Top 500 Daphne du Maurier Quotes (2026 Update)
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301. “The order never varies. Two slices of bread-and-butter each, and China tea. What a hide-bound couple we must seem, clinging to custom because we did so in England. Here, on this clean balcony, white and impersonal with centuries of sun, I think of half-past-four at Manderley, and the table drawn before the library fire. The door flung open, punctual to the minute, and the performance, never-varying, of the laying of the tea, the silver tray, the kettle, the snowy cloth.”

— Daphne du Maurier

302. “To me, lonely, anxious, and a survivor of too many emotional shipwrecks, he came almost as a savior, as an answer to prayer. To be strong as he was, and tender too, lacking all personal conceit, I had not met with that. I know what he was to me. But I to him...”

— Daphne du Maurier

303. “Doctors he would not tolerate; he had always believed in treating himself, and now he had not even the energy to do this.”

— Daphne du Maurier

304. “The word lingered in the air once I had uttered it, dancing before me, and because he received it silently, making no comment, the word magnified itself into something heinous and appalling, a forbidden word, unnatural to the tongue. And I could not call it back, it could never be unsaid.”

— Daphne du Maurier

305. “Mary’s mother turned to her and said, “There’s something of me gone in the grave with poor Nell, Mary. I don’t know whether it’s my faith or what it is, but my heart feels tired and I can’t go on anymore.”

— Daphne du Maurier

306. “I was possessed of a sudden with supernatural powers.”

— Daphne du Maurier

307. “You’re all wounded and hurt and torn inside.”

— Daphne du Maurier

308. “Friendship and duty are two separate things,” he said, “and I put duty first. You are another generation, you wouldn’t understand.”

— Daphne du Maurier

309. “Children’s tears are very near the surface, and come at the first crisis.”

— Daphne du Maurier

310. “They were ageless, they were sexless, they were neither male nor female, old or young, but the beauty of their faces, and of their bodies too, was more stirring and exciting than anything I had ever seen or known, and with a sudden longing I wanted to be one of them, to be dressed as they were dressed, to love as they must love, to laugh and worship and be silent.”

— Daphne du Maurier

311. “In November, Foy Quiller-Couch and I went on another riding expedition, this time to Bodmin moors, putting up at the wayside hostelry, Jamaica Inn.”

— Daphne du Maurier

312. “I did not know what to answer, because it would be too sudden and too direct, but I knew in my heart that what I wanted was everything that could be between a woman and a man; not at first, of course, but later, when we had found our other mountain, or our wilderness, or wherever it was we might go to hide ourselves from the world. There was no need to rehearse all that now. The point was that I was prepared to follow her anywhere if she would let me.”

— Daphne du Maurier

313. “But the sky on the horizon was not dark at all. It was shot with crimson, like a splash of blood.”

— Daphne du Maurier

314. “She had grown older in four days, and the face that looked back at her from the spotted, cracked mirror was drawn and tired. There were dark rings beneath her eyes, and little hollows in her cheeks. Sleep came late to her at night, and she had no appetite for food. For the first time in her life she saw a resemblance between herself and her Aunt Patience.”

— Daphne du Maurier

315. “As an eavesdropper in time my role was passive, without commitment or responsibility. I could move about in their world unwatched, knowing that whatever happened I could do nothing to prevent it – comedy, tragedy, or farce – whereas in my twentieth century existence I must take my share in shaping my own future and that of my family.”

— Daphne du Maurier

316. “There was Manderley, our Manderley, secretive and silent as it had always been, the gray stone shining in the moonlight of my dream...”

— Daphne du Maurier

317. “It seemed to Lady Althea, as she stood there above the steps, that all the people pressing forward were staring, not at the Dome of Rock, but at her alone, and were nudging on another, whispering, smiling; for she knew, from her own experience of mocking others, that there is nothing more likely to unite a crowd of strangers in a wave of laughter than the sight of someone who, with dignity shattered, becomes suddenly grotesque.”

— Daphne du Maurier

318. “I thought how little we know about the feelings of old people.”

— Daphne du Maurier

319. “It was as though there was some latent power in his fingers which turned them from bludgeons into deft and cunning servants. Had he cut her a chunk of bread and hurled it at her she would not have minded so much; it would have been in keeping with what she had seen of him. But this sudden coming to grace, this quick and exquisite moving of his hands, was a swift and rather sinister revelation, sinister because it was unexpected and not true to type. She thanked him quietly, and began to eat.”

— Daphne du Maurier

320. “Perhaps she had exaggerated; people very often were wrong about their relatives.”

— Daphne du Maurier

321. “I am sorry, Ellen; but I have always been plain-spoken, as you know. Living quietly as you do, you should manage very well on your allowance. But when it comes to supporting your husband as well, that is another matter. However, do not let us talk of it again. It is embarrassing to both of us. If you are ever in want, my dear, write privately to me.”

— Daphne du Maurier

322. “Now that the Duke of York was dead it was an ideal opportunity to break her contract. The book would have a tremendous sale in London, the publisher had intimated; everyone would talk about it, and her portrait would be published in the papers, and all the old notoriety, which, truth to tell, she had missed sadly during the years of retirement, would be hers again.”

— Daphne du Maurier

323. “November 1929, and I was still pegging away at Part Three, with a lump on my third finger from holding my pen too tightly. A pity I didn’t own a typewriter.”

— Daphne du Maurier

324. “There was a garden at the back, a delight to the children, and a green gate in the wall that led to a private avenue, all tangled undergrowth and mystery. And away behind this was the Bois itself, the enchanted forest, stretching surely to eternity, thought the children; a paradise with no beginning and no end. It was these years in Passy, between 1842 and 1847, that Kicky was to describe nearly fifty years later in Peter Ibbetson.”

