Patrick Rothfuss Quotes

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

Why do we stop for the greystones?"
"Tradition, my boy," he said grandly, throwing his arms wide. "And superstition. They are one and the same, anyway."

How do they feel about demons off in Atur?" he asked.
"Scared." My father tapped his temple. "All that religion makes their brains soft."

You don't seem the superstitious type.
"I'm not," Ben said. "I'm careful. There's a difference."

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.

Seven things has Lady Lackless
Keeps them underneath her black dress
One a ring that’s not for wearing
One a sharp word, not for swearing
Right beside her husband’s candle
There’s a door without a handle
In a box, no lids or locks
Lackless keeps her husband’s rocks
There’s a secret she’s been keeping
She’s been dreaming and not sleeping
On a road, that’s not for traveling
Lackless likes her riddle raveling.

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.”

It’s hard to be wrongfully accused, but it’s worse when the people looking down on you are clods who have never read a book or traveled more than twenty miles from the place they were born.

Call a jack a jack. Call a spade a spade. But always call a whore a lady. Their lives are hard enough, and it never hurts to be polite.

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.

My name is Kvothe, pronounced nearly the same as “Quothe.” Names are important as they tell you a great deal about a person. I’ve had more names than anyone has a right to.
The Adem call me Maedre. Which, depending on how it’s spoken, can mean “The Flame,” “The Thunder,” or “The Broken Tree.”

So you went looking for a myth and found a man.

So this is the difference between telling a story and being in one, he thought numbly, the fear.

I'll admit, I was disappointed to learn that dragons didn't exist. That's a hard lesson for a boy to learn.
Chronicler smiled. "Honestly, I was a little disappointed myself. I went looking for a legend and found a lizard. A fascinating lizard, but a lizard just the same."

It was one of those perfect autumn days so common in stories and so rare in the real world.