“ ‘Since your work is terrorism, that’s the most extreme argument for crime I’ve ever heard. You’re eschewing all personal responsibility. It’s as bad as those who sacrifice their personal will into the gloomy morasses of the unknowable will of some unnameable god. If you suppress the idea of personhood then you suppress the notion of individual culpability.’ ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150317 @ 1800
“ ‘Hah! You the most individual, the most separate, the most real . . .’ ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150317 @ 1200
“ ‘Ah—now I’ve heard the word I never expected to hear you say.”
“Denial? Sin?”
“No. We.”
“I don’t know why—”
“The lone dissenter at Crage Hall turns institutional? A company gal? A team player? Our former Miss Queen of Solitaire?”
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150317 @ 0600
“ ‘Fiyero’s capacity for evil is in believing too strenuously in a capacity for good.”
“And yours?”
“Mine is in thinking in epigrams.’
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150316 @ 1800
“ ‘I thought you were fond of her!”
“Don’t you know affection when you see it?” scoffed Elphaba. “I love Nessie. She’s a pain in the neck, she’s intolerably righteous, she’s a nasty piece of work. I’m devoted to her.”
“She’ll be the Eminent Thropp.”
“Better she than I,” said Elphaba dryly. “For one thing, she has great taste in shoes.’
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150316 @ 1200
“ ‘So, my dear, you don’t care where he is, or what happens to him now?”
“How can you say that?” She sat up, steaming. “I love the mad old tunnel-visioned bastard. He really believed in what he preached. He even thought that a Quadling corpse found floating faceup in a brackwater pond—provided it had a tattoo of conversion on it somewhere—was better off than a survivor. He felt he’d written a single ticket to the Other Land assembly of the Unnamed God. I think he considered it work well done.’
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150316 @ 0600
“ ‘No, Papa isn’t there now, thank—thank whoever, whatever, thank nothing,” continued Elphaba. ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150315 @ 1800
“ ‘Yes. But things are not always as they seem. And it has been clear for some time that the Wizard’s bag of tricks would not do forever. There are bound to be popular uprisings—the stupid, senseless kind, in which strong dumb people enjoy getting killed for the sake of political changes that’ll be rolled back within the decade. Adds such meaning to meaningless lives, don’t you think? One can’t imagine any other reason for it… ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150315 @ 1200
“ Without him we’d have been swept away in firestorm, years ago. We can but be grateful. A strong fist does wonders in a rotten situation. Walk softly but carry a bit stick. I see I offend. Well, a man is always good for the public face of power, no? ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150313 @ 1800
“ Glinda suspected that Nessarose might develop a knack for being witheringly superior. She winced in advance, even while taking Nessarose’s suggestion to heart. ”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150313 @ 1200
“ ‘We were talking about your childhood,” said Glinda.
“Well that’s it, that’s all part of it. You can’t divorce your particulars from politics,” Elphaba said. “You want to know what we ate? How we played?’
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150313 @ 0600
“ ..Myself, I think it’s a part of the Lurlinist cycle that’s gotten detached and developed independently. Arrant nonsense. We have no proof that magic is so strong—”
“We have no proof that god is so strong,” interrupted Tibbett.
“Which strikes me as being as good an argument against god as it is against magic,” said Elphaba, “but never mind that…
”
— Gregory Maguire (Wicked: Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked Years) )
20150312 @ 1800