Bernard Cornwell: Trending quotes

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Bernard Cornwell: 350 quotes1 like

“We have honour, Sharpe. That is our private strength, our honour. We're Soldiers, you and I. We cannot expect riches, or dignity, or continual victory. We will die, probably, in battle, or in a fever ward, and no one will remember us, so all that is left is honour.”

Bernard Cornwell

Major Kearsey
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Gold (1981)

“The Light Company were not worried by the French. If Richard Sharpe wanted to lead them to Paris they would go, blindly confident that he would see them through”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, p. 36
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Gold (1981)

“All gunners were deaf, they said. They were the kings of the battlefield and they never heard the applause.”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, p. 249
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Honor (1985)

“The British army fought against other infantry arrayed in two ranks and every man could use his musket, and if cavalry threatened they marched and wheeled into a square of four ranks, and still every man could use his musket, but the soldiers at the heart of the two French columns could never fire without hitting the men in front.”

Bernard Cornwell

Lieutenant Richard Sharpe, p. 226
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Havoc (2003)

“What we should have done, lads, is gone north.”

Bernard Cornwell

Lieutenant Richard Sharpe, p. 290
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Rifles (1988)

“And don't tell me this isn't your war. You swore an oath to serve the King of Spain, and the king of Spain is a prisoner in France and you were supposed to be his guard. By God, this is your war far more than it's my war. I never swore an oath to protect Spain, I never had a woman raped by a Frenchman or a child murdered by a dragoon or a harvest stolen and a house burned by a Crapaud forage party. Your country has suffered all those things, and your country is Spain, and if you'd rather fight for Ireland than for Spain, then why in the name of Almighty God did you take the Spanish oath?”

Bernard Cornwell

Captain Richard Sharpe, p. 110
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Battle (1995)

“The Tippoo himself led the defenders north of the breach. The Tippoo had cursed Gudin for blowing the mines too early and thus wasting its terrible destructive power, but now he tried to revive the defense by his personal example. He stood in the front rank of his soldiers while behind him a succession of aides loaded jewel-encrusted hunting rifles. One by one the rifles were given to the Tippoo who aimed and fired, aimed and fired, and redcoat after redcoat was struck down.”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, p. 351
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Tiger (1997)

“Sharpe led the way towards the right hand door, all waiting done, all nervousness dispelled because the fight was on and there was nothing now but to win. This was the Sharpe who had saved Wellington's life at Assaye, who had hacked through the ranks to take an Eagle with Harper, who had gone, maddened, into the breach at Badajoz. This was the Sharpe whom Major General Nairn had only been able to guess at as he looked at the quiet, dark-haired man across the rug in Frenada.”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, p. 118
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Enemy (1984)

“Some French ran for help to the British infantry. The red ranks opened up, helped them in, because all infantry feared that moment when the cavalry hit them at full charge. The British soldiers shouted at the French, told them to run to the British lines, and the red-coated men watched in awe what the Heavy Dragoons were doing and knew Fate could have decreed it otherwise and so they helped their enemy to escape the common enemy of all infantry.”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, describing the effect of a successful British cavalry charge, p. 249
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Sword (1983)

“Of all the ridiculous, unnecessary, stupid things, the Horse Guards had sent tents! Soldiers had always slept in the open! Sharpe had woken in the morning with his hair frozen to the ground, had woken with his clothes sopping wet, but he had never wanted a tent! He was an infantryman. An infantryman had to march, and march fast, and tents would slow them down.”

Bernard Cornwell

Major Richard Sharpe, p. 40
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Honor (1985)

“Patrick Harper was an Ulsterman from Donegal and had been driven into the ranks of Britain's army by hunger and poverty. He was a huge man, four inches taller than Sharpe who was himself six feet tall. In battle Harper was an awesome figure, yet in truth he was a kind, humorous and easygoing man whose benevolence disguised his life's central contradiction, which was that he had no love for the king for whom he fought and for the country whose flag he defended, yet there were few better soldiers in all King George's army, and none who was more loyal to his friends.”

Bernard Cornwell

Narrator, p. 19
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Battle (1995)

“It turns out that the Danish gunboats are rather better than ours. They draw less water and carry heavier ordnance and the results are not at all pretty.”

Bernard Cornwell

Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Prey (2001)

“I think the French are interested only in food and wine', Vicente said.
'I can think of something else,' Sharpe said, and received a stern look from Sarah.
'There is no food here, … just higher things.”

Bernard Cornwell

Source: Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Escape (2003)

“Put a British Soldier in a wilderness and he would soon discover a taproom.”

Bernard Cornwell

Captain Richard Sharpe, p. 54
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Fury (2006)

“You want a blessing, my son? Then God give strength to your bow and add bite to your arrows! May your arm never tire and your eye never dim. God and the saints bless you while you kill!”

Bernard Cornwell The Grail Quest

English Prior, p. 54
The Grail Quest, Vagabond (2002)

“He had been a tough, cheerful youngster, the sort who collected birds' eggs, scrapped with other boys and climbed the church tower on a dare, and now he was a tough cheerful young man who thought that being an officer in Lawford's regiment was just about the finest thing life could afford. He liked soldiering and he liked soldiers.”

Bernard Cornwell

Lieutenant Jack Bullen, p. 307
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Escape (2003)

“A soldier's death, he thought, was a happy one, because a man, even in the throes of awful pain, would die in the best company of the world.”

Bernard Cornwell

General Thomas Graham, p. 234
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Fury (2006)

“"You had no choice, sir." "There's always a choice."”

Bernard Cornwell

Lieutenant Robert Knowles and Captain Richard Sharpe on the destruction of Almieda's magazine, p. 239
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Gold (1981)

“If I take a man into battle, my lord, i like to offer him a better than even chance that he'll march away with his skin intact. If I wanted to kill the buggers I'd just strangle them in their sleep. It's kinder.”

Bernard Cornwell

Captain Richard Sharpe, p. 88
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Battle (1995)

“There's a great bloody mine, sir! Just waiting to kill our lads! I ain't letting that happen. You can do what you bloody well like, but I'm going to kill some more of these bastards.”

Bernard Cornwell

Private Richard Sharpe, p. 329
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Tiger (1997)