Knights Of The Round Table Quotes

The fairy or fantastic world replaces the classical Hades (or Hell) in Sir Orfeo, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight takes this fantasy element to new heights. Sir Gawain is one of the Knights of the Round Table, the followers of King Arthur, who is so much of a presence in English history, myth and literature. ~ Ronald Carter

I want to sit around a Gypsy campfire, eating freshly caught rabbit in the company of bare knuckle fighters, and listen to stories about their fights. I want to sit with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table after they've defeated the barbarians in battle. I want to be there when Arthur pulls Excalibur from the stone, and I want to be surrounded by dragons, wizards and sorcerers. I want to meet the Muslim leader, Saladin, who occupied Jerusalem in 1187, and despite the fact that a number of holy Muslim places had been violated by Christians, preferred to take Jerusalem without bloodshed. He prohibited acts of vengeance, and his army was so disciplined that there were no deaths or violence after the city surrendered. I want to sit around the desert campfire with him.
I want to drink with Caribbean buccaneers of the 17th century and listen to their tales of preying on shipping and Spanish settlements. I want to witness Celtic Berserkers fighting in ritual warfare in a trance-like fury. I want to spend time working on a scrap cruise, the very last cruise before the ship's due to be scrapped, so there's no future in it, and it attracts all the mad faces of the Merchant Navy. Faces that are known in that industry, who couldn't survive outside 'the life' and who for the most part are quite dangerous and mad themselves. I'd rather have one friend who'll fight like hell over ten who'll do nothing but talk shit. And I want to ride with highwaymen on ribbons of moonlight ~ Karl Wiggins

His very first story, he told me as he was dying, was set in Camelot, the court of King Arthur in Britain: Merlin the Court Magician casts a spell that allows him to equip the Knights of the Round Table with Thompson submachine guns and drums of .45-caliber dumdums.
Sir Galahad, the purest in heart and mind, familiarizes himself with this new virtue-compelling appliance. While doing so, he puts a slug through the Holy Grail and makes a Swiss cheese of Queen Guinevere. ~ Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

The knight knew he was of good breeding and noble blood, that his reputation was sterling. He had no dalliances. He was a highly decorated Knight of the Round Table. ~ Julia Mills

May it not also be that the cause of civilization itself will be defended by the skill and devotion of a few thousand airmen? There never has been, I suppose, in all the world, in all the history of war, such an opportunity for youth. The Knights of the Round Table, the Crusaders, all fall back into the past. ~ Winston Churchill

What I call Professionalism someone else might call the Artist's Code or the Warrior's Way. It's an attitude of egolessness and service. The Knights of the Round Table were chaste and self-effacing. Yet they dueled dragons. ~ Steven Pressfield

Gawain laid his hand on his son's shoulder. "Sir Perceval, when the priest reads the lesson, he says that he who would save his life must lose it. Good words for any man, for there are moments when cowardice will bring death more surely than boldness. But the ordinary man knows, when he goes out to meet the wolf in his road, that he may yet come home in peace. Not so the knights of the Round Table. We win through one deadly peril only to face another. If we banish one evil, we must go on to the next and after that, to the next - until death meets us in the path. We yield up our bodies every day, not for glory and fortune but so that those weaker than ourselves may live. Do you understand?"
"I do," said Sir Perceval. "And I say that there is no nobler calling. I am content." But then he thought of the Lady Blanchefleur kissing his brow on a night of fire and blood, and with a sudden ache of grief told himself that even a hundred years of peace would not be enough time to spend with her. ~ Suzannah Rowntree

