Top 160 Douglas Stuart Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Rain was a natural state of Glasgow. It kept the grass green and the people pale and bronchial.”

— Douglas Stuart

2. “She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good. Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.”

— Douglas Stuart

3. “Flames are not just the end, they are also the beginning. For everything that you have destroyed can be rebuilt. From your own ashes you can grow again.”

— Douglas Stuart

4. “Dance for me, Hugh,” said Agnes, out of the blue. “Eh?” answered Shuggie, rolling over on the carpet. Leek groaned, he didn’t like it when she made a pet of his brother. What good was a soft boy in a hard world? He left them to their nonsense. They listened to him slam his bedroom door and knew he would be hunched over, his heavy headphones on, drawing again in the black book. “Go on, dance for me. I want you to show me how the kids today dance.”

— Douglas Stuart

5. “Howse aboots some light entertainment?”

— Douglas Stuart

6. “But how come Morrissey didnae think there was panic on the streets of Glasgow? There’s plenty of fuckin’ panic here.”

— Douglas Stuart

7. “Mungo looked both up and down the hill, and then he kissed James quickly on the lips. It was like hot buttered toast when you were starving. It was that good.”

— Douglas Stuart

8. “There were rows of teeth marks on the windowsill, perfect little half-moons of anxiety.”

— Douglas Stuart

9. “Don’t let it bother you. They see the one thing that’s a bit more special than them and then they just pile on.”

— Douglas Stuart

10. “Cheer up. I love you, Mungo Hamilton.”

— Douglas Stuart

11. “The sun was not yet fully overhead in the sky, and everything beautiful was all already ruined.”

— Douglas Stuart

12. “If I were you, I would keep dancing.” “I can’t.” The tears were coming. “You know they only win if you let them.” “I can’t.” His arms and fingers were still outstretched and frozen, like a dead tree. “Don’t give them the satisfaction.” “Mammy, help. I can’t.” “Yes. You. Can.” She was still smiling through her open teeth. “Just hold your head up high and Gie. It. Laldy.”

— Douglas Stuart

13. “Mungo’s capacity for love frustrated her. His loving wasn’t selflessness, he simply couldn’t help it. Mo-Maw needed so little and he produced too much, so that it all seemed a horrible waste. It was a harvest no one had seeded, and it blossomed from a vine no one had tended. It should have withered years ago, like hers had, like Hamish’s had, yet Mungo had all this love to give and it lay about him like ripened fruit and nobody bothered to gather it up.”

— Douglas Stuart

14. “Shug had seen it before, those with least to give always gave the most.”

— Douglas Stuart

15. “The man’s mouth was a collection of broken teeth. He had a grin like a graveyard full of wrecked headstones.”

— Douglas Stuart

16. “George said. “I am on fire. I do not burn. It’s Saint Agnes’s lament.”

— Douglas Stuart

17. “Listen son, at ma age love is a nuisance of a thing. What ye want is some easy company on a Tuesday night, a bit of help runnin’ the hoose, and if yer lucky a bit of nookie as long as ye can both lie on yer side while ye’re at it.” Mungo didn’t laugh at the joke. Jocky dropped his dout into his mug. “What ye want is an easy life. There’s nothin’ easy about love.”

— Douglas Stuart

18. “Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.”

— Douglas Stuart

19. “From his real father he had inherited a gentle personality, quiet and pensive, lonesome and faraway.”

— Douglas Stuart

20. “As I reached out for help, everyone shrank back from me; they pulled away from fear that the fire would return.”

— Douglas Stuart

21. “Her brother had been gifted with legendary stubbornness; he just stared through you and floated away, leaving behind his frame to be pecked to pieces.”

— Douglas Stuart

22. “Shuggie watched her and said under his breath, “Why can’t I be enough?” But she wasn’t listening.”

— Douglas Stuart

23. “It was a fresh start, she had thought, and hopefully a better class of alcoholic.”

— Douglas Stuart

24. “The temptation was sweet; the possibilities hung in the air like a thousand doors.”

— Douglas Stuart

25. “Christ’s sake, Mungo. You must be steamin’. Have you forgotten what it’s like out there? If they knew, they would stab us! Rip us from balls to chin just for something to talk about down the pub.”

— Douglas Stuart

26. “Twenty. Five. Years. Out at the Dalmarnock Iron Works, and all he got was three weeks’ wages. Three weeks! I went up there maself, chapped on the big red gaffer’s door, and I telt him what he could dae with three weeks’ wages.”

— Douglas Stuart

27. “They were happy with her alone, with her sobriety and the peace it brought.”

— Douglas Stuart

28. “Leek frowned at Shuggie, like he was angry at his hope, disappointed that Shuggie was stupid enough to still believe.”

