Patrick Rothfuss Quotes

He picked the rock back up. “Do you believe that it floated?”
“No!” I sulked, rubbing my temples.
“Good. It didn’t. Never fool yourself into perceiving things that don’t exist.”

There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.

All stories are true," Skarpi said. "But this one really happened, if that's what you mean." He took another slow drink, then smiled again, his bright eyes dancing. "More or less. You have to be a bit of a liar to tell a story the right way. Too much truth confuses the facts. Too much honesty makes you sound insincere."

“Music is a fine thing, but metal lasts.” He struck the table with two huge fingers to emphasize his point....
As I left, I thought about what Kilvin had said. It was the first thing he had said to me that I did not agree with wholeheartedly. Metal rusts, I thought, music lasts forever.
Time will eventually prove one of us right.

Everyone thinks chemistry and alchemy are so similar, but they’re really not. They’re not even related. They just happen to live in the same house.

Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts. There are seven words that will make a person love you. There are ten words that will break a strong man’s will. But a word is nothing but a painting of a fire. A name is the fire itself.

I have been called Kvothe the Bloodless, Kvothe the Arcane, and Kvothe Kingkiller. I have earned those names. Bought and paid for them.
But I was brought up as Kvothe. My father once told me it meant “to know.”
I have, of course, been called many other things. Most of them uncouth, although very few were unearned.
I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep.
You may have heard of me.

Nobles’ sons are one of nature’s great destructive forces, like floods or tornadoes. When you’re struck with one of these catastrophes, the only thing an average man can do is grit his teeth and try to minimize the damage.

Anyway, I was listening to Beagle answer a question on the panel, he said something along the lines of, "I'd never want to write The Last Unicorn again. It was excruciatingly hard, because I was writing a faerie tale while at the same time writing a spoof of a faerie tale."
I just sat there thunderstruck. I realized that's exactly what I had been doing for over a decade with my story. I was writing heroic fantasy, while at the same time I was satirizing heroic fantasy.
While telling his story, Kvothe makes it clear that he's not the storybook hero legends make him out to be. But at the same time, the reader sees that he's a hero nonetheless. He's just a hero of a different sort.

That’s a whole new type of stupid.

Upon him I will visit famine and a fire.
Till all around him desolation rings
And all the demons in the outer dark
Look on amazed and recognize
That vengeance is the business of a man.

When we are children we seldom think of the future. This innocence leaves us free to enjoy ourselves as few adults can. The day we fret about the future is the day we leave our childhood behind.

Lord but I dislike poetry. How can anyone remember words that aren’t put to music?

A tinker’s debt is always paid:
Once for any simple trade.
Twice for freely given aid.
Thrice for any insult made.

The truth was, I needed to impress them. I knew from my previous discussions with Ben that you needed money or brains to get into the University. The more of one you had, the less of the other you needed.