Slay like the knights of the Round Table ~ Me

We walk inside, and I stop short. Our booth, the one we always sit in, has pale pink balloons tied around it. There's a round cake in the center of the table, tons of candles, pink frosting with sprinkles and Happy Birthday, Lara Jean scrawled in white frosting. Suddenly I see people's heads pop up from under the booths and from behind menus--all of our friends, still in their prom finery: Lucas, Gabe, Gabe's date Keisha, Darrell, Pammy, Chris. "Surprise!" everyone screams.
I spin around. "Oh my God, Peter!"
He's still grinning. He looks at his watch. "It's midnight. Happy birthday, Lara Jean."
I leap up and hug him. "This is just exactly what I wanted to do on my prom night birthday and I didn't even know it." Then I let go of him and run over to the booth.
Everyone gets out and hugs me. "I didn't even know people knew it was my birthday tomorrow! I mean today!" I say.
"Of course we knew it was your birthday," Lucas says.
Darrell says, "My boy's been planning this for weeks."
"It was so endearing," Pammy says. "We called me to ask what kind of pan he should use for the cake."
Chris says, "He called me, too. I was like, how the hell should I know?"
"And you!" I hit Chris on the arm. "I thought you were leaving to go clubbing!"
"I still might after I steal some fries. My night's just getting started, babe." She pulls me in for a hug and gives me a kiss on the cheek. "Happy birthday, girl."
I turn to Peter and say, "I can't ~ Jenny Han

It was a meal that we shall never forget; more accurately, it was several meals that we shall never forget, because it went beyond the gastronomic frontiers of anything we had ever experienced, both in quantity and length. It started with homemade pizza - not one, but three: anchovy, mushroom, and cheese, and it was obligatory to have a slice of each. Plates were then wiped with pieces torn from the two-foot loaves in the middle of the table, and the next course came out. There were pates of rabbit, boar, and thrush. There was a chunky, pork-based terrine laced with marc. There were saucissons spotted with peppercorns. There were tiny sweet onions marinated in a fresh tomato sauce. Plates were wiped once more and duck was brought in... We had entire breasts, entire legs, covered in a dark, savory gravy and surrounded by wild mushrooms.

We sat back, thankful that we had been able to finish, and watched with something close to panic as plates were wiped yet again and a huge, steaming casserole was placed on the table. This was the specialty of Madame our hostess - a rabbit civet of the richest, deepest brown - and our feeble requests for small portions were smilingly ignored. We ate it. We ate the green salad with knuckles of bread fried in garlic and olive oil, we ate the plump round crottins of goat's cheese, we ate the almond and cream gateau that the daughter of the house had prepared. That night, we ate for England. ~ Peter Mayle

When I was growing up I had three wishes. I wanted to be a Lindbergh-type hero, learn Chinese, and become a member of The Algonquin Round Table. ~ John F. Kennedy

The King and Queen of Hearts were seated on their throne when they arrived, with a great crowd assembled about them
all sorts of little birds and beasts, as well as the whole pack of cards: the Knave was standing before them, in chains, with a soldier on each side to guard him; and near the King was the White Rabbit, with a trumpet in one hand, and a scroll of parchment in the other. In the very middle of the court was a table, with a large dish of tarts upon it: they looked so good, that it made Alice quite hungry to look at them
'I wish they'd get the trial done,' she thought, 'and hand round the refreshments!' But there seemed to be no chance of this, so she began looking at everything about her, to pass away the time. ~ Lewis Carroll

LONDON. TRINITY TERM one week old. Implacable June weather. Fiona Maye, a High Court judge, at home on Sunday evening, supine on a chaise longue, staring past her stockinged feet toward the end of the room, toward a partial view of recessed bookshelves by the fireplace and, to one side, by a tall window, a tiny Renoir lithograph of a bather, bought by her thirty years ago for fifty pounds. Probably a fake. Below it, centered on a round walnut table, a blue vase. No memory of how she came by it. Nor when she last put flowers in it. The fireplace not lit in a year. Blackened raindrops falling irregularly into the grate with a ticking sound against balled-up yellowing newsprint. A Bokhara rug spread on wide polished floorboards. Looming at the edge of vision, a baby grand piano bearing silver-framed family photos on its deep black shine. On the floor by the chaise longue, within her reach, the draft of a judgment. ~ Ian McEwan

Ah ... Dectective, this is a very private and personal moment for them both. I'm sure you can understand their need for-"
A man stumbled out clutching a sheet round his waist and Valkyrie's eyes widened. "Whoa," she said as he hummed into a table. He was tall and sandy-haired and his physique was jaw-dropping lay amazing. "No way," she said. "Scapegrace?"
The man looked at her, and shook his head. The a woman came charging out of the back room, slammed into the man and they both went rolling across the floor.
"Give it to me!" The woman screamed. "Give it to me!"
Nye scuttled over. "Mr Scapegrace, you know the procedure cannot be repeated, your brains are in far too deteriorated a condition."
"You! Gave! Me! The! Wrong! Body! ~ Derek Landy