— Daphne du Maurier

325. “I am considered silly, selfish and incredible by all concerned. No use in explaining. I prefer to live happily in discomfort here in beloved Fowey to living comfortably, query, and discontentedly in indifferent Hampstead. That’s all. I’m used to being alone. Why fuss? Why struggle? It’s funny that no one seems really to understand my craving for solitude, that I am sincerely, and without posing, happiest when alone. It’s my natural state.”

— Daphne du Maurier

326. “What a time you’ve been. You can’t afford to dream this morning, you know, there’s too much to be done.”

— Daphne du Maurier

327. “There was no yesterday and no tomorrow; fear had been slung aside, and shame forgotten. We were all together – Pappy and Mama; Maria and Niall and Celia – we were all happy, with so many people looking at us, we were all enjoying ourselves. It was a game that we played, a game that we understood. We were the Delaneys. And we were giving a party.”

— Daphne du Maurier

328. “The only timid one of the trio was the nameless heroine in Rebecca, and she found strength of purpose when she discovered that her husband Maxim truly loved her, and had never cared for his first wife Rebecca.”

— Daphne du Maurier

329. “The system might one day change, but human nature remained the same, and there were always people who profited at the expense of others.”

— Daphne du Maurier

330. “The world of today asleep, and my world not awakened, or not as yet, until the drug possessed me.”

— Daphne du Maurier

331. “No, it was done with and finished. Escape was a thing of yesterday.”

— Daphne du Maurier

332. “Soon we won’t be children anymore. We shall be like Them.”

— Daphne du Maurier

333. “If I possessed the world, you should have it also.”

— Daphne du Maurier

334. “I had become like a prisoner in chains, and the dungeon was deep.”

— Daphne du Maurier

335. “It seemed strange that things could still be done to me after I was dead, that my body would perhaps be found and handled by people I should never know, that really a little life would go on about me which I should never feel.”

— Daphne du Maurier

336. “This moment now, at twenty past eleven, this must never be lost,” and I shut my eyes to make the experience more lasting.”

— Daphne du Maurier

337. “Daphne du Maurier was the fifth-generation descendant of a French master craftsman who settled in England during the Revolution. The Glass-Blowers, the fictionalized story of his family, was originally published in 1963, but du Maurier first conceived of writing about her French forebears in the mid-1950s. She had recently completed her novel about Mary Anne Clarke, her famous great-great-grandmother, and a complementary work about the French side of her family seemed logical.”

— Daphne du Maurier

338. “He was folding up his napkin, pushing back his plate, and I wondered how it was he spoke so casually, as thought the matter was of little consequence, a mere adjustment of plans. Whereas to me it was a bombshell, exploding in a thousand tiny fragments.”

— Daphne du Maurier

339. “Fashions change so quickly nowadays they may even have altered by the time you get upstairs.”

— Daphne du Maurier

340. “The proprietor bowed, and walked with him to the entrance. ‘In Venice the whole world meets,’ he said smiling. ‘It is possible the signore will find his friends tonight. Arrivederci, signore.”

— Daphne du Maurier

341. “Nat thought to himself that “they” were no doubt considering the problem at that very moment, but whatever “they” decided to do in London and the big cities would not help the people here, three hundred miles away. Each householder must look after his own.”

— Daphne du Maurier

342. “You could stoop down and pick a fallen petal, crush it between your fingers, and you had there, in the hollow of your hand, the essence of a thousand scents, unbearable and sweet.”

— Daphne du Maurier

343. “Jamaica Inn stands today, hospitable and kindly, a temperance house on the twenty-mile road between Bodmin and Launceston. In the following story of adventure I have pictured it as it might have been over a hundred and twenty years ago; and although existing place-names figure in the pages, the characters and events described are entirely imaginary. Daphne du Maurier Bodinnick-by-Fowey October 1935.”

— Daphne du Maurier

344. “The glass world was unique, a law unto itself. It had its own rules and customs, and a separate language too, handed down not only from father to son but from master to apprentice, instituted heaven knows how many centuries ago wherever the glass-makers settled – in Normandy, in Lorraine, by the Loire – but always, naturally, by forests, for wood was the glass foundry’s food, the mainstay of its existence.”

— Daphne du Maurier

345. “I’ll not show fear before Joss Merlyn or any man,” she said, “and, to prove it, I will go down now, in the dark passage, and take a look at them in the bar, and if he kills me it will be my own fault.”

— Daphne du Maurier

346. “The visitors sat down, languid, and content to rest. Seecombe brought cake and wine.”

— Daphne du Maurier

347. “She had beauty that endured, and a smile that was not forgotten. Somewhere her voice still lingered, and the memory of her words.”

— Daphne du Maurier

348. “It was unlike anything I had ever known. I had no feeling, no pain.”

— Daphne du Maurier

349. “I don’t think there is any necessity to bring Inspector Welch into the affair – yet,” said Colonel Julyan. His voice was different, harsher. I did not like the way he used the word, “yet.” Why must he use it at all? I did not like it.”

— Daphne du Maurier

350. “This time the man confessed that there was slight detachment of the retina, and that Kicky must give up all thought of working for several months, and devote himself to the cure. He must have treatment at least once a week, continue with the ordinary bathing and poulticing at home, and put himself on a diet. He must, in fact, resign himself to being more or less of an invalid for the immediate future.”

— Daphne du Maurier