Had you but seen it, I promise you, your high-minded principles would have melted like candle wax. Never would you have wished such beauty away.

Little by little, the old world crumbled, and not once did the king imagine that some of the pieces might fall on him.

Happiness was useless to me. It was heartache that filled my purse. What happy man has need of Shakespeare?

C'est pas assez que tous tu dis c'est de la merde, François? Tu veux coucher dans la merde, aussi?

Most of the mess that is called history comes about because kings and presidents cannot be satisfied with a nice chicken and a good loaf of bread.

On those nights, the words were for me alone. They came up unbidden from my heart. They spilled over my tongue and spilled out my mouth. And because of them, I, who was nothing and nobody, was a prince of Denmark, a maid of Verona, a queen of Egypt. I was a sour misanthrope, a beetling hypocrite, a conjurer's daughter, a mad and murderous king.