He got up. It was too early to go to bed; at least, he was not in the mood for it. He pined for a bit of amusement - something cheap and easy. A seat in the pictures, cigarettes, beer. Useless! No money to pay for any of them. He would read KING LEAR and forget this filthy century. Finally, however, it was THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES that he took from the mantelpiece. SHERLOCK HOLMES was his favorite of all books, because he knew it by heart. The oil in the lamp was giving out and it was getting beastly cold. Gordon dragged the quilt from his bed, wrapped it round his legs and sat down to read. His right elbow on the table, his hands under his coat to keep them warm, he read through "The Adventure of the Speckled Band." The little gas-mantle sighed above, the circular flame of the oil-lamp burned low, a thin bracket of fire, giving out no more heat than a candle. ~ George Orwell

The ballroom was empty of people but filled with round tables and chairs. It was set for a wedding party. White tablecloths with huge pink bows and pink and white artificial flower centerpieces, a two-foot riser with a long decorated table for the bridal party, a smaller round table next to the riser. The smaller table supported a massive wedding cake that was being cooled by a standing fan. "This is so romantic," I said to Ranger. "Does it give you ideas?" He wrapped an arm around me, dragged me close against him, and kissed me on the forehead. "Yes, it gives me ideas, but not about marriage. Mostly about setting fire to this atrocity. ~ Janet Evanovich

I am sorry for him; I couldn't be
angry with him if I tried. Who suffers by his ill whims? Himself always.
Here he takes it into his head to dislike us, and he won't come and dine
with us. What's the consequence? He don't lose much of a dinner."
"Indeed, I think he loses a very good dinner," interrupted Scrooge's
niece. Everybody else said the same, and they must be allowed to have
been competent judges, because they had just had dinner; and, with the
dessert upon the table, were clustered round the fire, by lamp-light. ~ Charles Dickens

She unwrapped the lamb chops from their white butcher paper and peeled a few potatoes and opened a can of peas. Her father came in with the newspaper under his arm and then swatted her on the hip with it as he went to the table to sit down. And then Jimmy came in still wearing his overcoat to say, "What's this? What's this?" And then told their father with his hands on his hips that George was taking "our miss here" out to dinner. And her father lowered the paper and smiled at her - his round, florid face and his sparse white hair which he no longer bothered to slick down with water or tonic, being mostly housebound and hardly out of his slippers all week long - and only began to pout a little, Jimmy too, when she set the plate of lamb chops and the mint jelly and the mashed potatoes and peas in their bowls on the table and then pulled off her apron and said, "I'm just going to take a shower." "Be sure to put it back," Jimmy said ~ Alice McDermott

Beyond those to another hall, with four doors--not woven doors, but real colorwood ones--redwood, bluewood, goldwood, greenwood--beautifully carved and obviously ancient.
The servants opened one and bowed me into a round-walled room that meant we were in a tower; windows on three sides looked out over the valley. The room was flooded with light, so much that I was dazzled for a moment and had to blink. Shading my eyes, I had a swift impression of a finely carved and gilded redwood table surrounded by blue satin cushions. Then I saw that the room was occupied.
Standing between two of the windows, almost hidden by slanting rays of sun, was a tall figure with pale blond hair.
The Marquis was looking down at the valley, hands clasped behind him. At the sound of the door closing behind me he looked up and came forward, and for a moment was a silhouette in the strong sunlight.
I stood with my back to the door. We were alone.
"Welcome to Renselaeus, Lady Meliara." And when I did not answer, he pointed to a side table. "Would you like anything to drink? To eat?"
"Why am I here?" I asked in a surly voice, suddenly and acutely aware of how ridiculous I must look dressed in his livery. "You may as well get the threats out at once. All this politeness seems about as false as…" As a courtier's word, I thought, but speech wouldn't come and I just shook my head.
He returned no immediate answer; instead seemed absorbed in pouring wine from a fine silver dec ~ Sherwood Smith

