Top 500 Diana Gabaldon Quotes (2024 Update)
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151. “I was in the heart of chaos, and no power of mind or body was of use against it.”

— Diana Gabaldon

152. “Mmphm,” he said. “Hell of a choice, there. A stick up the cock, or a finger up the backside, eh?”

— Diana Gabaldon

153. “I reached for a pair of my own, intrigued. “Why not? Did the ancient Gaels not wear undergarments?” Frank leered. “You’ve never heard that old song about what a Scotsman wears beneath his kilts?” “Presumably not gents’ knee-length step-ins,” I said dryly. “Perhaps I’ll go out in search of a local kilt-wearer whilst you’re cavorting with vicars and ask him.” “Well, do try not to get arrested, Claire. The dean of St. Giles College wouldn’t like it at all.” In.”

— Diana Gabaldon

154. “IN THE LIGHT OF eternity, time casts no shadow. Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. But what is it that the old women see? We see necessity, and we do the things that must be done. Young women don’t see – they are, and the spring of life runs through them. Ours is the guarding of the spring, ours the shielding of the light we have lit, the flame that we are. What have I seen? You are the vision of my youth, the constant dream of all my ages.”

— Diana Gabaldon

155. “After all, I thought, what were days and weeks in the presence of eternity?”

— Diana Gabaldon

156. “It was the first breath of the new moon, but the whole of it was visible, a perfect ball of violet and indigo cupped in a sickle of light, luminous among the stars.”

— Diana Gabaldon

157. “It’s only the essence of a thing that counts. When time strips everything else away, it’s only the hardness of the bone that’s left.”

— Diana Gabaldon

158. “Overall, the library held a hushed exultation, as though the cherished volumes were all singing soundlessly within their covers.”

— Diana Gabaldon

159. “Jamie was real, alright, more real than anything had ever been to me, even Frank and my life in 1945. Jamie, tender lover and perfidious blackguard.”

— Diana Gabaldon

160. “A standing cock is quite blind, my dear,” he said at last, eyes still shut. “Surely you know that, physician that you are.”

— Diana Gabaldon

161. “We look in the mirror and see the shades of other faces looking back through the years; we see the shape of memory, standing solid in an empty doorway. By blood and by choice, we make our ghosts; we haunt ourselves.”

— Diana Gabaldon

162. “The body is amazingly plastic. The spirit, even more so. But there are some things you don’t come back from. Say ye so, a nighean? True, the body’s easily maimed, and the spirit can be crippled – yet there’s that in a man that is never destroyed.”

— Diana Gabaldon

163. “He shook his head slowly from side to side, as though it were very heavy. I could almost hear the contents sloshing.”

— Diana Gabaldon

164. “Faith is as powerful a force as science – but far more dangerous.”

— Diana Gabaldon

165. “Comment sont vos selles, grandpere? – Germain to Jamie.”

— Diana Gabaldon

166. “That’s for calling your father a fool. It may be true, but it’s disrespectful. Brian Fraser to teenage Jamie.”

— Diana Gabaldon

167. “Your husband should tan ye, woman,” said an austere voice from the blackness under a tree. “St. Paul says ‘Let a woman be silent, and – ’ ” “You can mind your own bloody business,” I snarled, sweat dripping behind my ears, “and so can St. Paul.”

— Diana Gabaldon

168. “According to the vicar, many of the local folk thought the War was due in part to people turning away from their roots and omitting to take proper precautions, such as burying a sacrifice under the foundation, that is, or burning fishes’ bones on the hearth – except haddocks, of course,” he added, happily distracted. “You never burn a haddock’s bones – did you know? – or you’ll never catch another. Always bury the bones of a haddock instead.”

— Diana Gabaldon

169. “What possessed ye, woman, to hit me in the heid wi’ a fish whilst I was fighting for my life?”

— Diana Gabaldon

170. “Movement at the door of the cabin, and a small figure that I recognized as Amy Higgins appeared. The tall woman pulled off her hat and waved it, her long red hair streaming out like a banner in the wind. “Hello, the house!” she called, laughing. Then I was flying down the hill, with Jamie just before me, arms flung wide, the two of us flying together on that same wind.”

— Diana Gabaldon

171. “I thought I could make out Jamie’s Highland screech, but that was likely imagination; they all sounded equally demented.”

— Diana Gabaldon

172. “If I find I need guidance, I’ll ask.”

— Diana Gabaldon

173. “They do say that God protects fools – but I think even the Almighty will lose patience now and then.”

— Diana Gabaldon

174. “Never,” he said, more softly. “For you are mine. My wife, my heart, my soul.”

— Diana Gabaldon

175. “And what’s wrong wi’ the way ye smell?′ he said heatedly. ‘At least ye smelt like a woman, not a damn flower garden. What d’ye think I am, a man or a bumblebee? Would ye wash yourself, Sassenach, so I can get within less than ten feet of ye?”

— Diana Gabaldon

176. “While my mind might object to being taken on a bare rock next to several sleeping soldiers, my body plainly considered itself the spoils of war and was eager to complete the formalities of surrender.”

