that would resonate to a president in the midst of civil war: political intrigue, the burdens of power, the nature of ambition, the relationship of leaders to those they governed. The plays illuminated with stark beauty the dire consequences of civil strife, the evils wrought by jealousy and disloyalty, the emotions evoked by the death of a child, the sundering of family ties or love of country. ~ Doris Kearns Goodwin

We thought of [New York] as a free city, like one of those storied prewar tropical nests of intrigue and licentiousness where exiles and lamsters and refugees found shelter in a tangle of improbable juxtapositions. ~ Luc Sante

I want to inspire and encourage people and intrigue them to want to know what makes me tick, which is ultimately the love of God, the grace, peace and forgiveness of God that I'm so thankful & grateful for. ~ Christian Hosoi

To me, rock music was never meant to be safe. I think there needs to be an element of intrigue, mystery, subversiveness. Your parents should hate it. ~ Trent Reznor

Different groups in the [Middle East] drew two lessons from [return of the shah in Iran] - one, that Americans were willing to use both force and intrigue to install or restore their puppet rulers in Middle Eastern countries; the other, that they were not reliable patrons when these puppets were seriously attacked by their own people, and would simply abandon them. The one evoked hatred, the other contempt - a dangerous combination.
Clearly, something deeper is involved than these specific grievances, numerous and important as they may be, something deeper which turns every disagreement into a problem and makes every problem insoluble. What we confront now is not just a complaint about one or another American policy but rather a rejection and condemnation, at once angry and contemptuous, of all that America is seen to represent in the modern world. (76) ~ Bernard Lewis

Scourge of the Betrayer is as harsh and profane as anything RichardK Morgan or Joe Abercrombie serves up. Fortunately, Saylards has the skills -and the humor - to pull it off. Snappy dialogue, political intrigue, shadycharacters, gripping action sequences, a poor guy that has no idea what he'sgotten himself into ... Yeah, there's a lot to like about this debut. ~ David Anthony Durham

If one sees the personality not as an apparatus that is essentially constructed by the time childhood is over, but as always in its essence developing, then life at 25 or 30 or at the gateway to middle age will stimulate its own intrigue, surprise, and exhilaration of discovery. ~ Erik Erikson

It's the same with books, you see mounds of them in bookshops and you want to read them all, or at least to have a taste of them. You think you could be missing out on something important, you see them and they intrigue you, they tempt you, they tell you how insignificant your life is and how tremendous it could be. ~ Andres Neuman

Would you dare to reach inside the vault of a feral heart?
Glare into the keyhole, eyes bound with intrigue...is it real what we perceive? or does the absent colour leave you lost or decieved? ~ L V HALL

The path to love can be clouded with mystery and intrigue. ~ Truth Devour

We are taken through the pursuit of the American dream, the establishment of the American family, and a smattering of suspense and intrigue. ~ Nikita Allgire

Tales of power and ambition and intrigue and betrayal and desire - when you're telling those in a big way, you automatically want to go to Shakespeare. ~ Beau Willimon

Many photographers feel their client is the subject. My client is a woman in Kansas who reads Vogue. I'm trying to intrigue, stimulate, feed her. My responsibility is to the reader. The severe portrait that is not the greatest joy in the world to the subject may be enormously interesting to the reader. ~ Irving Penn

One of the things that did intrigue me about when I read the pilot - because I had not read the books before doing the show - was the mystery aspect of it. I didn't feel that it was just a crime-based story. It really does have that mystery element, and it felt like a throwback to other shows in the past that had a bit more of that. There was something iconic about it. The fact that it's set in Boston gave it a feeling that was different to me. So, I am definitely more of a fan of mysteries than I am of a circular crime-based genre. ~ Sasha Alexander

The personality and style of a photographer usually limits the type of subject with which he deals best. For example Cartier-Bresson is very interested in people and in travel; these things plus his precise feeling for geometrical relationships determine the type of pictures he takes best. What is of value is that a particular photographer sees the subject differently. A good picture must be a completely individual expression which intrigues the viewer and forces him to think. ~ Alexey Brodovitch