She was wearing a simple silver sheath cut within an inch of indecency, curving round her slender shoulders and then falling away to expose the smooth white skin of her back and just a hint of the soft round curve of her breasts. She had on no jewellery, only a pale wash of lipstick, and again the black halo of hair was arranged so that it looked almost wind tossed. Yet her dark tresses shone, framing her face with a soft, unearthly light. Next to the other women at the table, with their diamonds, heavy strands of pearls, and meticulously groomed faces and hair, she seemed feral and bewitching. The impact of her beauty lay in her confidence and her utter lack of self-awareness. In contrast, others appeared to be trying too hard, careful and staid. ~ Kathleen Tessaro

At dusk in the Temple Gardens the barrier between past and present turned fluid and ghosts walked. Here and there if Buckler looked closely he caught a glimpse of knights filing toward the ancient round Church, heads bowed in penitence…Buckler didn't mind the spirits. In fact, he preferred their company to that of the general run of human. For the ghosts reminded him that man's petty cares, so all consuming in life, would one day become nothing more than fit matter for an amusing story. ~ S.K. Rizzolo

...but that very thought, that she might become his wife, had for some reason entered his head the very first time she sat in his study at a little round table, diligently taking down in shorthand the words he dictated in his muffled voice - and he had been purposely dry and sharp with her that day, so she would not feel the power she had already gained over him, but when, as he dictated to her, he imagined himself kneeling before her beneath the flickering light of a nearly spent candle and kissing her feet, with her unable to leave because she was his wife, and about to blow out the candle so they could plunge into the passionate, exquisite swim, then his voice became hoarse and he shut his eyes to blot out the sight of this little girl, as he purposely tried to picture her to help restrain his imagination, girl students being as untouchable as postulants... ~ Leonid Tsypkin

I am extremely pleased and proud of the achievements of Round Table India. I truly believe in their cause of educating underprivileged children and giving them a new and assured future. I would like to reiterate my support to RTI in providing education to children and would like to support all their endeavors going forward. I will also try and involve my friends and family from the industry to help in this great cause wherever possible. ~ Gauri Khan

ABSTRACT THOUGHTS in a blue room; Nominative, genitive, etative, accusative one, accusative two, ablative, partitive, illative, instructive, abessive, adessive, inessive, essive, allative, translative, comitative. Sixteen cases of the Finnish noun. Odd, some languages get by with only singular and plural. The American Indian languages even failed to distinguish number. Except Sioux, in which there was a plural only for animate objects. The blue room was round and warm and smooth. No way to say warm in French. There was only hot and tepid If there's no word for it, how do you think about it? And, if there isn't the proper form, you don't have the how even if you have the words. Imagine, in Spanish having to assign a sex to every object: dog, table, tree, can-opener. Imagine, in Hungarian, not being able to assign a sex to anything: he, she, it all the same word. Thou art my friend, but you are my king; thus the distinctions of Elizabeth the First's English. But with some oriental languages, which all but dispense with gender and number, you are my friend, you are my parent, and YOU are my priest, and YOU are my king, and YOU are my servant, and YOU are my servant whom I'm going to fire tomorrow if YOU don't watch it, and YOU are my king whose policies I totally disagree with and have sawdust in YOUR head instead of brains, YOUR highness, and YOU may be my friend, but I'm still gonna smack YOU up side the head if YOU ever say that to me again;
And who the hell are you anyw ~ Samuel R. Delany

Kitty got up to fetch a table, and, as she passed, her eyes met Levin's. She felt for him with her whole heart, the more because she was pitying him for a suffering of which she was herself the cause. "If you can forgive me, forgive me," said her eyes, "I am so happy."
"I hate them all, and you, and myself," his eyes responded, and he took up his hat. But he was not destined to escape. Just as they were arranging themselves round the table, and Levin was on the point of retiring, the old Prince came in, and, after greeting the ladies, addressed Levin. ~ Leo Tolstoy

Lindsay [Doran] goes round the table and introduces everyone
making it clear that I am present in the capacity of writer rather than actress, therefore no one has to be too nice to me. ~ Emma Thompson

