Bernard Cornwell Quotes
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I'll happily mentor anyone who wants mentoring, and most of that goes on by internet rather than face to face.
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One book at a time... though I'm usually doing the research for others while I'm writing, but that sort of research is fairly desultory and I like to stick to the book being written - and writing a book concentrates the mind so the research is more productive.
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'Made in Sheffield, and guaranteed never to fail! Good slicer this is, real good. You can cut a man in half with one of these if you get the stroke right.'
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'Would you give my warmest regards to Sir Arthur Wellesley? Or Lord Wellington as we must now call him.' 'You know him, sir?' 'Of course. We were at the Royal Academy of Equiation together, at Angers. It's strange, Major, how your greatest soldier was taught to fight in France.'
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'If I take a man into battle, my lord, i like to offer him a better than even chance that he'll march away with his skin intact. If I wanted to kill the buggers I'd just strangle them in their sleep. It's kinder.'
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'There's a great bloody mine, sir! Just waiting to kill our lads! I ain't letting that happen. You can do what you bloody well like, but I'm going to kill some more of these bastards.'
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Sharpe, Lossow suspected, often got what he wanted, but the achievements never seemed to satisfy. His friend, the German decided, was like a man who, searching for a crock of gold, found ten and rejected them all because the pots were the wrong shape.
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'Whoa there, lad! Whoa! Gentle now! Die well, die well.'
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It seemed that if someone was lost in Copenhagen then the citizens regarded it as their duty to offer help.
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'What do you think?' 'Sir?' 'Frightening? Did you ever learn mathematics?' 'Yes, sir.' 'So add up how many Frenchmen can actually use their muskets.'
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'The Irish are very largely Romish, Sharpe. Papists! We shall have to watch our theological discourse if we're not to unsettle their tempers! You and I might know that the pope is the reincarnation of the Scarlet Whore of Babylon, but it won't help our cause if we say it out loud. Know what I mean?'
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'The Major's a grand big fellow, so he is.' 'So what are we? The damned?' 'We're that, sure enough, but we're also Riflemen, sir. You and me, we're the best God-damned Soldiers in the world.'
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For five thousand infantry would now cross the Kaitna at a place where men said the river was uncrossable, then fight an enemy horde at least ten times their number. ... The enemy had stolen a march, the redcoats had journeyed all night and were bone tired, but Wellesley would have his battle.
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A charge of knights was supposed to be thundering death on hooves, a flail of metal driven by the ponderous weight of men, horses and armor, and properly done, it was a mass maker of widows.
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Looking back, of course, it was irresponsible, mad, forlorn, idiotic, but if you don't take chances then you'll never have a winning hand, and I've no regrets.
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'The door is locked, Captain.' 'Then I'll break it down.' 'It is a shrine.' 'Then I'll say a prayer of forgiveness after I've knocked it down.'
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Here, in this filthy stench of powder smoke, he felt at home. Other men learned how to plough fields or to shape wood, but Sharpe had learned how to use a musket or rifle, sword or bayonet, and how to turn an enemy's flank or assault a fortress.
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Of course some days are easier than others, but my worst day is better than being in most humdrum occupations.
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He's actually a rather good ruler. Better, I suspect, than most of our Christian monarchs. He's certainly been good for Mysore. He's fetched it a deal of wealth, given it more justice than most countries enjoy in India and he's been tolerant to most religions, though I fear he did persecute some unfortunate Christians.
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To say anything was useless, to say nothing was cowardly. 'I think it a bad idea, Sir.'
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'The more I see of families ... the happier I am to be an orphan.'
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If he had learned one thing as a Soldier it was that any decision, even a bad one, was better than none.
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I know nothing about producing TV drama and any involvement on my part is liable to prove an obstacle to the producers, so I prefer to be a cheerleader and let them get on with it.
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'So I do my duty, and land in the shit.' 'You have at last seized the essence of soldiering.'