The Changeling
Quotes
Chapter 1
“this little scarecrow by the desk”
“amusement, like suffering, must never be shown”
“pompous bore”
Chapter 2
“she didn’t have two children, she had three”
“You dream too much about what should be, Charlie; you don’t see what really is”
Chapter 3
“Pity was never shown by him, only comradeship”
“Never to whine; to accept what came; to wait for better” (page 18)
“So far he had preserved this lonely independence”
“You’ll gang to hell in your ain way”
Chapter 4
“if he were to be grateful to anyone, his confidence in himself would be destroyed”
Chapter 6
“He’s laughing at us all the time”
Chapter 8
“Here he was arrived in his kingdom,”
(the white roses) “they symbolised for Charlie his country’s sad harsh history”
Chapter 9
“it was beginning to thaw, against his wish, threatening his whole carefully built up system of self-sufficiency” (of Tom’s heart)
Chapter 10
“she would have to try to be warmer towards him”
Chapter 11
“I saw you stealing”
Chapter 12
“This boy has bewitched us all”
“Either our daughter’s a nasty spiteful liar, or Tom Curdie’s a thief”
“Mary, if he goes, I go too.”
“he would depend on Mary’s advice and judgement”
Chapter 13
“There’s a fog of doubt and suspicion and distrust in this house.”
“Changeling,” he muttered. “Changeling.”
Chapter 14
“A sense of strangeness possessed and frightened him.”
Chapter 15
“he could not go back to his old life, he had left Donaldson’s Court forever.”
“He would be amidst what he wanted, and yet never be able to obtain it.”
Chapter 16
“It’s only a place with a fine viewpoint,” he murmured. (Charlie on Canada Hill.)
“We’ll send him away and forget him.”
“a failed experiment”
“love had failed amongst them”
Chapter 18
“his compassion was academic…and his love was cowardly.”
“the thief, liar, betrayer, changeling.” (Charlie on Tom.)
“Where have I to go?” “I canna go there.”
“a feeling of profoundest complicity with Tom.” (Gillian on Tom.)
Chapter 19
“He seemed to her under some kind of doom”
Chapter 20
“this bloodsucking witch from slumdom” (Queenie Curdie)
“he’s my ain son, but I hae never understood him”
Chapter 21
“a’ the time his he’rt’s been breaking” (Queenie on Tom)
“he had done the boy more harm than good”
“we’ve found him sly, secretive and deceitful”
Chapter 22
“there was nowhere she could advise him to go”
“She felt not only pity and love from him…but also complicity”
“his face glimmering like the skull they had found on the hill”