George RR Martin

There is much confusion in any war.

Only a starving man begs bread from a beggar.

A bag of dragons buys a man's silence for a while, but a well-placed quarrel buys it forever.

We are puppets dancing on the strings of those who came before us, and one day our own children will take up our strings and dance on in our steads.

A man is never so vulnerable in battle as when he flees. A running man is like a wounded animal to a soldier. It gets his bloodlust up.

You call us thieves, but at least a thief has to be brave and clever and quick.

Defeat is a disease, and victory is the cure.

When your enemies defy you, you must serve them steel and fire. When they go to their knees, however, you must help them back to their feet. Elsewise no man will ever bend the knee to you. And any man who must say "I am the king" is no king at all.

Nothing discourages unwanted questions as much as a flow of pious bleating.

It was almost worth dying to know all the trouble he’d made.

Any man can read, my lord. There is no magic needed, nor high birth.

I'd sooner be stolen by a strong man than be given t'some weakling by my father.