Flashman and the avoidance of Powerpoint

. . . I tried to run, my wounded leg gave way beneath me, and I went head-first into a large rock by the wayside and lost all interest in the proceedings.



Flashman on the March, p.265, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


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Fretful followers

He was back at dawn with his fretful followers, several hundred of ’em; they tried to break out of Magdala by the back door, which would have meant a terrifying descent of the Sangalat cliffs in pitch darkness, if they’d been mad enough to attempt it. They’d been discouraged by the presence of Gallas who were waiting for them at the foot of the precipice chanting, “Come down, beloved, oh come down!” I must say I liked the Gallas’ style.


Flashman on the March, p.260, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


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A fleeing Flashy

Ask any man who’s been hit foursquare by a fleeing Flashy, fourteen stone of terrified bone and muscle, and he’ll agree that it’s a moving experience . . .



Flashman on the March, p.240, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


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Over the wall

They’d been my associates in a botched attempt to rescue Max on the eve of his execution. We’d failed because (you’ll hardly credit this) the great clown had refused point-blank to escape because it didn’t sort with his imperial dignity, Austro-Hungarian royalty preferring to die than go over the wall.


Flashman on the March, p.5, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


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Team, driver and all

Half a dozen fugitives had the same notion, and one, a sergeant gunner, was half-aboard the beast. “Mine, damn you!” roars he, “She can’t take two!”
       “Right you are, my son,” says I, and knocked him flying. I got a limb across that heaving bare back — and that’s all I ever needed. Thank God I’ve never seen the mount I couldn’t master; I wound my hands into the mane, dug in my heels, and went head down for the ravine, just as the gun I had lately left went careering into it — team, driver and all.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.279, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Prefer to substitute

     Somewhere or other that downy bird Kipling observes that the lesson of the island race is to put away all emotion and entrap the alien at the proper time.* I learned it in my cradle, long before he wrote it, and have practised it all my life with some success, and only this difference, that for “entrap” I prefer to substitute “escape”.

* Footnote 16: The quotation is from "In Ambush", in Stalky & Co.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.89, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Duty and desperate notions

‘Silence, Ryan! says I. ‘I won’t hear of it.’ [an escape attempt] This was one of these dangerous bastards, I could see, full of duty and desperate notions.

Flashman at the Charge, p.121, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes,duty.

To do list

Now all that remained to be done was for me to sell a runaway slave and arrange for us to get out of town without any holes in our hides. Easy enough, you may think, for a chap of Flashy’s capabilities, and I’ll admit your confidence wouldn’t be misplaced.

Flash For Freedom!, p.208, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

Fast moves

   ‘My God!’ he cries. ‘Betrayed!’
    Well, I’d heard the same sort of exclamation before, and I’ve heard it since, and there’s no doubt it’s unnerving. But I doubt if there’s a man living who can move faster with his pants round his ankles than I can…

Flash For Freedom!, p.187, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1980.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.