So we may well believe that the King's men were shriven on the night before they fought. Something of the young man's vision had penetrated to his captains and his soldiers. Something of the new ideal of the Round Table which was to be born in pain, something about doing a hateful and dangerous action for the sake of decency
for they knew that the fight was to be fought in blood and death without reward. They would get nothing but the unmarketable conscience of having done what they ought to do in spite of fear
something which wicked people have often debased by calling it glory with too much sentiment, but which is glory all the same. This idea was in the hearts of the young men who knelt before the God-distributing bishops
knowing that the odds were three to one, and that their own warm bodies might be cold at sunset. ~ T.H. White

Drink deep the cup of life; take it's dark wine into your soul. For it passes round the table only once. ~ Jack McDevitt

This is the oath of a Knight of King Arther's Round Table and should be for all of us to take to heart. I will develop my life for the greater good. I will place character above riches, and concern for others above personal wealth, I will never boast, but cherish humility instead, I will speak the truth at all times, and forever keep my word, I will defend those who cannot defend themselves, I will honor and respect women, and refute sexism in all its guises, I will uphold justice by being fair to all, I will be faithful in love and loyal in friendship, I will abhor scandals and gossip-neither partake nor delight in them, I will be generous to the poor and to those who need help, I will forgive when asked, that my own mistakes will be forgiven, I will live my life with courtesy and honor from this day forward. ~ King Arthur

Next came the drawing room and Abigail stared in surprise. It appeared as though the occupants had just been called away. A tea set sat on the round table, cups encrusted with dry tea. A book lay open over the arm of the sofa. A needlework project, nearly finished, lay trapped under an overturned chair. What had happened here? Why had the family left so abruptly, and why had the rooms been entombed for almost two decades? ~ Julie Klassen

My particular memory is of a quail-pie. Quails may be alright for Moses in the desert, but, if they are served in the form of pie at dinner, they should be distributed at a side-table, not handed round from guest to guest. The countess having shuddered at it and resumed her biscuit, it was left to me to make the opening excavation. The difficulty was to know where each quail began and ended: the job really wanted a professional quail-finder, who might have indicated the on the surface of the crust at which it would be most hopeful to dig for quails. ~ A.A. Milne

There does exist and has existed for a generation, an international Anglophile network which operates, to some extent, in the way the radical Right believes the Communists act. In fact, this network, which we may identify as the Round Table groups, has no aversion to cooperating with the Communists, or any other groups, and frequently does so. I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for 20 years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960s, to examine its papers and secret record. ~ Carroll Quigley

Tortolita, let me tell you a story," Estevan said. "This is a South American, wild Indian story about heaven and hell." Mrs. Parsons made a prudish face, and Estevan went on. "If you go visit hell, you will see a room like this kitchen. There is a pot of delicious stew on the table, with the most delicate aroma you can imagine. All around, people sit, like us. Only they are dying of starvation. They are jibbering and jabbering," he looked extra hard at Mrs. Parsons, "but they cannot get a bit of this wonderful stew God has made for them. Now, why is that?"

"Because they're choking? For all eternity?" Lou Ann asked. Hell, for Lou Ann, would naturally be a place filled with sharp objects and small round foods.

"No," he said. "Good guess, but no. They are starving because they only have spoons with very long handles. As long as that." He pointed to the mop, which I had forgotten to put away. "With these ridiculous, terrible spoons, the people in hell can reach into the pot but they cannot put the food in their mouths. Oh, how hungry they are! Oh, how they swear and curse each other!" he said, looking again at Virgie. He was enjoying this.

"Now," he went on, "you can go and visit heaven. What? You see a room just like the first one, the same table, the same pot of stew, the same spoons as long as a sponge mop. But these people are all happy and fat."

"Real fat, or do you mean just well-fed?" Lou Ann asked.