— Douglas Stuart

29. “The teacher gave up yelling encouragement and tried insults instead. He was an old man but a fit, flinty one, a Scottish shinty champion in his day. When they banned the cane a few years before he thought he might give up teaching altogether. In the end it made little difference; after all the years of peering into the dark corners of little boys’ souls, he knew where real pain and motivation lay.”

— Douglas Stuart

30. “Mungo’s capacity for love frustrated her. His loving wasn’t selflessness; he simply could not help it. Mo-Maw needed so little and he produced so much. So that it all seemed a horrible waste. It was a harvest no one seeded, and it blossomed from a vine no one tended.”

— Douglas Stuart

31. “I had to see if you would actually come.” Agnes took hold of the neck of his jumper then. Shug picked up his money belt and kissed her with a forceful tongue. He had to squeeze all the small bones in her hands to get her to release him. She had loved him, and he had needed to break her completely to leave her for good. Agnes Bain was too rare a thing to let someone else love. It wouldn’t do to leave pieces of her for another man to collect and repair later.”

— Douglas Stuart

32. “She thought about tilting further then, dared herself to do it. How easy it would be to kid herself that she was flying, until it became only falling and she broke herself on the concrete below.”

— Douglas Stuart

33. “Are you going to stick in at the school?” “I’ll try.” “Well, try harder. Don’t make the same mistake as me, Shuggie. Make something of yourself.”

— Douglas Stuart

34. “What kind of man are you going to be when you grow up?” “What do you want me to be?” Agnes thought for a moment. “Peaceful.” She pushed at his wet hair again. “Less worried-looking.”

— Douglas Stuart

35. “The ball sailed over them, and the other boys tore up the field like Shetland ponies, cantering as one and giving the impression they were scared to be separated. The teacher stopped at a trot. “Oi, you two ladies, when you are done having tea, how about you play some bloody fitba,” he barked.”

— Douglas Stuart

36. “She’s no gonnae get any better, son. Come away from there.” Shuggie paused for a second, he looked over his narrow shoulder bone and shrugged. “But she might.”

— Douglas Stuart

37. “Separately, the two women had spent whole afternoons hiding behind settees from the Provident man. It was like an odd synchronized swimming, the way the Pithead women all sank to the carpet and crawled across the floor. The Provvie was a thin man in a big suit.”

— Douglas Stuart

38. “It was clear now: nobody would get to be made brand new.”

— Douglas Stuart

39. “Shug would have liked to leave a sovereign print on his face.”

— Douglas Stuart

40. “Big Shug Bain had seemed so shiny in comparison to the Catholic. He had been vain in the way only Protestants were allowed to be, conspicuous with his shallow wealth, flushed pink with gluttony and waste.”

— Douglas Stuart

41. “Shug smiled. She was only twenty-four and already his doormat. “I didnae think you were coming,” she said, climbing into the back of the taxi. “What did you call me out here fur?” “I missed ye, that’s all,” she said. “I haven’t seen ye in weeks.” She rolled her thick legs open and shut coquettishly. “You’ve no gone off o’ me, have ye?” She grinned.”

— Douglas Stuart

42. “The rubber tip had worn away from around the right heel, and although she had coloured the shoe in with an old black bingo marker, the sharp metal nail scraped the floor with the screech of hard times.”

— Douglas Stuart

43. “They were silent a good long time after that. It grew so late it became early.”

— Douglas Stuart

44. “Spell it,” said Jodie quickly. “Spell whut?” “Genetics.”

— Douglas Stuart

45. “The morning light was the colour of too-milky tea. It snuck into the bedsit like a sly ghost, crossing the carpet and inching slowly up his bare legs.”

— Douglas Stuart

46. “I’ve never liked those AA places. They attract the lowest kind of people. God gave you a will. You should use it to save yourself.”

— Douglas Stuart

47. “Like the stubborn oose you pick from an acrylic jumper, some unseen static kept pulling his gaze back to the boy. James turned away. He knew if they caught him staring they would have a hundred names for him before he had a name for himself.”

— Douglas Stuart

48. “I learnt how to start a fire. I learnt how to put bait on a hook.” “See!” Mo-Maw sounded like she was relieved. “That’s what ah telt our Jodie. That’s what ah wanted you to do this for. Masculine pursuits. It’ll make a man out of ye.”

— Douglas Stuart

49. “It looked like the lager beauties sometimes did, a careless printer and a misaligned screen, and suddenly the woman was no longer whole, just a mess of different layers.”

— Douglas Stuart

50. “Don’t cross your legs when you walk. Try and make room for your cock.” Leek grabbed at the bulge in the front of his corduroy and strode back and forth in a half strut, half lazy amble. “Don’t bend your knees so much. Take longer, straighter steps.”

— Douglas Stuart