Death Quotes by Hilary Mantel

11 Death quotes by Hilary Mantel

Hilary Mantel's eleven brief reflections on death exhibit the same sharp narrative precision she brings to her historical novels. Though a compact collection, the quotes give a vivid sense of her nuanced approach to the inevitable end.

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“I tell you, dear Citizen Camille—it’s not the deaths I can’t stand. It’s the judgements, the judgements in the courtroom.”

Hilary Mantel

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“...this is what death does to you, it takes and takes, so that all that is left of your memories is a…

Hilary Mantel

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“the lawyers’ saying ‘Le mort saisit le vif’? The dead grip the living. The prince dies but his power passes at the…

Hilary Mantel

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“At the front, people die for their mistakes. Why should politicians be more gently treated? They made the war. They deserve a…

Hilary Mantel

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He once thought it himself, that he might die with grief: for his wife, his daughters, his sisters, his father and master…

Hilary Mantel

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“This is Maximilien de Robespierre, barrister-at-law: unmarried, personable, a young man with all his life before him. Today against his most deeply…

Hilary Mantel

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“Mirabeau: “If you have been told to clear us from this hall, you must ask for orders to use force. We shall…

Hilary Mantel

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“He knows different now. It's the living that chase the dead. The long bones and skulls are tumbled from their shrouds, and…

Hilary Mantel

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“Your fear is, that if you marry Adèle, you will love her. If you have children, you will love them more than…

Hilary Mantel

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“His sister Kat, her husband, Morgan Williams, have been plucked from this life as fast as his daughters were taken, one day…

Hilary Mantel

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“He finds he cannot think of the dying men at all. Into his mind instead strays the picture of More on the…

Hilary Mantel

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People will identify with a persecuted minority without asking themselves what they are identifying with.

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“The hunter is among the most innocent of men; living in the moment makes him feel pure. When he returns in the evening, his…

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“But what would happen … I mean, what would be so awful … if they did meet up?” “Why, it would be like the…

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When you have committed enough words to paper, you feel you have a spine stiff enough to stand up in the wind. But when…

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At New Year's he had given Anne a present of silver forks with handles of rock crystal. He hopes she will use them to…

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“The story of my own childhood is a complicated sentence that I am always trying to finish, to finish and put behind me. It…

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“He wants to say, because Anne is not a carnal being, she is a calculating being, with a cold slick brain at work behind…

Hilary Mantel

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“Come to that, don't pay out good money for horoscopes. If things are going to go badly for you, is that what you need…

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“But my sins are my strength, he thinks; the sins I have done, that others have not even found the opportunity of committing. I…

Hilary Mantel

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Feminism hasn't failed, it's just never been tried.

Hilary Mantel

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“Mirabeau: “If you have been told to clear us from this hall, you must ask for orders to use force. We shall leave our…

Hilary Mantel

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“Cardinal Campeggio has implored Katherine to bow to the king's will, accept that her marriage is invalid and retire to a convent. Certainly, she…

Hilary Mantel

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“Sion calls Anne an eel, he calls her a slippery dipper from the slime, and he remembers what the cardinal had called her: my…

Hilary Mantel

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I spend a great deal of time on research, on finding all the available accounts of a scene or incident, finding out all the…

Hilary Mantel

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“At the front, people die for their mistakes. Why should politicians be more gently treated? They made the war. They deserve a dozen deaths,…

Hilary Mantel

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