We are all imprisoned by the dictionary. We choose out of that vast, paper-walled prison our convicts, the little black printed words, when in truth we need fresh sounds to utter, new enfranchised noises which would produce a new effect. — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
There is a kind of laughter that sickens the soul. Laughter when it is out of control: when it screams and stamps its feet, and sets the bells jangling in the next town. Laughter in all its ignorance and cruelty.… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
Gormenghast, that is, the main massing of the original stone, taken by itself would have displayed a certain ponderous architectural quality were it possible… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
Through her, in microcosm, the wide earth sobbed. The starglobe sank in her; the colours faded. The death-dew rose and the wild birds in… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“Behind him she saw something which by contrast with the alien incalculable figure before her, was close and real. It was something which she… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“If seeing her an hour before her last Weak cough into all blackness I could yet Be held by chalk-white walls - The Consumptive.… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“He knew that he was caught up in one of those stretches of time when for anything to happen normally would be abnormal. The… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“Would you be so kind as to remove your redundant carcass from the door of this room, my man,’ he said, in his high,… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
What is Time... That you speak of it so subserviently? Are we to be the slaves of the sun, that second-hand, overrated knob of… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“He could now inhabit the world of words, with, at the back of his melancholy, a solace he had not known before” — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“He had emptied the bright goblet of romance; at a single gulp he had emptied it. The glass of it lay scattered on the… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“I want a big breakfast," said Fuchsia at last. "I want a lot to eat, I'm going to think today.” — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“Before it had awoke to die on the instant of its waking, a score of bells and clocks had shouted midday and for a… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
“Gormenghast. Withdrawn and ruinous it broods in umbra: the immemorial masonry: the towers, the tracts. Is all corroding? No. Through an avenue of spires… — Mervyn Peake Copy Share Image