— Diana Gabaldon

177. “But just then, for that fraction of time, it seems as though all things are possible. You can look across the limitations of your own life, and see that they are really nothing.”

— Diana Gabaldon

178. “For I hadn’t stood frozen at the revelation of Geilie’s pregnancy. It was something else I had seen that chilled me to the marrow of my bones. As Geilie had spun, white arms stretched aloft, I saw what she had seen when my own clothes were stripped away. A mark on one arm like the one I bore. Here, in this time, the mark of sorcery, the mark of a magus. The small, homely scar of a smallpox vaccination.”

— Diana Gabaldon

179. “There aren’t many people like that – who will tell you the truth about themselves and anything else right out. I’ve only met three people like that, I think – four now,” she said, her smile widening to warm him. “There was.”

— Diana Gabaldon

180. “Did ye know that the silkies put aside their skins when they come ashore, and walk like men? And if ye find a silkie’s skin and hide it, he – or she – ” he added, fairly, “canna go into the sea again, but must stay with ye on the land.”

— Diana Gabaldon

181. “To the taste of breasts like apricots, the warm scent of a woman’s navel when she wakens in the winter, the warmth of a mound that fills your hand like a peach, split with ripeness.”

— Diana Gabaldon

182. “The thing was, some men needed killing. The Church didn’t admit that, save it was war. The Mohawk understood it fine. So did Uncle Jamie.”

— Diana Gabaldon

183. “And when my body shall cease, my soul will still be yours, Claire – I swear by my hope of heaven, I will not be parted from you. – Jamie.”

— Diana Gabaldon

184. “I am deeply indebted to many people who have shared their love of and insights into these remarkable books with me over the years, none more than Jessica Matthews of George Mason University.”

— Diana Gabaldon

185. “You are my courage, as I am your conscience,” he whispered. “You are my heart – and I your compassion. We are neither of us whole, alone. Do ye not know that, Sassenach?” “I do know that,” I said, and my voice shook. “That’s why I’m so afraid. I don’t want to be half a person again, I can’t bear it.”

— Diana Gabaldon

186. “BILIOUS HUMOURS.”

— Diana Gabaldon

187. “I had not slept with many men other than my husband, but I had noticed that before to sleep, actually sleep with someone did give this sense of intimacy, as though your dreams had flowed out of you to mingle with his and fold you both in a blanket of unconscious knowing.”

— Diana Gabaldon

188. “That’s what marriage is good for; it makes a sacrament out of things ye’d otherwise have to confess. Jamie Fraser.”

— Diana Gabaldon

189. “And a long time,” he said. “I am a jealous man, but not a vengeful one. I would take you from him, my Sassenach – but I wouldna take him from you.”

— Diana Gabaldon

190. “Leaving me to plant the rest of the garlic, Mrs. Fitz sailed away like a galleon, young Alec bobbing in her wake. I worked contentedly through the morning, planting garlic, pinching back dead flower heads, digging out weeds and carrying on the gardener’s never-ending battle against snails, slugs, and similar pests. Here, though, the battle was waged bare-handed, with no assistance from chemical antipest compounds.”

— Diana Gabaldon

191. “My father always said that was the difference between an American and an Englishman. An Englishman thinks a hundred miles is a long way; an American thinks a hundred years is a long time.”

— Diana Gabaldon

192. “The greatest burden lies in caring for those we cannot help.”

— Diana Gabaldon

193. “He touched the rough crucifix that lay against his chest and whispered to the moving air, “Lord, that she might be safe, she and my children.” Then turned his cheek to her reaching hand and touched her throught the veils of time.”

— Diana Gabaldon

194. “It’s two hundred year, in the Highland tales – when folk fall asleep on fairy duns and end up dancing all night wi’ the Auld Folk; it’s usually two hundred year later when they come back to their own place.”

— Diana Gabaldon

195. “She said if ever I saw you again, I was to tell you two things, just as she told them to me. The first was, “I think it is possible, but I do not know.” And the second – the second was just numbers. She made me say them over, to be sure I had them right, for I was to tell them to you in a certain order. The numbers were one, nine, six, and seven.”

— Diana Gabaldon

196. “You are my courage, as I am your Conscience,” he whispered. “You are my hear and I your compassion. We are neither of us whole, alone.”

— Diana Gabaldon

197. “I have noticed,” she said slowly, “that time does not really exist for mothers, with regard to their children. It does not matter greatly how old the child is.”

— Diana Gabaldon

198. “For the moment, everything had disappeared: the church, the battle, the screams and shouts and the rumble of limber wheels along the rutted road through Freehold. There wasn’t anything but her and him, and he opened his eyes to look on her face, to fix it in his mind forever.”

— Diana Gabaldon

199. “Come to bed, a nighean. Nothing hurts when ye love me.” He was right; nothing did.”

— Diana Gabaldon

200. “James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser,” I said, spacing the words, formally, the way Jamie had spoken them to me when he first told me his full name on the day of our wedding.”

— Diana Gabaldon