“Galinda didn't see the verdant world through the glass of the carriage; she saw her own reflection instead. She had the nearsightedness of youth. She reasoned that because she was beautiful she was significant, though what she signified, and to whom, was not clear yet...She was, after all, on her way to Shiz because she was smart. But there was more than one way to be smart.”

“She dropped her shyness like a nightgown, and in the liquid glare of sunlight on old boards she held up her hands-as if, in the terror of the upcoming skirmish, she had at last understood that she was beautiful. In her own way.”

“Galinda didn't often stop to consider whether she believed in what she said or not; the whole point of conversations was flow.”

“I was quite a looker in my time," she said. Was she reading his mind, or only being smart, to know she must be hideous?"Oh, had they invented time as long ago as that?”

“They had ganged up on her, in the claustrophobic, loving way of families, and she wanted no more of it.”

“Indeed, she often wondered if she were dead, or dying from the inside out, and that was the root of her calm, the reason she could surrender her character.”

“So she listened hard. And she began to evolve, because stories work their magic that way. They build conviction and erode conviction in equal measure.”