Quotes from book

The Wee Free Men

“And then there was the headless horseman!" said Tiffany. "He had no head!"
"Well, that is the major job qualification," said the toad.”

“Them as can do, has to do for them as can't. And someone has to speak up for them as has no voices.”

“We cannae just rush in, ye ken."
"Point o' order, Big Man. Yejust rush in. Wejust rush in."
"Aye, Big Yan, point well made. But ye gotta knowye're just gonna rush in. Ye cannae just rush in. It looks bad, havin' to rush oout again straight awa'.”

“Quick, someone's coming! Look real!”

“He's probably their battle poet, too."
"You mean he makes up heroic songs about famous battles?"
"No, no. He recites poems that frighten the enemy…. When a well-trained gonnagle starts to recite, the enemy's ears explode.”

“Ordinary fortune-tellers tell you what you want to happen; witches tell you what’s going to happen whether you want it to or not. Strangely enough, witches tend to be more accurate but less popular.”

“That, lad," he said proudly, "was some of the worst poetry I have heard for a long time. It was offensive to the ear and a torrrture to the soul…. We'll make a gonnagle out of ye yet!”

“And all the stories had, somewhere, the witch. The wicked old witch.
And Tiffany had thought: Where's the evidence?”

“They can tak' oour lives but they canna tak' oour troousers!”

“We sleepwalk through our lives, because how could we live if we were always this awake?”

“The girls were expected to grow up to be somebody's wife. They were also expected to read and write, those being considered soft indoor jobs that were too fiddly for the boys.”

“Even in a dream, even at a posh ball, the Nac Mac Feegle knew how to behave. You charged in madly, and you screamed… politely. pommes frites”

“They didn't have to be funny — they werejokes.”

“Never cross a woman with a star on a stick, young lady. They've got a mean streak.”

“This wasn't food - it was what food became if it had been good and gone to food heaven.”

“He said it was better to belong where you don't belong than not to belong where you used to belong, remembering when you used to belong there.”

“The thing about witchcraft," said Mistress Weatherwax, "is that it's not like school at all. First you get the test, and then afterward you spend years findin' out how you passed it. It's a bit like life in that respect”

“They think written words are even more powerful,’ whispered the toad. ‘They think all writing is magic. Words worry them. See their swords? They glow blue in the presence of lawyers.”

“This time it had been magic. And it didn't stop being magic just because you found out how it was done.”