List of Mary Renault Quotes

By Her Shining And Her Power He Knew Her.

At The Stair-foot Hephaistion Was Waiting. He Happened To Be There, As He Happened To Have A Ball Handy If Alexander Wanted A Game, Or Water If He Was Thirsty; Not By Calculation, But In A Constant Awareness By Which No Smallest Trifle Was Missed. Now, When He Came Down The Stairs With A Shut Mouth And Blue Lines Under His Eyes, Hephaistion Received Some Mute Signal He Understood, And Fell Into Step Beside Him.

Each Man In His Life Honors, And Imitates As Well As He Can, That God To Whose Choir He Belonged, While He Is Uncorrupted In His First Incarnation Here; And In The Fashion He Has Thus Learned, He Bears Himself To His Beloved As Well As To The Rest. So, Then, Each Chooses From Among The Beautiful A Love Conforming To His Kind, And Then, As If His Chosen Were His God, He Sets Him Up And Robes Him For Worship.

I Thought, There Goes My Lord, Whom I Was Born To Follow. I Have Found A King. And, I Said To Myself, Looking After Him As He Walked Away, I Will Have Him, If I Die For It.

Love Is A Boaster At Heart, Who Cannot Hide The Stolen Horse Without Giving A Glimpse Of The Bridle.

To Hate Excellence Is To Hate The Gods.

It Gives Me No Joy To Be Praised At The Expense Of A Better Artist, By Someone Who Does Not Know The Difference Or Who Thinks Me Too Vain To Be Aware Of It Myself.

Tell A Man What He May Not Sing And He Is Still Half Free; Even All Free, If He Never Wanted To Sing It. But Tell Him What He Must Sing, Take Up His Time With It So That His True Voice Cannot Sound Even In Secret -- There, I Have Seen Is Slavery.

But It Is Not For The Perfect Vase Or The Polished Gem To Choose Their Owners.

Do Not Believe That Others Will Die, Not You.... I Have Wrestled With Thanatos Knee To Knee And I Know How Death Is Vanquished. Man's Immortality Is Not To Live Forever; For That Wish Is Born Of Fear. Each Moment Free From Fear Makes A Man Immortal.

An Audience Of Twenty Thousand, Sitting On Its Hands, Could Not Have Produced Such An Echoing Silence.

I Was A King And A King's Heir And Now I Am A Slave.