Without bureaus, committees, officials or emissaries to manufacture sentiment in his favor, without intrigue or effort on his part, Grant is the candidate whose supporters have never threatened to bolt. ~ Roscoe Conkling

He woos, he confronts, he delivers, he heals, he shoots straight, and then he uses intrigue. He lives out before them the most compelling view of God, shows them an incredibly attractive holiness while shattering the religious glaze. But still, he lets them walk away if they choose. ~ John Eldredge

If perception is limited by experience and knowledge, what deems my actions "correct" or my thoughts as moral? ~ Kierra C.T. Banks

India, she now knew, would not be content staying in the background, was nobody's wallpaper, insisted in interjecting itself into everyone's life, meddling with it, twisting it, molding it beyond recognition. India, she had found out, was a place of political intrigue and economic corruption, a place occupied by real people with their incessantly human needs, desires, ambitions, and aspirations, and not the exotic, spiritual, mysterious entity that was a creation of the Western imagination. ~ Thrity Umrigar

Anything is possible on a train: a great meal, a binge, a visit from card players, an intrigue, a good night's sleep, and strangers' monologues framed like Russian short stories. ~ Paul Theroux

Some people hide more than others, and it does intrigue me. ~ Tori Amos

Write what you care about, what interests and intrigues you. ~ Hallie Ephron

I don't know much about international policing and I would love to learn more. Especially in this day and age when the Internet is rapidly reducing borders and crime can happen on a larger scale than ever before. These things intrigue me. ~ Lisa Gardner

I care. I care about it all. It takes too much energy NOT to care ... the WHY of why we are here is an intrigue for adolescents; the HOW is what must command the living. Which is why I have lately become an insurgent again. ~ Lorraine Hansberry

Jungle sex," I panted.
"Let's go swimming," Shade said at the same time.
We stared at each other. He grinned like a loon. I blinked and then grinned also.
"I like the way you thing, starshine. ~ Amanda Bouchet

After all these years, he couldn't believe he'd recognized her so instantly. He prayed that she wouldn't recognize him, but as her eyes widened, he knew she had.
"Marcos?" she breathed.
And his worst nightmare came true. His cover was blown. ~ Elizabeth Heiter

While 'Visitation Street' has the markings of a traditional whodunnit mystery - starting with a missing girl, intrigue and many suspicious characters - Pochoda shows her hand early on by fingering a culprit. The book turns, then, into a 'whydunnit.' ~ Claire Cameron

There's a lot of thought in art. People get to talk about important things. There's a lot of sex, you know, in art. There's a lot of naked women and men, and there's intrigue, there's fakery. It's a real microcosm of the larger world. ~ Steve Martin

Intrigue stood behind her fear nudging and butting in with questions. ~ Staci M. Gillette

Later that week, I was bicycling down a pavement in the City of London when I passed a company called DLE, which stands for Davis Langdon & Everest.
Hmm, I thought, as I skidded to a halt.
I took a deep breath and then confidently walked into their ultraclean, ultrasmart reception, and asked to be put through to the CEO's office, saying it was both urgent and confidential.
Once I had the CEO's secretary on the line, I pleaded with her to help me get just two minutes of her boss's time.
Eventually after three attempts, due to a combination of pity and intrigue, she agreed to ask the CEO to see me for "literally two minutes."
Bingo.
I was escorted into a lift and then ushered into the calm of the CEO's top-floor office. I was very nervous.
The two head guys, Paul Morrell and Alastair Collins, came in, looking suspiciously at this scruffy youngster holding a pamphlet. (They later described it as one of the worst-laid-out proposals they had ever seen.)
But they both had the grace to listen.
By some miracle, they caught the dream and my enthusiasm, and for the sake of £10,000 (which to me was the world, but to them was a marketing punt), they agreed to back my attempt to put the DLE flag on top of the world.
I promised an awesome photograph for their boardroom.
We stood up, shook hands, and we have remained great friends ever since.
I love deals like that. ~ Bear Grylls

I feel like my imagination was crafted by Tolkien. He seemed to tap into that childhood intrigue of secret doors and hidden worlds. ~ Richard C. Armitage

