The Princess Bride… Great movie, or greatest movie?
Great book, or greatest book?
These questions are not for me to decide. All I know is that The Princess Bride is probably one of the most quoted movies of all time. And for good reason.
Here, I’ve collected what I believe to be the best quotes ever from The Princess Bride. Most of these quotes appeared in the movie, but a few are book-only (These are cited as “William Goldman, The Princess Bride”).
Enjoy, you warthog faced buffoons…
Optional Soundtrack for This Collection
“Westley and I are joined by the bond of love and you cannot track that, not with a thousand bloodhounds, and you cannot break it, not with a thousand swords.-Buttercup
“You fell victim to one of the classic blunders – The most famous of which is ‘never get involved in a land war in Asia’.-Vizzini
“Life isn’t fair, it’s just fairer than death, that’s all.-William Goldman, The Princess Bride
“We are men of action. Lies do not become us.-Westley
“Of all the necks on this boat your highness, the one you should be worrying about is your own.-Vizzini
“Poor and perfect… with eyes like the sea after a storm.-Buttercup
“I just work for Vizzini to pay the bills. There’s not a lot of money in revenge.-Inigo Montoya
“I’ve got my country’s 500th anniversary to plan, my wedding to arrange, my wife to murder and Guilder to frame for it; I’m swamped.-Prince Humperdink
“I just want you to feel you’re doing well. I hate for people to die embarrassed.-Fezzik
“Inconceivable!-Vizzini
“You mean, you put down your rock and I put down my sword, and we try kill each other like civilized people?-Westley
“Please consider me as an alternative to suicide.-Prince Humperdinck
“I have been in the revenge business so long. Now that it’s over, I do not know what to do with the rest of my life.-Inigo Montoya
“Move the thing! And…that other thing!-Vizzini
“A few more steps and we’ll be safe in the Fire Swamp!-Westley
“Then let’s look on the bright side: We’re having an adventure, and most people live and die without being as lucky as we are.-William Goldman, The Princess Bride
“Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.-Dread Pirate Roberts
“No one would surrender to the Dread Pirate Westley.-Westley
“You truly love each other and so you might have been truly happy. Not one couple in a century has that chance, no matter what the story books say. And so I think no man in a century will suffer as greatly as you will.-Prince Humperdink
“WRONG. Your ears you keep and I’ll tell you why. So that every shriek of every child at seeing your hideousness will be yours to cherish. Every babe that weeps at your approach, every woman who cries out, “Dear God! What is that thing,” will echo in your perfect ears. That is what “To The Pain” means. It means I leave you in anguish, wallowing in freakish misery forever.-Westley
“This is true love. Do you think this happens every day?-Westley
“Fezzik: I’m on the brute squad.
Miracle Max: You are the Brute squad!-The Princess Bride
“Her heart was a secret garden, and the walls were very high.-William Goldman, The Princess Bride
“Let me ‘splain… no, there is too much. let me sum up.-Inigo Montoya
““I love you,” Buttercup said. “I know this must come as something of a surprise, since all I’ve ever done is scorn you and degrade you and taunt you, but I have loved you for several hours now, and every second, more. I thought an hour ago that I loved you more than any woman has ever loved a man, but a half hour after that I knew that what I felt before was nothing compared to what I felt then. But ten minutes after that, I understood that my previous love was a puddle compared to the high seas before a storm.-William Goldman, The Princess Bride
“Learn to live with disappointment.-Westley
“Careful. People in masks cannot be trusted.-Fezzik
“There’s a shortage of perfect breasts in this world. It would be a pity to damage yours.-Westley
“You’ve been chasing me your entire life, only to fail now. I think that’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard; how marvelous.-Count Rugen
“Since the invention of the kiss, there have been 5 kisses that have been rated the most passionate, the most pure. This one left them all behind.-William Goldman, The Princess Bride
Bonus Quote
This last quote is from an interview that Mandy Patinkin (Inigo Montoya) gave on CBS This Morning. Here he explains his favorite quote from the Princess Bride. I love him.
“And for me that’s the most potent line in the whole film. And that is, ‘I have been in the revenge business so long. Now that it’s over, I do not know what to do with the rest of my life.’
And I love that line. I love it for all of us. Because the purpose of revenge, in my opinion, is completely worthless and pointless and the purpose of existence is to embrace our fellow human beings and not be vengeful and turn our darkness into light. So that’s the line I love from the movie.-Mandy Patinkin
Cheers to that.
