80+ Thomas Harris Quotes (Dark, Psychological And Thriller)

Thomas Harris is an American author who is best known for his psychological thrillers featuring the cannibalistic serial killer, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. He is also the author of the novel The Silence of the Lambs, which was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film in 1991. His other works include Red Dragon, Hannibal, and Hannibal Rising.

Top 10 Thomas Harris Quotes

1. I have no interest in understanding sheep, only eating them.
2. Human emotions are a gift from our animal ancestors. Cruelty is a gift humanity has given itself.
3. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti
4. A census taker tried to quantify me once. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a big Amarone. Go back to school, little Starling.
5. It rubs the lotion on its skin. It does this whenever it is told.
6. How seldom we recognize the sound when the bolt of our fate slides home.
7. Being smart spoils a lot of things, doesn't it?
8. Hannibal Lecter: We live in a primitive time - don't we, Will? - neither savage nor wise. Half measures are the curse of it. Any rational society would either kill me or give me my books.
9. He sees very clearly - he damn sure sees through me. It's hard to accept that someone can understand you without wishing you well. At Starling's age it hadn't happened to her much.
10. It's hard to have anything isn't it? Rare to get it, hard to keep it. This is a damn slippery planet.

Thomas Harris Short Quotes

• Nothing makes us more vulnerable than loneliness, except greed.
• Writing novels is the hardest thing I've ever done, including digging irrigation ditches.
• The very air had screams smeared on it. He flinched from the noise in this silent room.
• Life's too slippery for books, Clarice; anger appears as lust, lupus presents as hives.
• It occured to Starling how much Roden would benefit from an elbow smash in the hinge of his jaw.
• When you feel strain, keep your mouth shut if you can.
• Funerals often make us want sex-it's one in the eye for death.
• He was numb except for dreading the loss of numbness.
• Problem solving is hunting. It is savage pleasure and we are born to it.
• Nothing made me happen. I happened.

Thomas Harris Famous Quotes And Sayings

I collect church collapses, recreationally. Did you see the recent one in Sicily? Marvelous! The facade fell on sixty-five grandmothers at a special mass. Was that evil? If so, who did it? If he's up there, he just loves it, Officer Starling. Typhoid and swans - it all comes from the same place. — Thomas Harris

In her way, she was a hard one. Faith in any sort of natural justice was nothing but a night light; she knew of that. Whatever she did, she would end the same way with everyone does: flat on her back with a tube in her nose, wondering, "Is this all? — Thomas Harris

Allegra Pazzi: Dr. Fell, do you believe a man could become so obsessed with a woman, from a single encounter? Hannibal Lecter: Could he daily feel a stab of hunger for her and find nourishment in the very sight of her? I think so. But would she see through the bars of his plight and ache for him? — Thomas Harris

Did you ever think, Clarice, why the Philistines don't understand you? It's because you are the answer to Samson's riddle. You are the honey in the lion. — Thomas Harris

In making friends, she was wary of people who foster dependency and feed on it. She had been involved with a few--the blind attract them, and they are the enemy. — Thomas Harris

When Will Graham could open his right eye, he saw the clock and knew where he was- an intensive-care unit. He knew to watch the clock. Its movement assured him that this was passing, would pass. That's what it was there for. — Thomas Harris

… It is not healing to see your childhood home, but it helps you measure whether you are broken, and how and why, assuming you want to know. — Thomas Harris

But the face on the pillow, rosy in the firelight, is certainly that of Clarice Starling, and she sleeps deeply, sweetly, in the silence of the lambs. — Thomas Harris

We routinely leave our small children in day care among strangers. At the same time, in our guilt we evince paranoia about strangers and foster fear in children. — Thomas Harris

Hannibal at eighteen was rooting for Mephistopheles and contemptuous of Faust, but he only half-listened to the climax. He was watching and breathing Lady Murasaki... — Thomas Harris

The most stable elements, Clarice, appear in the middle of the periodic table, roughly between iron and silver. Between iron and silver. I think that is appropriate for you. — Thomas Harris

Shiloh isn’t haunted – men are haunted. Shiloh doesn’t care. — Thomas Harris

There is a common emotion we all recognize and have not yet named -- the happy anticipation of being able to feel contempt. — Thomas Harris

Intense fear comes in waves; the body can't stand it for long at a time. — Thomas Harris

You know how cats do. They hide to die. Dogs come home. — Thomas Harris

God's creatures who cried themselves to sleep stirred to cry again. — Thomas Harris

We rarely get to prepare ourselves in meadows or on graveled walks; we do it on short notice in places without windows, hospital corridors, rooms like this lounge with its cracked plastic sofa and Cinzano ashtrays, where the cafe curtains cover blank concrete. In rooms like this, with so little time, we prepare our gestures, get them by heart so we can do them when we're frightened in the face of Doom. — Thomas Harris

It's fear, Jack. The man deals with a huge amount of fear.' Because he got hurt?' No, not entirely. Fear comes with imagination, it's a penalty, it's the price of imagination. — Thomas Harris

One can only see what one observes, and one observes only things which are already in the mind. — Thomas Harris

Over this odd world, this half the world that's dark now, I have to hunt a thing that lives on tears. — Thomas Harris