"Just well-fed," he ~ Barbara Kingsolver

LE CHIFFRE looked incuriously at him, the whites of his eyes, which showed all round the irises, lending something impassive and doll-like to his gaze. He slowly removed one thick hand from the table and slipped it into the pocket of his dinner-jacket. The hand came out holding a small metal cylinder with a cap which Le Chiffre unscrewed. He inserted the nozzle of the cylinder, with an obscene deliberation, twice into each black nostril in turn, and luxuriously inhaled the benzedrine vapour. ~ Ian Fleming

No person can escape the germs of their eventual deterioration and destruction. A round-table of physical breakdown and death awaits the rich person and the poor person, as well as the common people and world leaders. The skulls of noble men and savages alike litter the streets of ancient cities. Modern humans live longer than the ancient people did, but eventually we all succumb to the same wretched infirmities. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

If there's a feeling to home, it's this. A place where there are no secrets, where nothing stays buried; not the past and not yourself. Where you can be all the versions of you, see it all reflected back at you as you walk the same stairs, the same halls, the same rooms. Feel the ghost of your mother as you sit at the kitchen table, hear the words of your father circling round and round after dinner, and your brother stopping by, wishing you'd be a little better, a little stronger ... It's four walls echoing back everything you've ever been and everything you've ever done, and it's the people who stay despite it all. Through it all. For it all. ~ Megan Miranda

Can you imagine how boring life would be without the seven little spices? you talk about sloth, but why would men and women get out of bed if there were no lust? Why would people want to be in a band if they couldn't feel the rush that rage bring to the musical table? Why would anyone want to be a bleeding heart without even a hint of greed in their dirty little soul? Why would the world go round if there weren't a few rules to break? A few revolutions to make? Let's put it this way: Why would you want to take a deep breath if you were expected to hold the damn thing? ~ Corey Taylor

I knew now what my earlier passion for Harry had hidden from me. That although I had bedded him as a free woman I was as bound as if I were the slave. For it was not a free choice. I had wanted him because he was the Squire, not for himself ... And it was no free choice, because I could not choose to say "No." My safety and security on the land meant I had to keep my special, costly hold on its owner. I paid him rent as surely as the tenants who came to my round rent table with their coins tied up in a scrap of cloth. When I lay on my back, or strode round the room threatening him with every imaginable, ridiculous torment, I was paying my dues. And the knowledge galled me. ~ Philippa Gregory

Imagine a morning in late November. A coming of winter morning more than twenty years ago. Consider the kitchen of a spreading old house in a country town. A great black stove is its main feature; but there is also a big round table and a fireplace with two rocking chairs placed in front of it. Just today the fireplace commenced its seasonal roar. A woman with shorn white hair is standing at the kitchen window. She is wearing tennis shoes and a shapeless gray sweater over a summery calico dress. She is small and sprightly, like a bantam hen; but, due to a long youthful illness, her shoulders are pitifully hunched. Her face is remarkable - not unlike Lincoln's, craggy like that, and tinted by sun and wind; but it is delicate, too, finely boned, and her eyes are sherry-colored and timid. "Oh my," she exclaims, her breath smoking the windowpane, "it's fruitcake weather! ~ Truman Capote

about four inches down, he suddenly came into a small chamber in the cool-damp sand and there lay eggs, many eggs, almost perfectly round eggs the size of table tennis balls, and he laughed then because he knew. It had been a turtle. ~ Gary Paulsen

Whatcha gonna do to this?
You may be older than me, but you're new to this.
Cause I been out there, queen of MC's,
When your man was walkin' round in mocknecks and Lee's.
While you were over here perpetratin' a fraud,
I was overseas on the charts with Boy George.
You're the beginner, Shante's the winner,
Havin' other competition for dinner.
Sit you on the table with a plate and cup,
Say grace ... and then eat your ass up. ~ Roxanne Shante

Most of the low latticed windows were innocent of blinds, and to the lookers-in from outside, the inmates, gathered round the tea-table, absorbed in handiwork, or talking with laughter or gesture, had each that happy grace which is the last thing the skilled actor shall capture – the natural grace which goes with perfect unconsciousness of observation. Moving at will from one theater to another, the two spectators, so far from home themselves, had something of wistfulness in their eyes... ~ Kenneth Grahame

Well you know, Woody doesn't rehearse, as opposed to my own method of directing where I really work with actors around a round table for weeks, examining the values of the material, so his technique is very different. ~ Mark Rydell

Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing on it except a tiny golden key, and Alice's first thought was that it might belong to one of the doors of the hall; but, alas! either the locks were too large, or the key was too small, but at any rate it would not open any of them. However, on the second time round, she came upon a low curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted! Alice opened the door and found that it led into a small passage, not much larger than a rat-hole: she knelt down and looked along the passage into ~ Lewis Carroll