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Goldman presents the novel as a good parts abridgement of a novel written (and then translated into English) by S. Morgenstern, a native of the novels fictional country of Florin.
The film version, also written by Goldman, and directed and cast marvelously well, was exceptionally true to the book, including the surrounding story of an old man reading to a sick child. Having the film, I neglected to re-read the book for too long. Now I find that some of the best passages are exactly those parts that couldnt fit into the film, no matter how faithful the adaptation.
I recommend the book. If you have enjoyed the film, I recommend the book all the more strongly: if you dont read it, youre still missing out! I hope these quotes give you some idea why.
The Princess Bride
S. Morgensterns Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure
Copyright © 1973 by William Goldman
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Youre always thinking, Billy. You just werent thinking about the reading test.
I could only nod.
What was it this time?
[...]
Bronko Nagurski. Hes a football player. A great football player, and the paper last night said he might come back and play for the Bears again. He retired when I was little but if he came back and I could get someone to take me to a game, I could see him play and maybe if whoever took me also knew him, I could meet him after and maybe if he was hungry, I might let him have a sandwich I might have brought with me. I was trying to figure out what kind of sandwich Bronko Nagurski would like.
She just sagged at her desk. Youve got a wonderful imagination, Billy.
I dont know what I said. Probably thank you or something.
| Topic: Teachers
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Who can know when his world is going to change? Who can tell before it happens, that every prior experience, all the years, were a preparation for . . . nothing. Picture this now: an all-but-illiterate old man struggling with an enemy tongue, an all-but-exhausted young boy fighting against sleep. And nothing between them but the words of another alien, painfully translated from native sounds to foreign. Who could suspect that in the morning a different child would wake? I remember, for myself, only trying to beat back fatigue. Even a week later I was not aware of what had begun that night, the doors that were slamming shut while others slid into the clear. Perhaps I should have at least known something, but maybe not; who can sense revelation in the wind?
What happened was just this: I got hooked on the story.
For the first time in my life, I became actively interested in a book. Me the sports fanatic, me the game freak, me the only ten-year-old in Illinois with a hate on for the alphabet wanted to know what happened next.
| Topics: Books (general) Stories
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Never argue with your wife about hostility when shes a certified Freudian.
| Topic: Freud
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I never was worth beans at self-scrutiny. Everything I write is impulse. This feels right, that sounds wronglike that. I cant analyzenot my own actions anyway.
I know I dont expect this to change anybody elses life the way it altered mine.
But take the title wordstrue love and high adventureI believed in that once. I thought my life was going to follow that path. Prayed that it would. Obviously it didnt, but I dont think theres high adventure left any more. Nobody takes out a sword nowadays and cries, Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father; prepare to die!
And true love you can forget about too. [...] (Sorry about that, Helen.)
Anyway, heres the good parts version. S. Morgenstern wrote it. And my father read it to me. And now I give it to you. What you do with it will be of more than passing interest to us all.
| Topics: Writing
Adventure
| One
The Bride |
The old man nodded. Now I can die.
She glanced at him. Dont. Her tone was surprisingly tender, and probably she sensed how important he really was to her, because when he did die, two years further on, she went right after, and most of the people who knew her well agreed it was the sudden lack of opposition that undid her.
| Topic: Marriage
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Did you forget to pay your taxes? (This was after taxes. But everything is after taxes. Taxes were here even before stew.)
| Topic: Taxes
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I have stayed these years in my hovel because of you. I have taught myself languages because of you. I have made my body strong because I thought you might be pleased by a strong body. I have lived my life with only the prayer that some sudden dawn you might glance in my direction. I have not known a moment in years when the sight of you did not send my heart careening against my rib cage. I have not known a night when your visage did not accompany me to sleep. There has not been a morning when you did not flutter behind my waking eyelids . . . Is any of this getting through to you, Buttercup, or do you want me to go on for a while?
Never stop.
There has not been
If youre teasing me, Westley, Im just going to kill you.
How can you even dream I might be teasing?
