“You English words?I know you:You are light as dreams,Tough as oak,Precious as gold,As poppies and corn,Or an old cloak:Sweet as our birdsTo the ear,As the burnet roseIn the heatOf Midsummer”

“Mrs Darley, I noticed, always had her corn dolly amidst an arrangement of cornflowers and poppies (albeit they were artificial!). The corn, I was to later understand, represented the God, the red poppies his sacrificial blood and the blue cornflowers his death and this is something I still adhere to today.”

“That's the city I see in my dreams, Poppy. It isn't like Ember at all. The sky is light and the buildings are tall and sort of sparkle." (Lina)”

“If you expect me to believe that a lawyer wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream, I must be dafter than I look.”

“Sometimes I think if I had to choose between an ear of corn or making love to a woman, I'd choose the corn.”

“Cure" is one of the most precious words in the English language. It's a short word. A clean and simple word. But it isn't so easy a thing as it sounds. There are questions like: How will this affect us in ten years? In twenty? What will it do to our children? Our children's children?”