A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court The Supernatural Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Page)

Quote #1

If everybody about here was so honestly and sincerely afraid of Merlin's pretended magic as Clarence was, certainly a superior man like me ought to be shrewd enough to contrive some way to take advantage of such a state of things. (5.3)

Careful, Hank—you're using the very thing you want to destroy… Oh, okay, they're gonna burn you at the stake, so we'll forgive you.

Quote #2

"Banish this calamity, spare the sun!" (6.6)

Arthur is pretty rattled by the eclipse that Hank is passing off as magic. This moment also puts Hank in a bind: he's making use of the very fear that he wants to destroy, which may be one of the things that leads to his downfall. He has to perpetrate belief in the supernatural if he wants to end it, a bind that's bound to create problems down the road.

Quote #3

Those multitudes presently began to agitate for another miracle. (7.4)

The pattern gets set pretty quickly for Hank. He needs to produce "magic" to keep the people in line, which further feeds into the fact that he's a wizard rather than an engineer. It takes the whole book for him to even drop the pretense of magic, and in the end, he still can't undo it.