Most scenes together: Count Laszlo de Almásy & Katharine Clifton (8), Count Laszlo de Almásy & Madox (2)
The English Patient quotes
Page 1 of 6We didn't care about countries did we? Brits, Arabs, Hungarians, Germans. None of that mattered, did it? It was something finer than that.
I just wanted you to know— I'm not missing you yet.
You will...you will.
Szerelem 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 he becomes her slave, and he sews her clothes, and worships—Stop it! Stop it! You're always beating me!
Bastard! You bastard, I believed you! You should be my slave.
There is no God... but I hope someone looks after you.
Just in case you're interested, it's called the suprasternal notch. Come and visit us in Dorset when all this nonsense is over. [Heads away but turns back]
You'll never come to Dorset.
There's also a plant - I've never seen it but I'm told you can cut a piece the size of a heart from this plant and the next day it will be filled with a delicious liquid.
Find that plant. Cut out its heart.
This... this, the hollow at the base of a woman's throat, does it have an official name?
Good God, man, pull yourself together.
When were you most happy?
Now.
When were you least happy?
Now.
What do you love?
What do I love?
Say everything.
Water—fish in it—and hedgehogs—I love hedgehogs. Marmite—I'm addicted, and baths, but not with other people! Islands—and your handwriting. I could go on all day.
Go on all day.
My husband.
And what do you hate most?
A lie. And what do you hate most?
Ownership—or being owned. When you leave, you should forget me.
You're wearing the thimble.
Of course. You idiot. I always wear it. I've always worn it. I've always loved you.
You get to the morning and the poison leaks away, doesn't it? Black nights. I thought I would kill you.
You can't kill me. I died years ago.
No, I can't kill you now.
You're in love with him, aren't you? Your poor patient. You think he's a saint because of the way he looks?
I don't think he is. I'm not so in love with him. I'm in love with ghosts. And so is he. He's in love with ghosts.
I'm one of his ghosts and he wouldn't even know.
I'll probably marry him.
Really? That's sudden.
My mother always told me I would summon my husband by playing the piano.
Then I tell myself he spends all day searching, in the night he wants to be found.
Kip I do. I do want you to find me! I do want to be found.
Geoffrey's not in Cairo. He's not actually a buffoon. The plane wasn't a wedding present. It belongs to the British Government. They want aerial maps of the whole of North Africa. So I think he's in Ethiopia. In case you were counting on his sudden appearance.
And the marriage. . . is that a fiction?
No, the marriage isn't a fiction.
Shall we be all right?
Yes. Yes. —Absolutely.
Oh dear.