Top 500 George R.R. Martin Quotes (2025 Update)
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451. “The blood of the First Men still flows in the veins of the Starks, and we hold to the belief that the man who passes the sentence should swing the sword.”

— George R.R. Martin

452. “It burns, it does. Nothing burns like the cold.”

— George R.R. Martin

453. “Then the storm broke, and the dragons danced.”

— George R.R. Martin

454. “The morning had dawned clear and cold, with a crispness that hinted at the end of summer. They set forth at daybreak to see a man beheaded, twenty in all, and Bran rode among them, nervous with excitement. This was the first time he had been deemed old enough to go with his lord father and his brothers to see the king’s justice done. It was the ninth year of summer, and the seventh of Bran’s life.”

— George R.R. Martin

455. “They would not love me living, so let them dread me dead.”

— George R.R. Martin

456. “A cold wind was blowing from the north, and it made the trees rustle like living things.”

— George R.R. Martin

457. “Words are wind, but wind can fan a fire. My father and my uncle fought words with steel and flame. We shall fight words with words, and put out the fires before they start.”

— George R.R. Martin

458. “So many vows... they make you swear and swear. Defend the King. Obey the king. Obey your father. Protect the innocent. Defend the weak... what if your father despise the king? what if the king massacres the innocent? Its too much. No matter what you do, your forsaking one vow or another.”

— George R.R. Martin

459. “If I took it away, no doubt I’d find a morningstar hidden under your pillow within a fortnight. Try not to stab your sister, whatever the provocation.”

— George R.R. Martin

460. “When Maester Aemon heard him sing, he said his voice was honey poured over thunder.”

— George R.R. Martin

461. “For the oak recalls the acorn, the acorn dreams the oak, the stump lives in them both.”

— George R.R. Martin

462. “You know I’ve always considered women to be people.”

— George R.R. Martin

463. “A man like Tywin Lannister comes but only once in a thousand years.”

— George R.R. Martin

464. “We read fantasy to find the colors again, I think. To taste strong spices and hear the songs the sirens sang.”

— George R.R. Martin

465. “Winter will never come for the likes of us. Should we die in battle, they will surely sing of us, and it’s always summer in the songs. In the songs all knights are gallant, all maids are beautiful, and the sun is always shining.”

— George R.R. Martin

466. “Sleep is a little death, dreams the whisperings of the Other, who would drag us all into his eternal night.”

— George R.R. Martin

467. “Why do the Gods make kings and queens if not to protect the ones who can’t protect themselves?”

— George R.R. Martin

468. “What a Kraken grasps it does not lose, be it a longship or leviathan.”

— George R.R. Martin

469. “Snow, the boy is called,” Pycelle said unhelpfully. “I glimpsed him once at Winterfell,” the queen said, “though the Starks did their best to hide him. He looks very like his father.” Her husband’s by-blows had his look as well, though at least Robert had the grace to keep them out of sight.”

— George R.R. Martin

470. “Tyrion Lannister could not have been more astonished if Aegon the Conqueror himself had burst into the room, riding on a dragon and juggling lemon pies.”

— George R.R. Martin

471. “You were made to be kissed, often and well.”

— George R.R. Martin

472. “She should be on a hill somewhere, under a fruit tree, with the sun and clouds above her and the rain to wash her clean.”

— George R.R. Martin

473. “Better to mock the game than to play and lose.”

— George R.R. Martin

474. “You can’t hammer tin into iron, no matter how hard you beat it, but that doesn’t mean it’s useless.”

— George R.R. Martin

475. “IT IS SAID with truth that every building is constructed stone by stone, and the same may be said of knowledge, extracted and compiled by many learned men, each of whom builds upon the works of those who preceded him. What one of them does not know is known to another, and little remains truly unknown if one seeks far enough.”

— George R.R. Martin

476. “Soon comes the cold, and the night that never ends.”

— George R.R. Martin

477. “When they write the history of my reign, sweet sister, they will say that it began tonight.”

— George R.R. Martin

478. “We came here to be free of Old Valyria, and your Targaryens are Valyrian to the bone.”

— George R.R. Martin

479. “A foot of shattered antler, tines snapped off, all wet with blood.”

— George R.R. Martin

480. “Light our fire and protect us from the dark, blah blah, light our way and keep us toasty warm, the night is dark and full of terrors, save us from the scary things, and blah blah blah some more.”

— George R.R. Martin

481. “I have a hole where my heart should be, she thought, and nowhere else to go.”

— George R.R. Martin

482. “Everything’s better with some wine in the belly.”

— George R.R. Martin

483. “Clever bird, clever man, clever clever fool,”said Patchface, jangling. “Oh, clever clever clever fool.”He began to sing. “The shadows come to dance, my lord, dance my lord, dance my lord,”he sang, hopping from one foot to the other and back again. “The shadows come to stay, my lord, stay my lord, stay my lord.”He jerked his head with each word, the bells in his antlers sending up a clangor.”

— George R.R. Martin

484. “She had never loved him so much as she did in that instant.”

— George R.R. Martin

485. “Daenerys Targaryen wed Khal Drogo with fear and barbaric splendor in a field beyond the walls of Pentos, for the Dothraki believed that all things of importance in a man’s life must be done beneath the open sky.”

— George R.R. Martin

486. “A ruler needs a good head and a true heart,” she famously told the king. “A cock is not essential.”

— George R.R. Martin

487. “If he must be alone, he would make solitude his armor.”

— George R.R. Martin

488. “His eyes were open wounds beneath his heavy brows, a blue as dark as the sea by night.”

— George R.R. Martin

489. “I’m a huge fan of Tolkien. I read those books when I was in junior high school and high school, and they had a profound effect on me. I’d read other fantasy before, but none of them that I loved like Tolkien.”

— George R.R. Martin

490. “I’m sorry that I never trusted you. I don’t know how to do that anymore.”

— George R.R. Martin

491. “For herself, she wanted sleet and ice, howling winds, thunder to shake the very stones of the Red Keep. She wanted a storm to match her rage.”

— George R.R. Martin

492. “Lord Pea Pod. If you were a man, I would kill you for that, but my sword is made of too fine a steel to besmirch with craven’s blood. Aye, men are dying. More will die before we see Winterfell. What of it? This is war. Men die in war. That is as it should be. As it has always been.”

— George R.R. Martin

493. “She went to the window seat and sat there, sniffling, hating them all, and herself most of all. It was all her fault, everything bad that had happened.”

— George R.R. Martin

494. “Ofttimes a very small man can cast a very large shadow. Tyrion smiled. Lord Varys, I am growing strangely fond of you. I may kill you yet, but I think I’d feel sad about it. I will take that as high praise.”

— George R.R. Martin

495. “Fierce as a wolverine, calm as still water.”

— George R.R. Martin

496. “The distinction between literary and genre fiction is stupid and pernicious. It dates back to a feud between Robert Louis Stevenson and Henry James. James won, and it split literature into two streams. But it’s a totally false dichotomy.”

— George R.R. Martin

497. “Lonely and lovely and lethal, Jon Snow reflected, and I might have had her. Her, and Winterfell, and my lord father’s name. Instead he had chosen a black cloak and a wall of ice. Instead he had chosen honor. A bastard’s sort of honor.”

— George R.R. Martin

498. “Remember Old Nan’s stories, Bran. Remember the way she told them, the sound of her voice. So long as you do that, part of her will always be alive in you.”

— George R.R. Martin

499. “He drank his way across the narrow sea.”

— George R.R. Martin

500. “In the songs all knights are gallant, all maids are beautiful, and the sun is always shining.”

— George R.R. Martin