Svengali - A Conversation About Music and Memory
Svengali:
Now... what did we do last?
Madame Honori:
Don't you remember?
Svengali:
I am speaking about music.
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Svengali - Contrasting Views on England's Charm
Billee:
You're wonderful. You're the sweetest thing I've ever known. When we're married, I want to take you to England, and to my mother... She'll be proud of you, Trilby. Proud of you as I am.
Trilby O'Farrell:
Tell me: what's England like?
Billee:
Oh, England's beautiful! Green fields, and hedgerows and hollyhocks, primroses...
Svengali: [eavesdropping; continues to laugh]
... and fog, and pneumonia, and shopkeepers, and flat feet, and boiled beef and cabbage - ha, ha, ha! Trilby in England would be like a butterfly in mutton soup!
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Svengali - Ambition and Discontent in Artistic Pursuits
Trilby O'Farrell:
Svengali, I've tried, but I...
Svengali:
Ja, ja, ja, ja. But you know very well why you can't. It is the magnificent young Englander. The head of the Purity Brigade. Sir Galahad. This stiff-necked little Billie... What is he, Liebchen? With his silly paints in one hand, and these twiddling brushes of pig's bristles in the other... What does he amount to, compared to Svengali? Ah, he paints his silly pictures and sends them to London, where they hang up on the wall like... dead soldiers on parade. And the people pass in a long procession - "ah" - and yawn. Svengali will go to London himself! Where he will be all alone on a platform. And Princesses. And Countesses. And serene Highnesses will fling him their jewels, and applaud, and invite him to their palaces. And he will take you with him. I never look at them. Ah, we could be so happy.
Trilby O'Farrell:
But I... I don't like palaces.
Svengali:
No. Nor anything else that other women like. Except the little Bi--. Look at me .. in the eyes!
Svengali:
Open your eyes.
Trilby O'Farrell:
Oh, I do love you!
Svengali:
Close your eyes.
Trilby O'Farrell:
I love...
Svengali:
Ah, don't say it! You are beautiful, my manufactured love. But it is only Svengali talking to himself again.
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Svengali - Embracing Optimism Amidst Challenges
Gecko:
Maestro, I don't know what we are going to do. We have borrowed from everyone we know. We cannot go back to Bernard's. He will throw us out.
Svengali:
Oh, possibly, possibly... But there are other people... Our English friends - - they have not enjoyed the fragrance of our society, for a week. We will go there.
Gecko:
But Maestro, the last time we were there, Monsieur Taffy, and Monsieur the Laird, and even little Billie... he's so kind.
Svengali:
Now listen. Gecko. You know, the trouble with you is you have not sufficient optimism. Little things discourage you. Remember, in the bright lexicon of youth, there is no such word... as "Fail.
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Svengali - Desire for Love Beyond Death
Svengali: [as he is on the verge of death]
Oh, God, grant me in death... what you denied me in life... the woman I love.
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Svengali - Obsession with Svengali Defined
Svengali: [to Trilby]
There is nothing in your mind... nothing in your heart... nothing in your soul... but Svengali... Svengali... Svengali... !
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Svengali - The Limits of Human Understanding
Svengali:
That might be as well to remember. There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
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