I'm loving doing Outlander. We've got a great cast and we're up in the Scottish Highlands. [ ... ] It's big budget, they're spending a lot of money on it. They're going for a very gritty and realistic portrayal of the Highlands and I play Dougal MacKenzie, the War Chieftain of Clan MacKenzie. As that implies, he's quite the serious character. There's lots of political intrigue, there's romance, there's adventure and action and there's time-travel. ~ Graham McTavish

It is not easy to find something that will intrigue and bind your interest and enthusiasm. This you must seek for yourself. ~ Walter Annenberg

They were a fanatically independent people, much addicted to intrigue, treachery and murder, and that among their other national traits was an intolerance of rulers (or, if it came to that, of any form of authority whatsoever, other than their own desires). ~ M.M. Kaye

What's life without a little intrigue, ~ Anonymous

Moscow had this incredible, intense atmosphere of intrigue and darkness and secrecy. ~ Alan Furst

You walked in, and the air changed. It gives you an advantage and you're enough of a challenge.

I'm not trying to be a challenge.

It's one of the things that makes you one. ~ Nora Roberts

Every king sleeps, but not every king wakes up as king! The snakes of the intrigue crawl around during the night! The cleverest king is the least sleeping king! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

A good title should be like a good metaphor. It should intrigue without being too baffling or too obvious. ~ Walker Percy

Most people like to read about intrigue and spies. I hope to provide a metaphor for the average reader's daily life. Most of us live in a slightly conspiratorial relationship with our employer and perhaps with our marriage. ~ John Le Carre

My fave routine is The Roller Coaster. First of all it's a great way to get into a card trick, without stating it's a card trick. The routine is so brilliantly structured as to at first, intrigue, psychologically unsettle and then blow away your audience. An extra bonus is that it will hopefully create a welcome respite from bloody invisible deck routines. Worth the price of the book. ~ Steve Valentine

She was a stirrer of the pot, a lover of intrigue and distress, a creature who seemed to draw oxygen from the spectacle of people at each other's throat, everybody in a state of upset and talking about her. ~ David Gilmour

My ultimate game - or at least one I would really like to see - would be something where it was like the beginning of George R. R. Martin's 'Game of Thrones', where you're Ned Stark, and you know that one of your friends has been murdered, and you go to the capital city and you have to navigate this web of court intrigue. ~ Austin Grossman

Oooh, intrigue?' Sylvie said playfully. 'Want to know a secret? I am someone else. Nobody knows the real me.'
Jess opened the door, sick of being toyed with, wanting to get away. Her voice was flat. 'You're a girl. It's the same for all of us. ~ Kirsty Eagar

Emancipation is the demand of civilization. That is a principle; everything else is an intrigue. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

A clue is a key which unlocks a box full of keys - those peculiarly tempting arrangements of circumstance and fate are points of departure which lead to infinite realms of mystery that beckon with the taboo of hidden knowledge. I am compelled to follow where the curling finger of intrigue flits seductively among shadows whose origins lie in primeval antiquity. The Forbidden Occult is forever enshrined in the luminous cathedral of my imagination. Every philosopher's stone I look under carries my mind aloft on the fairy wings of discovery to ever higher treasures of exponentially expanding conscious awareness. ~ Sean Terrence Best

What! Have you no monks to teach, to dispute, to govern, to intrigue and to burn people who do not agree with them? ~ Voltaire

For a novelist, the gaps in a story are as intriguing as material that still exists. ~ Sara Sheridan

But this month is all about CITY OF JASMINE which I hope you already have in your hot little hands. My favorite review snippet? KIRKUS REVIEWS said it's "part screwball comedy".
I can't tell you how much time I spent with Carole Lombard and William Powell and Irene Dunne when I was writing it. I adore the 30s comedies for their light-hearted take on relationships and adventure - and the glamorous settings and occasional dash of intrigue only heighten the magic. (Did you know that Nicholas Brisbane from my Lady Julia series was named for THE THIN MAN's Nick Charles? And apologies to Dashiell Hammett, but I fell in love with the film long before I read the book and appreciated how much it had been lightened in the adaptation!) So when you're reading CITY OF JASMINE, give some thought to who you'd like to see playing Evie and Gabriel - I'd love to hear who you'd cast in your own production. ~ Deanna Raybourn

