Trust to luck

      There's a moment, and I've faced it more often than I care to remember, when you're rat-in-the-corner, all your wriggling and lying and imploring have failed, there's nowhere to run, and your only hope is to do your damnedest and trust to luck and every dirty dodge you know.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.148, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, luck.

True words

…the only fly in the ointment as I rolled down to Calcutta had been the discovery that during my absence from England some scribbling swine had published his reminiscences of Rugby School, with me as the villain of the piece. A vile volume entitled Tom Brown’s Schooldays, on every page of which the disgusting Flashy was to be found torturing fags, shirking, toadying, lying, whining for mercy, and boozing himself to disgraceful expulsion — every word of it true, and all the worse for that.


Flashman and the Angel of the Lord, p.23, Harper Collins, 1995.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, disgrace.

Whet your prevarications

There’s nothing more discouraging than lying to a poker face, when what you need is gasps and whistles and cries of “I’ll be damned!” and “What happened then?” to whet your prevarications.

Flashman and the Dragon, pp.36-37, Fontana Paperback edition, 1986.

Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, lying.