Eleanor Catton Quotes

Men still have to be governed by deception.

Power over others is weakness disguised as strength.

It's possible for people to gain control of every facet of your life.

We lead them to believe that we are in complete control over every aspect of their lives.

The man who speaks to you of sacrifice, speaks of slaves and masters. And intends to be the master.

To succeed in chaining the multitude, you must seem to wear the same fetters.

Who owns a man, Durnik?” the blond young man asked sadly. “The one who rules him, or the one who pays him?

Democracy has proved only that the best way to gain power over people is to assure the people that they are ruling themselves. Once they believe that, they make wonderfully submissive slaves.

Next to enjoying ourselves, the next greatest pleasure consists in preventing others from enjoying themselves, or, more generally, in the acquisition of power.

I call the discourse of power any discourse that engenders blame, hence guilt, in its recipient.

Authority poisons everybody who takes authority on himself.

Power is domination, control, and therefore a very selective form of truth which is a lie.

Give a man a free hand and he'll try to put it all over you.

The concept of power we admire is power over someone else.

Secrecy is the foundation of politics.

The wise become as the unwise in the enchanted chambers of Power, whose lamps make every face the same colour.

My instincts are always against people who want to fasten some sort of hegemony onto things.

You carry forever the fingerprint that comes from being under someone's thumb.

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power.

What the power structure is afraid of is that we're going to learn to recognize the truth when we hear it.

People demand freedom only when they have no power.

So I still seized the power, but I felt that if I officially made myself the boss, in black and white, it would be too intimidating for the other producers and the other men who worked on the show. In other words, I had the power, but I gave them the title.

I've been dealing with politicians all my life. All my life. And I've always gotten them to do what I need them to do.

If you were to come to Minnesota, I could have you locked up like that. That's power.

He was always testing you. He was always testing his power.