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"He looks around at his guests. All are prepared. A Latin grace; English would be his choice, but he will suit his company. Who cross themselves ostentatiously, in papist style. Who look at him, expectant. He shouts for the waiters. The doors burst open. Sweating men heave the platters to the table. It seems the meat is fresh, in fact not slaughtered yet. It is just a minor breach of etiquette. The company must sit and salivate. The Boleyns are laid at his hand to be carved."
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Exlpore more Etiquette quotes
"To call certain people, such as your boss, teachers, professors, doctors, your parent's friends, etc. by their first names might be considered disrespectful. It is best to err on the side of caution until you know what is appropriate."
"It's not bad to cough. But cover your mouth when coughing. It's not bad to complain. But cover your mouth when complaining, else you'll spread infections of complains on us!"
"Sometimes you must agree with someones opinion for the sake of being polite and modest, but within you, you know that you are not foolish and crazy."
"Take the initiative with deliberate steps to be a polite person:1. Cover your mouth when you cough or sneeze.2. Reciprocate a thoughtful word or a good deed in kind.3. Say "excuse me" when you bump into someone, unintentionally violate someone's space, or need to get someone's attention.4. Apologize when you've made a mistake or are in the wrong.5. Live by the "Golden Rule" and treat others the way you would like to be treated.6. When dining at home or in a restaurant, wait until everyone is served before eating your meal.7. Acknowledge notable events like birthdays, weddings, and anniversaries."
"We must remember that some hand gestures which are commonly used and widely accepted in the U.S. might be considered rude or offensive in other countries. As always, I encourage you to be mindful of how and where you use certain gestures to assure you maintain your professionalism and positive impressions."
"Keep your opinion to yourself unless it's asked for."
Explore more quotes by Hilary Mantel
"There's a feeling of power in reserve, a power that drives right through the bone, like the shiver you sense in the shaft of an axe when you take it into your hand. You can strike, or you can not strike, and if you choose to hold back the blow, you can still feel inside you the resonance of the omitted thing."
"Fiction leaves us so much work to do, allows the individual so much input; you have to see, you have to hear, you have to taste the madeleine, and while you are seemingly passive in your chair, you have to travel."
"No man as godly as George, the only fault he finds with God is that he made folk with too few orifices. If George could meet a woman with a quinny under her armpit, he would call out 'Glory be' and set her up in a house and visit her every day, until the novelty wore off. Nothing is forbidden to George, you see. He'd go to it with a terrier bitch if she wagged her tail at him and said bow-wow.'For once he is struck silent. He knows he will never get it out of his mind, the picture of George in a hairy grapple with a little ratting dog."
"This is what death does to you, it takes and takes, so that all that is left of your memories is a faint tracing of spilled ash."
"If you help load a cart you get a ride in it, as often as not. It gives him to think, how bad people are at loading carts. Men trying to walk straight ahead through a narrow gateway with a wide wooden chest. A simple rotation of the object solves a great many problems."
"The trouble with England, he thinks, is that it's so poor in gesture. We shall have to develop a hand signal for 'Back off, our prince is fucking this man's daughter.' He is surprised that the Italians have not done it. Though perhaps they have, and he just never caught on."
"He is not a man wedded to action, Boleyn, but rather a man who stands by, smirking and stroking his beard; he thinks he looks enigmatic, but instead he looks as if he's pleasuring himself."
"The maid found a handkerchief of hers, under the bed in which she had died. A ring that had been missing turned up in his own writing desk. A tradesman arrived with fabric she had ordered three weeks ago. Each day, some further evidence of a task half finished, a scheme incomplete. He found a novel, with her place marked.And this is it."
"In the forest you may find yourself lost, without companions. You may come to a river which is not on a map. You may lose sight of your quarry, and forget why you are there. You may meet a dwarf, or the living Christ, or an old enemy of yours; or a new enemy, one you do not know until you see his face appear between the rustling leaves, and see the glint of his dagger. You may find a woman asleep in a bower of leaves. For a moment, before you don't recognise her, you will think she is someone you know."
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