Well, you havent once said you loved me.
| Topic: Romance
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There have been five great kisses since 1642 B.C., when Saul and Delilah Korns inadvertent discovery swept across Western civilization. (Before then couples hooked thumbs.) And the precise rating of kisses is a terribly difficult thing, often leading to great controversy, because although everyone agrees with the formula of affection times purity times intensity times duration, no one has ever been completely satisfied with how much weight each element should receive. But on any system, there are five that everyone agrees deserve full marks.
Well, this one left them all behind.
| Topic: Kisses
| Three
The Courtship |
In any case, the two countries had stayed alive over the centuries mainly by warring on each other. There had been the Olive War, the Tuna Fish Discrepancy, which almost bankrupted both nations, the Roman Rift, which did send them both into insolvency, only to be followed by the Discord of the Emeralds, in which they both got rich again, chiefly by banding together for a brief period and robbing everybody within sailing distance.
| Topic: War
| Five
The Announcement |
This was long after hairdressers; in truth, ever since there have been women, there have been hairdressers, Adam being the first, though the King James scholars do their very best to muddy this point.
| Topic: Scripture
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Domingo Montoya was funny-looking and crotchety and impatient and absent-minded and never smiled.
Inigo loved him. Totally. Dont ask why. There really wasnt any one reason you could put your finger on. Oh, probably Domingo loved him back, but love is many things, none of them logical.
| Topic: Love
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Although I die in your hut, and although it is your own stubborn fault that causes my ceasing, in other words, even though you are killing me, dont think twice about it. I love you as I always have and God forbid your conscience should give you any trouble. He pulled open his coat, brought the knife closer, closer. The pain is worse than I imagined! Yeste cried.
How can it hurt when the point of the weapon is still an inch away from your belly? Domingo asked.
Im anticipating, dont bother me, let me die unpestered.
| Topic: Suicide
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Because, my friend Yeste, you are very famous and very rich, and so you should be, because you make wonderful weapons. But you must also make them for any fool who happens along. I am poor, and no one knows me in all the world except you and Inigo, but I do not have to suffer fools.
You are an artist, Yeste said.
No. Not yet. A craftsman only. But I dream to be an artist. I pray that someday, if I work with enough care, if I am very very lucky, I will make a weapon that is a work of art. Call me an artist then, and I will answer.
| Topic: Artists
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He would find the six-fingered man. He would go up to him. He would say simply, Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die, and then, oh then, the duel.
It was a lovely plan, really. Simple, direct. No frills. In the beginning, Inigo had all kinds of wild vengeance notions, but gradually, simplicity had seemed the better way. Originally, he had all kinds of little plays worked out in his mindthe enemy would weep and beg, the enemy would cringe and cry, the enemy would bribe and slobber and act in every way unmanly. But eventually, these too gave way in his mind to simplicity: the enemy would simply say, Oh yes, I remember killing him; Id be only too delighted to kill you too.
| Topic: Vengeance
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That explains it. Actually, of course, it didnt explain anything, but whenever doctors are confused about something, which is really more frequently than any of us would do well to think about, they always snatch at something in the vicinity of the case and add, That explains it.
| Topic: Medicine
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I always think everything is a trap until proven otherwise, the Prince answered. Which is why Im still alive.
| Six
The Festivities |
What happens here that you arent going to read is the six-page soliloquy from Inigo in which Morgenstern, through Inigo, reflects on the anguish of fleeting glory. The reason for the soliloquy here is that Morgensterns previous book had gotten bombed by the critics and also hadnt sold beans.
| Topic: Authors
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[...] Inigo would say barrel and Fezzik right quick would come back carol and maybe they would sing a little something until Inigo said serenade and you couldnt stump Fezzik with one that easy because of centigrade and then Inigo would make a word about the weather and Fezzik would rhyme it [...]
| Topic: Rhyming
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I said, How do you mean?
And thats when she put her book down. And looked at me. And said it: Life isnt fair, Bill. We tell our children that it is, but its a terrible thing to do. Its not only a lie, its a cruel lie. Life is not fair, and it never has been, and its never going to be.
Would you believe that for me right then it was like one of those comic books where the light bulb goes on over Mandrake the Magicians head? It isnt! I said, so loud I really startled her. Youre right. Its not fair. I was so happy if Id known how to dance, Id have started dancing. Isnt that great, isnt it just terrific? I think along about here Edith must have thought I was well on my way toward being bonkers.
