Dalgliesh Quotes & Sayings

I stood in the rain, watching his car go. A string tied to it looped around my heart and pulled tighter and tighter until it sheared clean through. — Leah Raeder

He didn't want her; he wanted me. Well, you know how it is.
Dalgliesh did know. This, after all, was the commonest, the most banal of personal tragedies. You loved someone. They didn't love you. Worse still, in defiance of their own best interests and to the destruction of your peace, they loved another. What would half the world's poets and novelists do without this universal tragicomedy? — P.D. James

If our reputation rests on the decisions we make, then Abishag has impeccable taste. If fragrance is worn to make a personal statement, then the unchosen Abishag has publicly proclaimed her allegiance. She has put on the scent of her lord, for her lord. She belongs to him. Every facet of her character proclaims rejection of other, so-called, 'shepherds.' Whether he chooses her, or not, she has chosen him.
pg 36 — Michael Ben Zehabe

And ask them about the town that was by the sea - when they transgressed in [the matter of] the sabbath - when their fish came to them openly on their sabbath day, and the day they had no sabbath they did not come to them. Thus did We give them trial because they were defiantly disobedient. — Qur'an

What about his style?" asked Dalgliesh who was beginning to think that his reading had been unnecessarily restricted.
"Turgid but grammatical. And, in these days, when every illiterate debutante thinks she is a novelist, who am I to quarrel with that? Written with Fowler on his left hand and Roget on his right. Stale, flat and, alas, rapidly becoming unprofitable ... "
"What was he like as a person?" asked Dalgliesh.
"Oh, difficult. Very difficult, poor fellow! I thought you knew him? A precise, self-opinionated, nervous little man perpetually fretting about his sales, his publicity or his book jackets. He overvalued his own talent and undervalued everyone else's, which didn't exactly make for popularity."
"A typical writer, in fact?" suggested Dalgliesh mischievously. — P.D. James

If you're going to play a character who has a deformed face, you should have a deformed face. — Vanessa Paradis

The English, thought Kate, obviously regarded praying much as they did a necessary physical function, something best done in private. Dalgliesh apologized for interrupting her work: We're police officers and I'm afraid we're here on police business. Were you — P.D. James

Snapping shut his mobile, Dalgliesh reflected that murder, a unique crime for which no reparation is ever possible, imposes it own compulsions as well as it's conventions. He doubted whether Macklefield [the murder victim's Will attorney] would have interrupted his country weekend for a less sensational crime. As a young officer he, too, had been touched, if unwillingly and temporarily, by the power of murder to attract even while it appalled and repelled. He had watched how people involved as innocent bystanders, provided they were unburdened by grief or suspicion, were engrossed by homicide, drawn inexorably to the place where the crime had occurred in fascinated disbelief. The crowd and the media who served them had not yet congregated outside the wrought-iron gates of the Manor. But they would come, and he doubted whether Chandler-Powell's [owner of the Manor where the murder was committed] private security team would be able to do more than inconvenience them. — P.D. James

If we manage to last in spite of everything, it is because our infirmities are so many and so contradictory that they cancel each other out. — Emile M. Cioran

Being a reporter took me out of myself and that shaped me as a writer. — Tom Barbash

See, Cletus has this thing for cheese, but since he has no thumbs he has to have me give him his cheese on his food every night. If I die, no one else knows about Cletus and the cheese, and poor old Cletus would lose his mind. So I can't die until he does. See how that works? (Jack) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

To be afraid and to be brave is the best kind of courage of all. — Alice Dalgliesh

Acting is everybody's favorite second job. — Jack Nicholson

What the future held for her she didn't know. Of two things only she was certain. There would be children-her own or other people's-and there would be books. — Alice Dalgliesh

If I get to be a legend, I've achieved my goal. — Usain Bolt

Dalgliesh was too experienced to assume that fear implied guilt; it was often the most innocent who were the most terrified. — P.D. James

Writing humor is not something every single person can do. — Celia Rivenbark

Dalgliesh reflected that one of the minor hazards of a murder investigation was the inordinate amount of caffeine he was expected to consume. But he wanted the interview to be as informal as possible, and food or drink always helped. — P.D. James

Great leaders are inspired by a challenge, a need, a problem, an issue that needs to be corrected. — Del Suggs

Friends have ways of speaking without words. — Alice Dalgliesh

You have two choices," Vance said.
I stopped in the doorway to the hall and put my hands on my hips.
"And those would be?" I asked.
"We can talk or we can f**k."
My eyes rounded. Then they narrowed. I didn't answer.
"Though," he went on, "I should tell you even if you pick talking, after we're done, we're still gonna f**k."
I frowned at him and leaned in. "You are too much," I snapped.
He ignored my threatening posture. "You don't chose, I will, and I'll pick f**king. We can talk after. — Kristen Ashley

Friends have a way of speaking without words. — Alice Dalgliesh

SIR DANIEL was a large man, broad of shoulder ... his eyes were rather small above the double pouches and the look they fixed on Dalgliesh gave nothing away. Looking at his bland, unrevealing face sparked off for Dalgliesh a childhood memory. A multi-millionaire, in an age when a million meant something, had been brought to dinner at the rectory by a local landowner who was one of his father's churchwardens. He too had been a big man, affable an easy guest. The fourteen-year-old Adam [Dalgliesh] had been disconcerted to discover during the dinner conversation that he was rather stupid. He had then learned that the ability to make a great deal of money in a particular way is a talent highly advantageous to it possessor and possibly beneficial to others, but implies no virtue, wisdom or intelligence beyond expertise in a lucrative field. — P.D. James

The foundation of a disciplined life is integrity and doing what we say we're going to do. — Rory Vaden

I'm looking forward to playing against all of them. I think all of them are great, they all have experience and they all are starters. It's going to be fun to go up against them. — Jadeveon Clowney