Quotes from book
Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness
Steven Erikson

Forge of Darkness is the first novel of The Kharkanas Trilogy by Canadian author Steven Erikson, set before the events of the Malazan Book of the Fallen.The novel is set 300,000 years before the events in the Book of the Fallen and explores the background of the Tiste race and their impending civil war. The novel is framed as being told by one poet to another.

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“What worth peace when it was maintained by threat?
It was only the fearful who knelt in worship before order, and Galar refused to leave in fear.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“Then, does everyone lives in fear?'
The firelight barely reached the huge man standing beside Raskan, and the deep voice that came from that vague shape sounded loose, unguarded. 'I would say, most of the time, yes. Fear that our opinion might be chalanged. Fear that our way of seeing things might be called ignorant, self-serving, or indeed evil. Fear for our persons. Fear for our future, our fate. Our moment of death. Fear of failing in all that we set out to achieve. Fear of being forgotten.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“Wisdom did not belong to mortals, and those whom others called wise were only those who, through grim experience, had touched the very edges of unwelcome truths. For the wise, even joy was tinged with sorrow. No, the world made its demands upon mortals and they were immediate ones, pressingly, ferociously so, and even knowing a reasonable course was not enough to alter a mad plunge into disaster.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“… In elegant remoteness, she arrives like a work of high art, and you may well desire to edge ever closer, seeking flaws in the maker's hand, but the closer you get, the more she blurs before your eyes.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“But we're different from hawks and wolves, Ville. We can actually figure out the consequences of what we do, and that makes us… oh, I don't know the word…'
'Culpable?' Rint suggested.
'Yes, that's the word all right.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“T'riss sat down opposite the Warden, her expression thoughtful. 'Is civilisation nothing but an illusion, then?'
'Crowd control.'
'Excuse me?'
'That's all civilisation is, T'riss. A means by which we manage the proliferation of our kind. It increases in complexity the more of us there are. Laws keeps us muzzled and punishment delivers the necessary message when those laws are broken. Civilizations in decline are notable when certain of their members escape justice, and do so with impunity.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“Words were no gift, said Haut. They were tangled nets snaring all who ventured into their midst, until an entire people could hang helpless, choking on their own arguments, even as dissolution closed in on all sides.
The Jaghut had rejected that path. Defying the eternal plea for communication among peoples, in the name of understanding, peace or whatever, they had stopped talking, even with each other. And their city was abandoned, home now to a single soul, the Lord of Hate, the one who had laid bare the brutal truth of the future awaiting them all.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

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“Do not let the title of scholar, or poet, or lord, intimidate you overmuch. More importantly, do not delude yourself into imagining that such men and women are loftier, or somehow cleverer or purer of intgrity or ideal than you or the other commoner. We live in a world of facades, but the grins behind them are all wretched.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

Steven Erikson photo

“I think I understand. Before there can be disdain, there must be pride.
One day I will find something to be proud of, and then I will find this taste of disdain, and see if it suits me. Should I not think this, being my father's son?
And yet, I do not. Pride needs no claws, no scaled armour about itself. Not every virtue must be a weapon.
These thoughts are my own. I will not crush them.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

Steven Erikson photo

“Art is the language of the tormented, but the world is blind to that, for ever blind.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

Steven Erikson photo

“This swirl of stars,' Draconus suddenly said, 'marks the plunge of light into darkness. These stars, they are distant suns, shihing their light down upon distant, unknown worlds. Worlds, perhaps, little different from this one. Or vastly different. It hardly matters. Each star swirls its path towards the centre, and at that centre is death - the death of light, the death of time itself.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

Steven Erikson photo

“Peace did not serve order; order served peace, and when order became godlike, sacrosant and inviolate, then the peace thus won became a prison, and those who sought their freedom became enemies to order, and in the elimination of such enemies, peace was lost.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)

Steven Erikson photo

“There is but one measure to the wisdom of a people, and that is the staying hand. Fail in restraint and murder thrives in your eyes, and all your claims to civilization ring hollow.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)
Context: It is the legacy of most intelligent beings to revel in slaughter for a time,' Haut replied. 'In this we play at being gods. In this, we lie to ourselves with delusions of omnipotence. There is but one measure to the wisdom of a people, and that is the staying hand. Fail in restraint and murder thrives in your eyes, and all your claims to civilization ring hollow.

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“Honour cannot be hoarded. Integrity cannot adorn a room. There is no courage in gold.”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

Forge of Darkness (2013)
Context: Wealth,' they said, 'is a false measure. Honour cannot be hoarded. Integrity cannot adorn a room. There is no courage in gold. Only fools build a fortress of wealth. Only fools would live in it and imagine themselves safe.

Steven Erikson photo

“Then, does everyone lives in fear?”

Steven Erikson book Forge of Darkness

The firelight barely reached the huge man standing beside Raskan, and the deep voice that came from that vague shape sounded loose, unguarded. 'I would say, most of the time, yes. Fear that our opinion might be chalanged. Fear that our way of seeing things might be called ignorant, self-serving, or indeed evil. Fear for our persons. Fear for our future, our fate. Our moment of death. Fear of failing in all that we set out to achieve. Fear of being forgotten.'
Forge of Darkness (2013)

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