Mikhail had come striding towards us with guardian efficiency, ready to find out what task I had in mind. He came to a screeching halt when he saw Sonya get out of the car. So did she. They both stood frozen, eyes wider that seemed physically possible. I knew then that the rest of us had ceased to exist, as had all our intrigue, missions, and ... well, the world. In that moment, only the two of them existed.
Sonya gave a strangled cry and then ran forward. This jolted him awake, in time to wrap her in his arms as she threw herself against him. She started crying, and I could see tears on his face too. He brushed her back and cupped her cheeks, staring down at her and repeating over and over, "It's you ... it's you ... it's you ... "
Sonya tried to wipe her eyes, but it didn't do much good. "Mikhail -I'm sorry-I'm sorry-"
"It doesn't matter." he kissed her and pulled back only enough to look into her eyes. "It doesn't matter. Nothing matters except that we're together again. ~ Richelle Mead

She died a few days later, and her death buried once and for all the intrigues between the Precious Wife, the Gracious Wife, and all the Imperial favorites. Rivalries and alliances, loathing and attraction had been dissolved. Their existence had been a pointless tragedy, just as the talent of one prodigious poetess had been. ~ Shan Sa

Three centuries had flowed past the old Manor House, centuries of births and of homecomings, of country dances and of the meetings of fox hunters. Strange that now in its old age this dark business should have cast its shadow upon the venerable walls! And yet those strange, peaked roofs and quaint, overhung gables were a fitting covering to grim and terrible intrigue. As I looked at the deep-set windows and the long sweep of the dull-coloured, water-lapped front, I felt that no more fitting scene could be set for such a tragedy. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

Most governments do have inbuilt biases in favour of the rich and powerful, and most do contain plenty of manipulators who love intrigue, who have lost whatever moral compass they may once have had and who protect themselves with steely cynicism. ~ Geoff Mulgan

Well, I think that the image is a part of me. I wear the baggy pants, the hats, the whole nine. And you know, I may add a little for the excitement and the intrigue in the videos, but my family has told me that little air of mystery that surrounds me is for real. ~ Aaliyah

Suffer barbaric childhood to give and receive remorselessly; civilized age learns to protect what it has, to neither give nor accept freely, to trust it's own mistrust above faith, and intriguing others above the innocent. Intrigue, after all, is rational, something the mind can sink it's teeth into, and defeat it with the good digestion of reason, a hopeless prospect for the toothless heart, and God only knows what innocence will do next. ~ William Gaddis

You're at this place filled with a bunch of people who want to better their lives, but they need the help of others if they want even the smallest chance to succeed. At this place they tell you their stories, and then they tell you their dreams. You are sitting there, a tourist among people who you do not belong around, but these people, they intrigue you. They show you what it means to rise when you are down. They show you that even the bloodiest battles with your mind can in fact be won. ~ M.B. Julien

There are women who never had an intrigue; but there are scarce any who never had but one. ~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld

We are designed to dance. To use our bodies as weapons of grace, beauty and intrigue. We are designed to stretch until we master growth. To replace old dead cells and be physically renewed each moment. So challenges don't destroy us, they just should make us dance more swiftly and passionately. For when we dance we please God. Especially when we dance in brokenness. ~ Phindiwe Nkosi

He leaned a fraction closer. "My lovers have always been warrior women. Strength intrigues me."
She refused to let him play with her like this, even if her body disagreed. Vehemently. "Do knives intrigue you, too? Because touch me and I will cut you up. I don't care if you throw me off the nearest balcony. ~ Nalini Singh

This variety of objects will suspend, for some time, the course of the narrative; but the interruption will be censured only by those readers who are insensible to the importance of laws and manners, while they peruse, with eager curiosity, the transient intrigues of a court, or the accidental event of a battle. ~ Edward Gibbon