Evil's just destructive? Then storms are evil, if it's that simple. And we have fire, and there there's hail. Underwriters lump it all under 'Acts of God. — Thomas Harris

You will not persuade me with appeals to my intellectual vanity. — Thomas Harris

Gratitude’s got a short half-life, Clarice. — Thomas Harris

Whenever feasible, one should always try to eat the rude. — Thomas Harris

What he has in addition is pure empathy and projection,” Dr. Bloom said. “He can assume your point of view, or mine – and maybe some other points of view that scare and sicken him. It’s an uncomfortable gift, Jack. Perception’s a tool that’s pointed on both ends. — Thomas Harris

I'm doing one of three things: I'm writing. I'm staring out the window. Or I'm writhing on the floor. — Thomas Harris

Back at his chair he cannot remember what he was reading. He feels the books beside him to find the one that is warm. — Thomas Harris

Ready when you are, Sergeant Pempbry. — Thomas Harris

You would think such a day would tremble to begin . . . — Thomas Harris

When the Fox hears the Rabbit scream he comes a-runnin', but not to help. — Thomas Harris

It's hard... to shake off something that's already under your skin. — Thomas Harris

The worm that destroys you is the temptation to agree with your critics, to get their approval. — Thomas Harris

Because it's his bad luck to be the best. — Thomas Harris

What does he do, Clarice? What is the first and principal thing he does, what need does he serve by killing? He covets. How do we begin to covet? We begin by coveting what we see every day. — Thomas Harris

And your dinner for the orchestra officials." "Haven't you ever had people coming over and no time to shop? You have to make do with what's in the fridge, Clarice. May I call you Clarice? — Thomas Harris

I found, and find, the scrutiny of Dr. Lecter uncomfortable, intrusive, like the humming of your thoughts when they x-ray your head. — Thomas Harris

I love myself that much and I will never apologize to you. — Thomas Harris

We can only learn so much and live. — Thomas Harris

You cant reduce me to a set of influences. — Thomas Harris

Before Me you are a slug in the sun. You are privy to a great Becoming and you recognize nothing. You are an ant in the after-birth.It is in your nature to do one thing correctly: before Me you rightly tremble. Fear is not what you owe Me, Lounds, you and the other pismires. You owe Me awe. — Thomas Harris

I am the dragon, and you call me insane. — Thomas Harris

I expect most psychiatrists have a patient or two they'd like to refer to me. — Thomas Harris

You must understand that when you are writing a novel you are not making anything up. It's all there and you just have to find it. — Thomas Harris

Typhoid and swans - it all comes from the same place. — Thomas Harris

I'm giving serious thought into eating yor wife” - Hannibal Lecter — Thomas Harris

One quality in a person doesn't rule out any other quality. They can exist side by side, good and terrible. Socrates said it a lot better. — Thomas Harris

Let me tell you about my day. I get up at 8 o'clock in the morning. At 8:30 am, I leave the house and I arrive at my office at 8:37. I stay in the office until 2 o'clock in the afternoon. I get in my Porsche and I'm home at 2:03 because the one-way streets make it faster for me to drive. And between 8:36 am and 2 pm, I'm doing one of three things: I'm writing. I'm staring out the window. Or I'm writhing on the floor. — Thomas Harris

What do you look at while you’re making up your mind? Ours is not a reflective culture, we do no raise our eyes up to the hills. Most of the time we decide the critical things while looking at the linoleum floor of an institutional corridor, or whispering hurriedly in a waiting room with a television blatting nonsense. — Thomas Harris

I would not have had that happen to you. Discourtesy is unspeakably ugly to me. — Thomas Harris

Fear comes with imagination, it’s a penalty, it’s the price of imagination. — Thomas Harris

The tragedy is not to die, but to be wasted. — Thomas Harris

On a related subject, Signore Pazzi, I must confess to you: I'm giving serious thought to eating your wife. — Thomas Harris

Lecter is so lucid, so perceptive; he's trained in psychiatry... and he's a mass murderer. — Thomas Harris

I'll confess it is pleasant to look at you asleep. You're quite beautiful, Clarice. — Thomas Harris

There is no murder. We make murder, and it matters only to us. — Thomas Harris

I think it's easy to mistake understanding for empathy - we want empathy so badly. Maybe learning to make that distinction is part of growing up. It's hard and ugly to know somebody can understand you without even liking you. — Thomas Harris

And be grateful. Our scars have the power to remind us that the past was real. — Thomas Harris

He moves smoothly and slowly, carrying his concentration like a brimming cup. — Thomas Harris

Good-bye Clarice. Will you let me know if ever the lambs stop screaming?" "Yes." Pembry was taking her arm. It was go or fight him. "Yes," she said. "I'll tell you." "Do you promise?""Yes. — Thomas Harris

The advantage of beating a mute is he can't tell on you. — Thomas Harris

Life Lessons by Thomas Harris

1. Thomas Harris teaches us the importance of understanding human psychology and motivations, as seen in his works such as The Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon.
2. His works also emphasize the power of storytelling and how it can be used to explore complex topics and emotions.
3. Lastly, Harris's works demonstrate the importance of creating compelling and believable characters that readers can connect with on an emotional level.