Boys play with death as though it were a game, cutting their teeth on daggers.
“HECUBA: I had a knife in my skirt, Achilles. When Talthybius bent over me, I could have killed him. I wanted to. I had the knife just for that reason. Yet, at the last minute I thought, he's some m...”
“(ghost of)ACHILLES: How can I force obedience on this? In other times I've used the fear of death to make a woman bow herself to me. If not the fear of her own death, then fear for someone else, a ...”
“Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of wi...”
“My dear,Find what you love and let it kill you.Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness.Let it kill you and let it devour your remains....”
“If you gave someone your heart and they died, did they take it with them? Did you spend the rest of forever with a hole inside you that couldn't be filled?”
“There comes a point when you win, and you can either soothe the loser into thinking there was something in it for them or kick them while they're down to make sure they know what just happened.”
“Any game where the goal is to build territory has to be beautiful. There may be phases of combat, but they are only means to an end, to allow your territory to survive. One of the most extraordinar...”
“He told us that nations of men fell into disorder, so nations of law were set up instead. He told us that nations of law then forgot justice and let the law become a Game, a Game in which the moves...”