Of such things dreams are made of, he thought. But then again what are dreams but wishes come true. -Grace Willows ~ Grace Willows

To treat things with respect and intrigue, we don't need to understand their motivations and inner lives - whatever knowing the inner life of a tangelo or a floor tile would mean.4 We just need to pay enough attention to discover what they do and how they work - to discover what they obviously and truly are - and then to make use of them in gratifyingly novel ways. And ~ Ian Bogost

We don't always like what's good for us," she said. "Especially at first. ~ Erin Beaty

In my headphones, I led a life of romance and incident and intrigue, none of which had anything to do with the world outside my Walkman. ~ Rob Sheffield

I have always thought, for my part, that bad institutions made bad magistrates; just as the cowardice and hypocrisy of certain bodies results solely from the spirit which governs them. Why, for instance, in spite of the virtues and talents for which they are so noted, are the academies generally centres of intellectual repression, stupidity, and base intrigue? That question ought to be proposed by an academy: there would be no lack of competitors. ~ Louis Auguste Blanqui

Well. I think it's safe to say that, in my absence, the power grabbing and backstabbing and political intrigue has officially reached an all-time Otherworld high.
~ Lesley Livingston

My Aunt Marion used to always tell me 'a touch of sun adds an air of intrigue ... ' ~ Tim Quinn

When I close my eyes I see your face, only your face. Fire rains around us, lightning strikes, and the blood of those we love threatens to be spilled at every turn and yet all I can see is you. You are the touch I crave, the scent I want to drown in, and the air that gives me life. There is nothing that can captivate me as you do. No matter the beauty, the violence, or the intrigue, you are the only thing that holds my every thought, my utter devotion, and because of that, you will also hold my life in the palm of your hands." ~Decebel ~ Quinn Loftis

It's a good sign but rare instance when, in a relationship, you find that the more you learn about the other person, the more you continue to desire them. A sturdy bond delights in that degree of youthful intrigue. Love loves its youth. ~ Criss Jami

The little red figure on my right shoulder asked me what I was doing. The little white figure on my left asked me the same. Both were, for this unique and solitary moment, in unison. ~ Flint Ory

Juliet is one of those rare novels that has it all: lush prose, tightly intertwined parallel narratives, intrigue, and historical detail all set against a backdrop of looming danger. Anne Fortier casts a new light on one of history's greatest stories of passion. I was swept away. ~ Sara Gruen

This is so hot! Nice storyline, just enough intrigue to allow you to breathe. - Fredriika ~ Scarlett Avery

Venice, that capital city of dream and intrigue, that double city (one above and seemingly solid, one below, wavering and reflected in the waters), which never disappoints ... ~ Erica Jong

Out in the field, any connection with home just makes you weaker. It reminds you that you were once civilized, soft; and that can get you killed faster than a bullet through the head. ~ Henry Mosquera

You have done an unwise thing, Martise of Asher," he said softly. "You've caught my interest. ~ Grace Draven

We cannot enter the monstrous schizophrenic morass of Nazi internecine intrigue; our minds cannot adapt. ~ Philip K. Dick

Religious or biblical can sometimes be a little soft, but 'A.D.' doesn't shy away from the violence of the time, the political intrigue. The story is really about the resurrection of faith, which is how the disciples went about keeping the word of Christ. So, they found all kinds of trouble and problems and torture and persecution. ~ Juan Pablo Di Pace

The "dangerous class," the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of old society, may, here and there, be swept into the movement by a proletarian revolution; its conditions of life, however, prepare it far more for the part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue. ~ Friedrich Engels

I try to explain that to my kids - the experience of going to a record store, flipping through racks and finding that album cover that intrigues you - but my kids don't want to know about it. They download the one song on the album they like, and pay their 99 cents. ~ Jon Bon Jovi

Kitchens and women were both subjects that simply did not intrigue him. ~ Laini Taylor

Just as some books are so beautiful and intriguing that you never want to put them down, forever eager of what lies beyond the scope of a single page, so you never cease to intrigue me, leaving me in constant yearning of all that resides within you. ~ Katie Douglas