Top 400 Mark Lawrence Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “Truth is a weapon and lies are a necessary shield.”

— Mark Lawrence

52. “It was a defeat, resorting to crude threats in a game of subtlety, but sometimes one must sacrifice a battle to win the war.”

— Mark Lawrence

53. “It’s often said that cowards make the best torturers. Cowards have good imaginations, imaginations that torment them with all the worst stuff of nightmare, all the horrors that could befall them. This provides an excellent arsenal when it comes to inflicting misery on others. And their final qualification is that they understand the fears of their victim better than the victim does himself.”

— Mark Lawrence

54. “It’s the silence that scares me. It’s the blank page on which I can write my own fears.”

— Mark Lawrence

55. “People who talk about the weather would be better served by admitting they’ve nothing to say but like the sound of their own voice.”

— Mark Lawrence

56. “Sometimes advance is the best form of retreat.”

— Mark Lawrence

57. “Never be so focused on picking a lock that you forget kicking down the door is also an option.”

— Mark Lawrence

58. “We all practice self-deception to a degree; no man can handle complete honesty without being cut at each turn. There’s not enough room in a man’s head for sanity alongside each grief, each worry, each terror that he owns. I’m well used to burying such things in a dark cellar and moving on.”

— Mark Lawrence

59. “I have been too young to know, and I have been too old to care. It’s in that oh so narrow slice between that memories are made.”

— Mark Lawrence

60. “IT IS IMPORTANT, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size.”

— Mark Lawrence

61. “Sometimes the only option is to raise the stakes, to throw yourself the other way, to force your opponent further down the path they’ve chosen, further than they might want to go.”

— Mark Lawrence

62. “Time heals all wounds, but often it’s only by the application of the grave, and while we live some hurts live with us, burning, making us twist and turn to escape them. And as we twist, we turn into other men.”

— Mark Lawrence

63. “A million words won’t push the ice back, not even the breadth of a finger. But one word will break a heart, two will mend it, and three will lay the highest low.”

— Mark Lawrence

64. “I am pride! Let the meek have their inheritance – I’d rather have eternity in shadows than divine bliss at the price you ask.”

— Mark Lawrence

65. “All the world and more has rushed eternity’s length to reach this beat of your heart, screaming down the years. And if you let it, the universe, without drawing breath, will press itself through this fractured second and race to the next, on into a new eternity. Everything that is, the echoes of everything that ever was, the roots of all that will ever be, must pass through this moment that you own. Your only task is to give it pause – to make it notice.”

— Mark Lawrence

66. “Every man has his thorns, not of him, but in him, deep as bones.”

— Mark Lawrence

67. “That soft seduction of need and want, an equation of dependence that eases under the skin, so slow and sweet, only to lay a man open at the very time he most needs his strength.”

— Mark Lawrence

68. “It’s what I am, and if you want excuses, come and take them.”

— Mark Lawrence

69. “We might live in a multiverse of infinite wonder, but we are what we are, and can only care about what falls into our own orbit.”

— Mark Lawrence

70. “A knight trusts in his own judgement, and the weight of his sword.”

— Mark Lawrence

71. “A book is as dangerous as any journey you might take. The person who closes the back cover may not be the same one that opened the front one. Treat them with respect.”

— Mark Lawrence

72. “I wanted to go home and if Hell rose up to stop me, it would make me desire it more.”

— Mark Lawrence

73. “Anything that happens without witnesses never really happened at all.”

— Mark Lawrence

74. “They say that time is a great teacher but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.”

— Mark Lawrence

75. “A man can reach into anything and turn it to his cause. It’s not want, or desire, just certainty. Only be assured that whatever you reach into will reach into you in turn.”

— Mark Lawrence

76. “It’s shame that gets us killed. Shame is the anchor, the heaviest burden to carry from the battlefield. Fortunately shame was an affliction I’d never suffered from.”

— Mark Lawrence

77. “Men are busy dying from the moment they’re born but it’s a crawl from the cradle to the grave.”

— Mark Lawrence

78. “It’s always a shock, when you’ve been hit by some calamity, to see the world go about its business with perfect indifference.”

— Mark Lawrence

79. “What does nostalgia mean to a child? An abstraction. A standing stone waiting for them in the mist. Walk a path across some decades, any path you like, and the word will gather weight. It will come to you trailing maybes and might-have-beens. Nostalgia is a drug, a knife. Against young skin it carries a dull edge, but time will teach you that nostalgia cuts – and that it’s a blade that we cannot keep from applying to our own flesh.”

— Mark Lawrence

80. “There are some things that must be done quickly or not at all. If someone asks you if you love them you cannot hesitate. There are some paths that must be taken at speed.”

— Mark Lawrence

81. “I had dug myself into Hell by not having the bravery to admit my cowardice. I resolved not to get into a similar situation again.”

— Mark Lawrence

82. “To some men there’s no poison worse than a gift, none worse than a measure of pity. I would know.”

— Mark Lawrence

83. “I like mountains, always have done. Big obstinate bits of rock sticking up where they’re not wanted and getting in folk’s way. Great. Climbing them is a different matter altogether though. I hate that.”

— Mark Lawrence

84. “A strange thing – nails will hold a building together, but there’s nothing better for taking a man apart.”

— Mark Lawrence

85. “There’s a paralysis in choice, especially when what’s at stake is more precious to a person than what they own.”

— Mark Lawrence

86. “The need for vengeance feels like a hunger, but there is no sating it. Instead it consumes the man that feeds it. Vengeance is taking from the world. The only cure is to give.”

— Mark Lawrence

87. “But who would I be then? Who would I be if I let go the wrongs that have shaped me?”

— Mark Lawrence

88. “If you must run, have something to run toward, so it feels less like cowardice.”

— Mark Lawrence

89. “When you’re moving in a dark and haunted forest the urge is for every step to be taken more quickly than the last. There’s a pressure between your shoulder blades. Each creak and groan is a hunter stalking you, each flutter of wind its breath, close against your neck. You want to break and run, in any direction, just as long as it’s fast.”

— Mark Lawrence

90. “The best liars always tell the truth – they just choose which parts.”

— Mark Lawrence

91. “IT IS IMPORTANT, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size. For Sister Thorn of the Sweet Mercy Convent Lano Tacsis brought two hundred men. From.”

— Mark Lawrence

92. “IT IS IMPORTANT, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient bravery. For when Sister Cage of the Sweet Mercy Convent steps onto the battlefield courage is often found to be in short supply. She.”

— Mark Lawrence

93. “THERE IS IN every delicate thing, no matter how precious, nor how beautiful, a challenge. Break me. No.”

— Mark Lawrence

94. “When a game cannot be won, change the game. I read that in the book of Kirk.”

— Mark Lawrence

95. “I’m coming for you and death will not hide you.” Jorg Ancrath.”

— Mark Lawrence

96. “Give him what he wants,” Jorg had said. “Then take what you want. Nobody is more vulnerable than in their moment of victory, and you know that whatever you do this man will never let you go while he lives.” I.”

— Mark Lawrence

97. “We came to woodlands, with leaves unfurling on every branch, as if one blow of spring’s green hammer had set them exploding from the bud.”

— Mark Lawrence

98. “Running ain’t no bad thing. Leastways if you run in the right direction.”

— Mark Lawrence

99. “I’m a liar and a cheat and a coward, but I will never, ever, rarely let a friend down.”

— Mark Lawrence

100. “It’s true that my foe outnumbered me, but I am the hero of Aral Pass, after all, and sometimes when Prince Jalan Kendeth is roused to anger it’s best to flee, whatever your number. If you’re eight.”

— Mark Lawrence