Cruel waste

Damnable altogether, cruel waste of good womanhood, but what would you do? Better one should go than two, and greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down someone else’s life for his own.



Flashman on the March, p.141, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, cruel.

Something about slaves

“ . . . but I’ll tell you something about slaves: however devoted and loving and like bloody spaniels they seem, they never forgive their owners for owning ’em.”


Flashman on the March, pp.86-7, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, slavery.

Try a little tenderness

      She took her lower lip gently in her teeth — a tiny gesture of puzzlement which has been turning my heart over since 1839.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.232, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, heart.

A near thing

      I love her dearly, far beyond any creature I’ve ever known, and I can prove it, for never once in almost seventy years of married life have I taken her by the throat. Mind you, it’s been a near thing, once or twice.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.232, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, throat.

A loving couple

. . . she had suddenly dropped him like a hot rivet, even cut him dead in the Row. I never knew why, and didn't inquire; the less I knew of her transgressions (and she of mine) the better — I reckon that's why we've always been such a loving couple.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.224, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, couple.

Babbling Brooke

. . . Daisy, who was known as Babbling Brooke, was a sort of mad socialist — even today, when she's Countess of Warwick, no less, she still raves in a ladylike way about the workers, enough said. At the time of Tranby she was a stunning looker, rich as Croesus, randy as a rabbit, and Prince Bertie's mount of the moment — indeed, I ain’t sure she wasn't the love of his life . . .

Flashman and the Tiger, p.223, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Beats a flat white

…coffee Arabi style — black as night, sweet as love, hot as hell…


Flashman and the Tiger, p.33, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Play it easy and modest

…I watched with approval, for I knew this game of old, having played it myself a hundred times in the days when I was being hero-worshipped. It’s almost a ritual: they flatter you by praising your words or actions, and you play it easy and modest, but just giving a hint every now and then, in a humorous way, what a desperate fellow you are, because that’s what they love above all.


Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, pp.214-15, Harper Collins, 1995.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, hero.

Savage females of the species

… I say this without conceit, since it ain’t my doing — while civilized women have been more than ordinarily partial to me, my most ardent admirers have been the savage females of the species. Take the captain of Gezo’s Amazons, for example, who’d ogled me so outrageously during the death-house feast; or Sonsee-array the Apache (my fourth wife, in a manner of speaking); or Queen Ranavalona, who’d once confessed shyly that when I died she intended to have part of me pickled in a bottle, and worshipped; or Lady Caroline Lamb — the Dahomey slave, not the other one, who was before my time. Yes, I’ve done well among the barbarian ladies. Elspeth, of course, is Scottish.



Flashman and the Dragon, p.81, Fontana Paperback edition, 1986.


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Flashman from the heart

      I thought of her finger, under that crushing boot, of the way she’d stood up in the bushes and walked straight out, of the bruising ride from Antan’, of all she’d endured since Singapore – and I didn’t feel ashamed, exactly, because you know it ain’t my line. But I felt my eyes sting, and I lifted her chin with my hand.
      ‘Old girl,’ says I, ‘you’re a trump.’

Flashman's Lady, p.284, Pan edition, 1979.

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Shelley or one of those chaps

…the blighter was really mad about her, and not just to board and scuttle her, either, but with all the pure, romantic trimmings, like Shelley or one of those chaps. astonishing – well, I love her myself, always have, but not to put me off my food.

Flashman's Lady, p.197, Pan edition, 1979.

Tags:Flashman, Flashman quotes, love.

Speak not of love Flashy

      ‘What did you ever know of love?’ cries he. ‘Let me hear that word on your lips again, and I’ll have them sewn together, with a scorpion in your mouth!’
      Well, when he put it like that, I saw there was no point in arguing.

Flashman's Lady, p.190, Pan edition, 1979.

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A quick look

I was roaring above the noise, at her, swearing I loved her and that she could still save herself, and she shot me a quick look as she took the mare’s bridle – just for an instant, but it’s stayed with me for fifty years, and you may think me an old fool and fanciful, but I’ll swear there were tears in her eyes…

Flashman in the Great Game, pp.314-5, Pan edition, 4th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes, look.

All men fear

It is no sin to be fearful, any more than it is a sin to be one-legged or red-haired. All men fear – even Yakub and Kutebar and all of them. To conquer fear, some need love, and some hate, and some greed, and some even – hasheesh.

Flashman at the Charge, pp.283-4, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes,fear, sin.

Near to worship

I can say that from that night on, as long as I knew her, she treated me with something near to worship. Which shows you how stupid a love-struck young woman can be.

Royal Flash, p.173, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1978.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

A sure sign

I wondered if I was falling in love with her, and decided that I was, and that I didn’t care, anyway – which is a sure sign.

Flashman, p.256, Pan edition, 12th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

Elspeth smiling

But it stayed with me, that queer, empty feeling in my inside, and of all the recollections of my life there isn't one that is clearer than of that warm evening by the Clyde, with Elspeth smiling at me beneath the trees.





Flashman, p.58, Pan edition, 12th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Elspeth, Clyde.