Alexander Knox

“The Kidnapped Surgeon (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1977)”

“Totem Dream (New York: Viking Press, 1973)”

“Night of the White Bear (New York: Viking Press, 1971)”

“Bride of Quietness (New York: Macmillan Co., 1933)”

“Infection...is like the wind, it bloweth where it listeth.”

“Surgery is speed and decision. A good surgeon saves his trembling till after he's killed the patient when it can do him no harm.”

“The tomahawk flickered after her like a stick-thin dwarf doing cartwheels in the air and the stone head made a cracking sound as it struck. She fell instantly, and curiously slowly. Her heavy body made no sound. Her skull was shattered and the haft of the tomahawk stood out like the handle of a spoon from a boiled egg.”

“Everything about the girl was like a round of yeasty dough. It cried out to be smoothed or pressed or moulded or lifted or patted or stroked or gathered up or folded.”

“Four beautiful maids Were all in love with me. They said that I could have but one So I went off to sea.”

“Like a revelation it came to him that it was far, far better to be an Eskimo; that these people didn't know their arse from a hole in the ground, that they had no business here, that his people had lived here and thrived for thousands of years and that they were the People. They were the People and all these were strangers with the habits of children, and they sulked like children because that's what they were. Old Ways were best!”

“He whispered steadily along in this pearly place, but though his steps were steady, a tension had seized him. It was a quivering, high-note vibration rather than a trembling. His flesh did not shake: inside his tightened skin he hummed, making no sound — a silent scream.”

“The high Arctic had more snow that year than anyone remembered.”

“There was no shame, but only graciousness, sun-soaked air, and, at the last, a peace such as the moss knows in the deepening corridors of trees.”