But it meant so much to me to have it said and out and free and flyingthat was the discontent I endured the night my father stopped reading, I realized right then. That was the reconciliation I was trying to make and couldnt.
And thats what I think this books about. All those Columbia experts can spiel all they want about the delicious satire; theyre crazy. This book says, life isnt fair and Im telling you, one and all, you better believe it. [...]
Look. (Grownups skip this paragraph.) Im not about to tell you this book has a tragic ending, I already said in the very first line how it was my favorite in all the world. But theres a lot of bad stuff coming up, torture youve already been prepared for, but theres worse. Theres death coming up, and you better understand this: some of the wrong people die. Be ready for it. This isnt Curious George Uses the Potty. Nobody warned me and it was my own fault (youll see what I mean in a little) and that was my mistake, so Im not letting it happen to you. The wrong people die, some of them, and the reason is this: life is not fair. Forget all the garbage your parents put out. Remember Morgenstern. Youll be a lot happier.
Okay. Enough. Back to the next. Nightmare time.
| Topic: Humanity
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Im fascinated to see what happens, the Count went on. Which pain will be least endurable? The physical, or the mental anguish of having freedom offered if the truth is told, then telling it and being thought a liar.
| Topic: Torture
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Is he really so wonderful, this Westley of yours?
Not so much wonderful as perfect, she replied. Kind of flawless. More or less magnificent. Without blemish. Rather on the ideal side. She looked at the Prince. Am I being helpful?
I think emotions are clouding your objectivity just a bit. Do you actually think that there is nothing the fellow cant do?
Buttercup thought for a while. Its not so much that theres nothing he cant do; its more that he can do it all better than anybody else can do it.
[...]
Well, why dont we just begin our letter with Divine Westley, and appeal to his sense of modesty, the Prince suggested.
Buttercup began to write, stopped. Does divine begin de or di?
| Topic: Heroes
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I think pain is the most underrated emotion available to us, the Count said. The Serpent, to my interpretation, was pain. Pain has been with us always, and it always irritates me when people say as important as life and death because the proper phrase, to my mind, should be, as important as pain and death.
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I understand everything, he said.
You understand nothing, but it really doesnt matter, since what you mean is, youre glad to see me, just as Im glad to see you because no more loneliness.
Thats what I mean, said Fezzik.
| Topic: Friendship
| Seven
The Wedding |
Sonny, dont you tell me whats worth whiletrue love is the best thing in the world, except for cough drops. Everybody knows that.
| Topic: Amusing one-liners
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One last thing: Hiram, my editor, felt the Miracle Max section was too Jewish in sound, too contemporary. I really let him have it on that one; its a very sore point with me, because, just to take one example, there was a line in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid where Butch said, I got vision and the rest of the world wears bifocals, and one of my genius producers said, That lines got to go; I dont put my name on this movie with that line in it, and I said why and he said, They didnt talk like that then; its anachronistic. I remember explaining, Ben Franklin wore bifocalsTy Cobb was batting champion of the American League when these guys were aroundmy mother was alive when these guys were alive and she wore bifocals. We shook hands and ended enemies but the line stayed in the picture.
And so here the point is, if Max and Valerie sound Jewish, why shouldnt they? You think a guy named Simon Morgenstern was Irish Catholic?
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As a matter of fact, everything Morgenstern wrote is historically accurate; read any decent book on Florinese history.
| Eight
Honeymoon |
I suppose I was dying again, so I asked the Lord of Permanent Affection for the strength to live the day. Clearly, the answer came in the affirmative.
I didnt know there was such a Fellow, Buttercup said.
Neither did I, in truth, but if He didnt exist, I didnt much want to either.
| Topic: Gods
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To be together. Until one of us dies.
Ive done that already, and I havent the slightest intention of ever doing it again, Westley said.
Buttercup looked at him. Dont we sort of have to sometime?
Not if we promise to outlive each other, and I make that promise now.
Buttercup looked at him. Oh my Westley, so do I.
And they lived happily ever after, my father said.
| Topic: Death
| text checked (see note) Jan 2006
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Graphics copyright © 2006 by Hal Keen
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