Key Insights & Memorable Quotes
Below are the most popular and impactful highlights and quotes from The City of Brass:
“Greatness takes time, Banu Nahida. Often the mightiest things have the humblest beginnings.”
“In what world do men and women pay the same price for passion?”
“You're some kind of thief, then?""That a very narrow-minded way of looking at it. I prefer to think of myself as a merchant of delicate tasks.”
“Nahri always smiled at her marks.”
“I'm coming back, Nahri," he promised. "You're my Banu Nahida. This is my city." His expression was defiant. "Nothing will keep me from either of you.”
“Someone steals from me, I steal from others, and I'm sure the people I stole from will eventually take something that doesn't belong to them. It's a circle. - Nahri”
“Can I swim?” he snapped, as if the very idea offended him. "Can you burn?”
“It's not haunted". Wajed countered. "It simply... misses its founding family.""The stairs vanished under me the last time I was there, uncle," Ali pointed out. "The water in the fountains turns to blood so often than people don't drink it.""So it misses them a lot.”
“Eat you?" He made a disgusted sound. "The smell of your blood alone is enough to put me off eating for a month.”
“It looked like the type of place people came to be forgotten”
“So you're telling me I should hide my kebabs? - Nahri”
“Praise be to God, have I actually silenced you for once? I should have accused you of treason earlier in our conversation and saved myself your insufferable comments.”
“To keep walking a path between loyalty to your family and loyalty to what you know is right. One of these days, you’re going to have to make a choice.”
“When the Franks and Turks weren't fighting over Egypt, the only thing they seemed to agree on was that the Egyptians couldn't govern it themselves. God forbid. It's not as though the Egyptians were the inheritors of a great civilization whose mighty monuments still littered the land. Oh, no. They were peasants, superstitious fools who ate too many beans”
“Judging from the screams of the mob, Nahri suspected animating winged lions that breathed flames was not a regular occurrence to the djinn world.”
“I'm not sleeping alongside you in some temple dedicated to fish orgies.”
“So you just live quietly with these powers?" he demanded. "Haven't you ever wondered why you have them? Suleiman's eye... you could be overthrowing governments, and instead you steal from peasants!”
“You're young," he said quietly. "You have no experience with what happens to people like us during a war. People who are different.”
“Because I am shafit. That I can wield my magic better than a pureblood, that the sheikh here could spin intellectual circles around the scholars of the Royal Library - that is proof that we're not so different from the rest o f you." He glared at Ali. "It's not a thin I mean to hide.”
“He snatched up the reins again, holding her tight. There was nothing affectionate or remotely romantic about the gesture; it was desperation, like a man clinging to a ledge. "We run.”
“Scattered minds are the enemy of magic.”
“The bow in hand, he finally staggered up and glanced down the alley, obviously searching for whoever had – what had he said? – ‘called’ him? Though he didn’t look much taller than her, the vast array of weapons – enough to fight a whole troop of French soldiers – was terrifying and slightly ridiculous. Like what a little boy might don to pretend to be some ancient warrior.A warrior. Oh, by the Most High… He was looking for her. Nahri was the one who had called him.”
“Often the mightiest things have the humblest beginnings.”
“Find out what you really are, what really exists in this world. Come to Daevabad where even a drop of Nahid blood will bring you honor and wealth beyond your imagining. Your own infirmary, the knowledge of a thousand previous healers at your fingertips. Respect.”
“She can help with your economic policies when you're king.""Yes, that's just what every man dreams of in a wife”
“Do you like your men tall, dark, and hostile?”
“He looks like he belongs here, she thought. Like a ghost forgotten in time, searching for its long dead-companions.”
“Oh, calm down, Sheikh." Zaynab shivered. "It's cold up here.""Cold? We're djinn! You are literally created from fire.”
“realize how different she was from the people around her, like being the only sighted person in a world of the blind.”
“It's not as though the Egyptians were the inheritors of a great civilization whose mighty monuments still littered the land. Oh, no. They were peasants, superstitious fools who ate too many beans.”
