What is your favorite line in fiction?

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meltzerboy said:
Another favorite of mine are the opening lines of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was the age of enlightenment, it was the age of foolishness.” A bit like our own era.
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Ah. My favorite lines come from the end, from Sydney Carton:

It is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done.

I always tear up when I read that!!
 
Viki63 said:
Yes, Peter Rabbit is like comfort food for the soul. Such a cozy world.

Here’s my other favorite:

"My brothers.
I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me. A day may come when the courage of Men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship. But it is not this day. An hour of wolves and shattered shields when the Age of Men comes crashing down.

But it is not this day! This day we fight!

By all that you hold dear on this good earth, I bid you stand, Men of the West!"

from the Return of the King.

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Gorgeous and inspiring and musical! Very cool quotes and ideas in this thread… 🙂

When I come back I’ll post a few more…
 
“In my time I have been called many things: sister, lover, priestess, wise-woman, queen. Now in truth I have come to be wise-woman, and a time may come when these things may need to be known. But in sober truth, I think it is the Christians who will tell the last tale. For ever the world of Fairy drifts further from the world in which the Christ holds sway. I have no quarrel with the Christ, only with his priests, who call the Great Goddess a demon and deny that she ever held power in this world. At best, they say that her power was of Satan. Or else they clothe her in the blue robe of the Lady of Nazareth-who indeed had power in her way, too-and say that she was ever virgin. But what can a virgin know of the sorrows and travail of mankind?”
  • Morgaine, The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
 
Interesting first line from a book I just picked up called ‘Lyrebird’ from a very popular current Irish writer named Cecelia Ahern

‘‘He moves away from the others, their constant chat blending into a tedious monotonous sound in his head.’’
 
This thread rocks! There’s an amazing variety of quotes on here. Some of them really have me scratching my head.

I’m going to think about my favorite quote, but for now…

My favorite quote as a kid was a Batman quote:

“All men have their limits. They learn what they are and learn not to exceed them. I ignore mine.”

Like most kids, I thought I was invincible, so it appealed to me.

This is another quote that stuck with me:

“Aw, you can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. Forfty percent of all people know that.”- Homer Simpson
 
“And then, Messieurs, I saw light. They were all in it.”
  • Hercule Poirot
I had the pleasure to read that book (I’m not going to say which one because I just spoiled it) when I was younger before I became jaded and too genre saavy. I remember actually gasping when I read that line.
 
M-Dent said:
Badges, we don’t need no stinkin’ badges. {Blazing Saddles}
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Objection! That line is from “Treasure of the Sierra Madre.”

If you want a Blazing Saddles quote,

“Candygram for Mr. Mongo. Candygram for Mr. Mongo.”

“As you spiritual leader, I implore you to pay heed to this Good Book and what is has to say.”
Bible gets shot
“Son, you’re on your own.”

“Isn’t anyone going to help that poor man.”

“Oh, baby. You are so talented. And they are so dumb.”
 
Tuxedo_Mark said:
Not only that, it’s a common misquote!

Check out this three-part series that an amateur filmmaker did:

Part 1: Famous Nonexistent Movie Quotes

Part 2: Famous Movie/TV Misquotes

Part 3: Famous Elusive/Unconfirmed Movie/TV Quotes
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Those are interesting. One little correction. “Hello, Clarice was said by Hopkins playing Hannibal Lector in the movie " Hannibal”.
In my opinion a far better movie though not nearly as famous. It delves into the characters more. I’ve never read the book silence if the lambs but perhaps it’s in there.
 
“My mother said I broke her heart, but it was my integrity that was important. Is that so selfish? It sells for so little, but it’s all we have left in this place. It is the very last inch of us, but within that inch we are free.” ~ V for Vendetta

“Nothing is your own except the few cubic centimeters inside your skull." ~1984

“Better never means better for everyone; it always means worse for some.” ~ The Handmaid’s Tale.
 
“I am SHOCKED to learn there is gambling going on here.” -Casablanca

[Sometimes expressed as "I am shocked, shocked I tell you … etc.]

“I hate snakes.” - [one of those Harrison Ford movies]

“I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.” [No idea where I heard or read that.] [Maybe on the TV show, MASH.]
 
“We just have this thing about death; it’s not us!”

— from SPACEBALLS
 
Here’s the best book chapter I’ve ever read.

"Vardaman

My mother is a fish."

From Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying .

Best chapter ever.
 
A favorite SCENE … the final LINE of which is a favorite of mine.

From the movie “The Man Who Would Be King”
District Commissioner: I have your records before me. There’s everything in them, from smuggling to swindling to receiving stolen goods to bare-faced blackmail.
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Peachy Carnehan: Sir, I resent the accusation of blackmail. It is blackmail to obtain money by threats of publishing information in a newspaper. But what blackmail is there in accepting a small retainer for keeping it out of a newspaper?
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District Commissioner: And how did you propose to keep it out?
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Peachy Carnehan: By telling the editor what I know about his sister, and a certain government official in these parts.
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*Daniel Dravot: *** Referring to Kipling, the journalist present]
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Let him put that in his paper, if he has need of news.
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“It’s very strange. I have been in the revenge business so long. Now that it’s over, I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life”

-Inigo Montoya in Princess Bride

“One thing is true of all governments - their most reliable records are tax records.”

-Finch, V for Vendetta

“Artists use lies to tell the truth, while politicians use them to cover the truth up.”

-Evey Hammond, V for Vendetta
 
This is probably cheating because it’s not just one line. But I love this passage so much:

Up till then he had been looking at the Lion’s great front feet and the huge claws on them; now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion’s eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory’s own that for a moment he felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was himself. “My son, my son,” said Aslan. "I know. Grief is great. Only you and I in this land know that yet. Let us be good to one another.”

From The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis
 
“I have been and always shall be your friend…live long and prosper.”

“Round up the usual suspects!”
 
Viki63 said:
Yes, Peter Rabbit is like comfort food for the soul. Such a cozy world.

Here’s my other favorite:

"My brothers.
I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me. A day may come when the courage of Men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship. But it is not this day. An hour of wolves and shattered shields when the Age of Men comes crashing down.

But it is not this day! This day we fight!

By all that you hold dear on this good earth, I bid you stand, Men of the West!"

from the Return of the King.

.
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From 'The Return of the King" the movie though. Not the book.
 
The closing line: “I am haunted by waters.” from A River Runs Through It. I don’t think of it as a favorite, but it has never left me, resurfacing at odd moments.

From verse:
“To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
poets.org/poetsorg/poem/ulysses

“Then felt I like some watcher of the skies, when a new planet swims into his ken;”
keats-shelley-house.org/en/works/works-john-keats/john-keats-chapman-s-homer

“The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out like shining from shook foil;”
bartleby.com/122/7.html
 
jeannetherese said:
“The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out like shining from shook foil;”
bartleby.com/122/7.html
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Aaargh! It’s far to lat to edit my post and I wish I could delete the above portion. I moved from prose fiction to poetry fiction and then, kept moving through favorite poetry lines forgetting the injunction that our lines must draw from fiction.

The world really is charged with the grandeur of God and I am so blessed to be able to see this.

My apologies for my earlier disoriented posting.
jt
 
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