Quotes by Robin Hobb

Life is a balance. We tend to forget that as we go blithely from day to day. We eat and drink and sleep and assume we will always rise up the next day, that meals and rest will always replenish us. Injuries we expect to heal, and pain to lessen as time goes by. Even when we are faced with wounds that heal more slowly, with pain that lessens by day only to return in full force at nightfall, even when sleep does not leave us rested, we still expect that somehow tomorrow will all come back into balance and that we will go on. At some point, the exquisite balance has tipped, and despite all our flailing efforts, we begin the slow fall from the body that maintains itself to the body that struggles, nails clawing, to cling to what it used to be.

It is the nature of human that we tend to pass our pain along. As if we could get rid of it by inflicting an equal hurt on someone else.

Love isnt just about feeling sure of the other person, knowing what he would give up for you. Its knowing with certainty what you are willing to surrender for his sake. Make no mistake; each partner gives up something. Individual dreams are surrendered for a shared one. In some marriages, one partner gives up almost everything she once thought she wanted. But its not always the woman who does so. Such sacrifice is not shameful. Its love. If you think the man is worth it, it works.

Do you not see how strange and wonderful that is? That all history balances on an affair of the human heart?

Isnt it strange how wise counsel can cool the hottest head? He made sense but my heart screamed protest.

We were both smiling, in that bittersweet way one does when imagining something the heart longs for and the head would dread.

Men of passion and vision are often seen as mad.

I found myself speaking softly as if I were telling an old tale to a young child. And giving it a happy ending, when all know that tales never end, and the happy ending is but a moment to catch one’s breath before the next disaster. But I didn’t want to think about that. I didn’t want to wonder what would happen next.

It was as if I had been following a narrow trail, and had suddenly realized that at any time I could leave it and strike out cross-country.

Be very chary of telling your hoarded secrets. Many lose all power once they have been divulged.

Home is people. Not a place. If you go back there after the people are gone, then all you can see is what is not there any more.

I truly wanted to live a life in which I could make my own choices, independent of the duties of my birth and position. It was only when fate granted that to me that I realized the cost of it. I could set aside my responsibilities to others and live my life as I please only when I also severed my ties to them. I could not have it both ways. To be part of a family, or any community, is to have duties and responsibilities, to be bound by the rules of that group.

There would always be dishonorable things done to preserve the honor of any power.

What is a secret? It is much more than knowledge shared with only a few, or perhaps only one another. It is power. It is a bond. It is a sign of deep trust, or the darkest threat possible.... Be very chary of revealing your hoarded secrets. Many lose all power once they have been divulged. Be even more careful of sharing your secrets lest you find yourself a puppet dancing on someone elses strings.

Suspense was an excellent tool for keeping powerful people off balance. It gave one bargaining power.

One way to disperse fear and create decision was to consider the worst possible outcome of ones actions.

There are always choices. But sometimes there are no good ones.

As much as I had always longed to be freed of my duties and obligations, being released from such bonds was as much a severing as an emancipation.

Refuse anxiety. When you borrow trouble against what might be, you neglect the moment you have now to enjoy. The man who worries about what will next be happening to him loses this moment in dread of the next with pre-judgement

There was a danger in asking too much of a child, but the danger of asking too little was almost equal.