English Patient

Caravaggio:
In Italy, there's always chickens, but no eggs. In Africa there's eggs, but never chickens. Who separated them?

Almásy:
I fear Madox knows about us, he keeps mentioning Anna Karenina

Madox:
I have to teach myself not to read too much into everything. It comes from too long having to read so much into hardly anything at all.

Almásy:
Swoon, I'll catch you.

Almásy:
This... this, the hollow at the base of a woman's throat, does it have an official name?

Madox:
Good God, man, pull yourself together.

Almásy:
There is no God... but I hope someone looks after you.

Madox:
Just in case you're interested, it's called the suprasternal notch. Come and visit us in Dorset when all this nonsense is over.

Madox:
You'll never come to Dorset.

Almásy:
What do you love?

Katharine Clifton:
What do I love?

Almásy:
Say everything.

Katharine Clifton:
Water, with fish in it. Hedgehogs, I love hedgehogs. Marmite. Baths, but not with other people! Islands. I could go on all day.

Almásy:
Go on all day.

Katharine Clifton:
Your handwriting.

Almásy:
And what else?

Katharine Clifton:
A husband.

Almásy:
What do you hate most?

Katharine Clifton:
A lie. What do you hate most?

Almásy:
Ownership. Being owned. What you leave here you should forget me.

Almásy:
It is a very plum plum.

Almásy:
I just wanted you to know: I'm not missing you yet.

Katharine Clifton:
You will.

Caravaggio:
Ask your saint who he is. Ask him who he's killed.

Almásy:
When were you most happy?

Katharine Clifton:
Now.

Almásy:
When were you least happy?

Katharine Clifton:
Now.

Almásy:
Ownership. I hate being owned.

Almásy:
I once traveled with a guide who was taking me to Faya. He didn't speak for nine hours. At the end of it he pointed to the horizon and said, "Faya!" That was a good day.

Katharine Clifton:
I'm impressed you can sew.

Almásy:
Good.

Katharine Clifton:
You sew very badly.

Almásy:
Well, you don't sew at all.

Katharine Clifton:
A woman should never learn to sew, and if she can she shouldn't admit to it.

Katharine Clifton:
Do you think you are the only one who feels anything?

Almásy:
How can you ever smile, as if your life hadn't capsized?

Almásy:
I once heard of a captain who wore a patch over a good eye. The men fought harder for him.

Katharine Clifton:
Promise me you'll come back for me.

Almásy:
I promise, I'll come back for you. I promise, I'll never leave you.

Katharine Clifton:
Am I K in your book? I think I must be.

Almásy:
I am a just a bit of toast, my friend.

Katharine Clifton:
You speak so many bloody languages, and you never want to talk.

Katharine Clifton:
I wanted to meet the man who could write such a long paper with so few adjectives.

Hana:
There's a man downstairs. He brought us eggs. He might stay.

Almásy:
Why? Can he lay eggs?

Hana:
He's Canadian.

Almásy:
Why are people so happy when they collide with someone from the same place? What happened in Montreal when you passed a man in the street? Did you invite him to live with you?

Almásy:
There is no God, but I hope someone watches over you.

Katharine Clifton:
Will we be alright?

Almásy:
Yes. Yes, absolutely.

Katharine Clifton:
"Yes" is a comfort. "Absolutely" is not.

Katharine Clifton:
This - what is this?

Almásy:
It's a folk song.

Katharine Clifton:
Arabic.

Almásy:
No, no. It's Hungarian. My daijka sang it to me when I was a child growing up in Budapest.

Katharine Clifton:
It's beautiful. What's it about?

Almásy:
Szerelam means love. And the story, well, there's this Hungarian count. He's a wanderer. He's a fool. And for years he's on some kind of a quest for... who knows what. And then one day, he falls under the spell of a mysterious English woman. A harpy, who beats him, and hits him, he becomes her slave, and he sews her clothes, and worships...

Almásy:
Stop it! Stop it! You're always beating me!

Katharine Clifton:
Bastard! You bastard, I believed you! You should be my slave.

Almásy:
New lovers are nervous and tender, but smash everything. For the heart is an organ of fire.

Almásy:
Every night I cut out my heart. But in the morning it was full again.

Hana:
I'm not in love with him. I'm in love with ghosts... And so is he, he's in love with ghosts.

Muller:
You are a Canadian spy working for the Allies. Code-name Moose.

Katharine Clifton:
My darling. I'm waiting for you. How long is the day in the dark? Or a week? The fire is gone, and I'm horribly cold. I really should drag myself outside but then there'd be the sun. I'm afraid I waste the light on the paintings, not writing these words. We die. We die rich with lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we've entered and swum up like rivers. Fears we've hidden in - like this wretched cave. I want all this marked on my body. Where the real countries are. Not boundaries drawn on mapswith the names of powerful men. I know you'll come carry me out to the Palace of Winds. That's what I've wanted: to walk in such a place with you. With friends, on an earth without maps. The lamp has gone out and I'm writing in the darkness.

Almásy:
You're wearing the thimble.

Katharine Clifton:
Of course, you idiot. I always wear it; I've always worn it; I've always loved you.

I once traveled with a guide who was taking me to Faya. He didn't speak for nine hours. At the end of it he pointed to the horizon and said, "Faya." That was a good day.