Quotes by George R.R. Martin

He was a pitiful thing. He had always been a pitiful thing. Why had she never seen that before? There was a hollow place inside her where her fear had been.

A great battle is a terrible thing, the old knight said, but in the midst of blood and carnage, there is sometimes also beauty, beauty that could break your heart.

Then a begging brother in a tattered brown robe said a blessing on his sword, and a maid kissed his cheek. They are for me, Why? He asked Pate. What am I to them? A knight who remembered his vows, the smith said.

Summer is the time for squabbles. In winter, we must protect one another, keep each other warm, share our strengths.

Free folk dont follow names, or little cloth animals sewn on a tunic, the King-Beyond-the-Wall had told him. They wont dance for coins, they dont care how your style yourself or what that chain of office means or who your grandsire was. They follow strength. They follow the man.

Day followed day, and night followed night, until Dany knew she could not endure a moment longer. She would kill herself rather than go on, she decided one night... Yet when she slept that night, she dreamt the dragon dream again. Viserys was not in it this time. There was only her and the dragon. Its scales were black as night, wet and slick with blood. Her blood, Dany sensed. Its eyes were pools of molten magma and when it opened its mouth, the flame came roaring out in a hot jet. She could hear it singing to her. She opened her arms to the fire, embraced it, let it swallow her whole, let it cleanse her and temper her and scour her clean. She could feel her flesh sear and blacken and slough away, could feel her blood boil and turn to steam, and yet there was no pain. She felt strong and new and fierce. And the next day, strangely, she did not seem to hurt quite as much.

The living have no place at the feasts of the dead.

Maris sighed, and put a gentle hand on his arm. Well do what we must, Coll. We have no choice. He looked up at her now, looking to her again as the child to the mother; although he knew now that she was as helpless as he, still he hoped. Why dont we have a choice? I dont understand.Maris sighed. Its law, Coll. We dont go against tradition here, you know that. We all have duties put upon us. If we had a choice I would keep the wings, I would be a flyer. And you could be a singer. Wed both be proud, and know we were good at what we did. Life will be hard as a land-bound. I want the wings so much. Ive had them, and it doesnt seem right that they should be taken from me, butmaybe—maybe the tightness in it is something I just dont see. People wiser than we decided that thingsshould be the way they are, and maybe, maybe Im just being a child about it, wanting everything my own way.

Words are wind.

Words are like arrows, Arianne. Once loosed, you cannot call them back.

Some words are wind, ser. Some are treason.

Words are wind, and the wind from Manderlys mouth means no more than the wind escaping his bottom.

Words are not swords.

But words in a book were one thing. The true test came in battle.

I don’t know what message to send to Bran. Help him Tyrion.”“What help could I give him? I am no maester, to ease his pain. I have no spell to give him back his legs.”“You gave me help when I needed it” Jon Snow said.“I gave you nothing,” Tyrion said. “Words.”“Then give your words to Bran too.

She went to the window seat and sat there, sniffling, hating them all, and herself most of all. It was all her fault, everything bad that had happened.

He cries behind his wall, I think, and no one knows, not even he. And no one will ever know, and in the end he’ll always be alone in smiling pain.

Let his sword break and his shield shatter, Sansa thought coldly as she shoved out through the doors, let his courage fail him and every man desert him.

It was a hollow victory they gave me. A crown...it was the girl I prayed them for. Your sister, safe... and mine again as she was meant to be. I ask you, Ned, what good is it to wear a crown?

These woods are as empty as you think, he had said. You cannot know what the light might summon from the darkness.