10
" ...I've been ripped off, lied to, slandered, gossiped about slapped, falsely accused, and had my truths not believed. I've had my heart broken, had my pride stomped on, witnessed unforgivable acts, and heard words that hurt so much I withed that they would not replay in my head, but they did. In all these moments--some tear-soaked, some life-defining, but all character-building moments--I have felt vulnerable.
And I believe these feelings of vulnerability--when a person feels scared and alone and overwhelmed and pissed off, wen the sting of unfairness bites deep--while miserable to live through, are the basis for writing compelling fiction. "
― Jessica Page Morrell
13
" The war was between the Danes and Wessex. My war was with Odda the Younger, and I knew I was driven by pride. The preachers tell us that pride is a great sin, but the preachers are wrong. Pride makes a man, it drives him. It’s the shield wall around his reputation and the Danes understood that. Men die they said, but reputation does not die.
What do we look for in a lord? Strength, generosity, hardness, and success. And why should a man not be proud of those things? Show me a humble warrior and I’ll see a corpse. Alfred preached humility, he even pretended to it, loving to appear in church with bare feet and prostrating himself in-front the alter, but he never possessed true humility. He was proud, and men feared him because of it, and men should fear a lord. They should fear his displeasure and fear his generosity will cease. Reputation makes fear, and pride protects reputation, and I marched North because my pride was endangered. "
― Bernard Cornwell , The Last Kingdom (The Saxon Stories, #1)
17
" LARRY--(with increasing bitter intensity, more as if he were fighting with himself than with Hickey) I'm afraid to live, am I?--and even more afraid to die! So I sit here, with my pride drowned on the bottom of a bottle, keeping drunk so I won't see myself shaking in my britches with fright, or hear myself whining and praying: Beloved Christ, let me live a little longer at any price! If it's only for a few days more, or a few hours even, have mercy, Almighty God, and let me still clutch greedily to my yellow heart this sweet treasure, this jewel beyond price, the dirty, stinking bit of withered old flesh which is my beautiful little life! (He laughs with a sneering, vindictive self-loathing, staring inward at himself with contempt and hatred. Then abruptly he makes Hickey again the antagonist.) You think you'll make me admit that to myself? "
― Eugene O'Neill , The Iceman Cometh
18
" For five hundred years my sisterhood has passed down a sacred vow,” says Caspida coldly, “to destroy the one who destroyed our queen. You know this, and you speak these words only to deceive me as you deceived her. You would have me believe that you are capable of love.”
“Believe me when I say I wish that I were not!” Angrily I round on her. “I do not tell you this for myself! Aladdin will die any moment, and the only way to save him is if you make a wish! Please, Caspida—they will kill him at dawn!” I point at the horizon, where the sun is minutes away from rising. “Let me save him, I beg you!”
I drop to my knees before her, doing what I never thought I could: grovel before a human. My pride unravels into smoke, carried away on the wind. Always I have thought myself above these mortals—I, immortal, powerful, able to shift from this form to that. But I let all of that go now, and I beg as I have never begged before. “Do what you like with me after that, but just let me save him!” I dig my fingers into the earth, my eyes damp with tears. My voice falls to a cracked whisper. “Please.”
“Why?”
I raise my face, finding her gaze unyielding. “Because it was my idea. Him wishing to be made a prince. Courting you. Lying all these weeks. I manipulated him and used him, and now they will kill him for it.”
“Why would you lead him into the palace knowing that eventually the truth would come out and he would have to pay the price?”
“Because . . .” I grind my teeth together, wishing the earth would swallow me up. “Because I was trying to win my freedom. Your people had captured the prince of the jinn—Nardukha’s own son. The Shaitan sent me to free him, and in turn, he would free me from my lamp. If I failed, he planned to sink your city into the sea. I had to get into the palace. Aladdin was my only way in.”
“So you don’t deny that you’re a monster. You used him for your own ends.”
I drop my head. “I know what I am. I know nothing can excuse what I did to Roshana, or to Aladdin, or to you. I’ve wronged so many, and there is so much I wish I could take back. I can’t save Roshana. But please—I beg of you—let me save him.”
Caspida lowers to her knees and studies me. I meet her gaze, humbled utterly.
“You want me to believe that you love him,” she whispers.
“Yes.” The word is but a breath, a stir of air in my treacherous lungs. “We’re running out of time. I cannot reverse death or the hours. Time is the strongest magic, and no jinni—not even the Shaitan—can rewrite the past. Once Aladdin is gone, he is gone. Let me save him, and I can help you win your city. "
― Jessica Khoury , The Forbidden Wish