“Revolution might sound a little dramatic, but in this world, choosing authenticity and worthiness is an absolute act of resistance. Choosing to live and love with our whole hearts is an act of defiance. You’re going to confuse, piss off, and terrify lots of people - including yourself. One minute you’ll pray that the transformation stops, and the next minute you’ll pray that it never ends. You’ll also wonder how you can feel so brave and so afraid at the same time. At least that’s how I feel most of the time...brave, afraid, and very, very alive.”
“I am going to keep on defying you. I am going to shame you with my defiance. You remind me that I am a mere mortal and you are a prince of Faerie. Well, let me remind you that means you have much to lose and I have nothing. You may win in the end, you may ensorcell me and hurt me and humiliate me, but I will make sure you lose everything I can take from you on the way down. I promise you this is the least of what I can do.”
″‘In several of [the districts], people viewed your little trick with the berries as an act of defiance, not an act of love. And if a girl from District Twelve of all places can defy the Capitol and walk away unharmed, what is to stop them from doing the same?’ he says. ‘What is to prevent, say, an uprising?‘”
“Back in February he had commented to the Seattle Times’ George Varnell that ‘there are more good individual men on this year’s squad than on any I have coached.’ The fundamental problem lay in the fact that he had felt compelled to throw that word ‘individual’ into the sentence. There were too many days when they rowed not as crews but as boatfuls of individuals. The more he scolded them for personal technical issues, even as he preached teamsmanship, the more the boys seemed to sink into their own separate and sometimes defiant little worlds.”
“Dear Everyone,
I think this dragon idea is simply silly and I won’t be shut up in a tower, and what’s more I won’t marry any stupid dragon-slaying prince. In fact I’ve decided that I don’t think I’ll marry anyone ever, so I’ve run away and it’s no use trying to find me, and please don’t worry because I shall be quite all right.
Love and kisses
Amy”
“The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”
“The power of a bold idea uttered publicly in defiance of dominant opinion cannot be easily measured. Those special people who speak out in such a way as to shake up not only the self-assurance of their enemies, but the complacency of their friends, are precious catalysts for change.”
″‘We haven’t got a cook! You do the cooking in this house, ma!’
‘Well, and if I do!’ retorted his mother, drying her eyes and looking rather defiant. ‘What I say is, the one that does the cooking is the cook, and I suppose I can give my notice as well as another!‘”
“Die? oh, no,” he exclaimed—“not die now, after having lived and suffered so long and so much! Die? yes, had I died years ago; but now to die would be, indeed, to give way to the sarcasm of destiny. No, I want to live; I shall struggle to the very last; I will yet win back the happiness of which I have been deprived.”
“Linton is all I have to love in the world, and though you have done what you could to make him hateful to me, and me to him, you cannot make us hate each other. And I defy you to hurt him when I am by, and I defy you to frighten me!”