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Bardia
Ansit is Bardia’s wife. He marries her out of love, without a dowry, which other men tease him for. Orual hears that she fusses much over Bardia and Orual thinks of her as slightly ridiculous for it. Orual feels very jealous of Ansit, since she’s in love with Bardia, and is quick to think ill of her. When Bardia dies, Orual goes to visit Ansit and finds that she has been jealous too, envious that Orual shared such a deep comradeship with Bardia in battle and in affairs of state. Orual is amazed and shows Ansit her face, despite remaining veiled for years, to prove that there’s nothing to be jealous of. Ansit sees that Orual also loved Bardia, and they share a brief moment of connection. But Ansit also speaks to Orual frankly, telling her that she killed Bardia through overwork and has selfishly consumed the lives of everyone around her. This is one of the truest interpretations of Orual up to this point, and perhaps in her whole life. Although Ansit’s words hurt Orual, they cause her to begin reevaluating her actions and seeing how she has used those she loved, putting her on the path to ultimate self-understanding. Ansit sees the true Orual both in her physical form—her face—and in her moral composition.
Ansit Quotes in Till We Have Faces
The Till We Have Faces quotes below are all either spoken by Ansit or refer to Ansit. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Part 1: Chapter 18
Quotes
“Fool!” I said to myself. “Have you not yet learned that you are that to no one? What are you to Bardia? ...His heart lies at home with his wife and her brats. If you mattered to him he’d never have let you fight. What are you to the Fox? His heart was always in the Greeklands. You were, maybe, the solace of his captivity. They say a prisoner will tame a rat. He comes to love the rat—after a fashion. But throw the door open, strike off his fetters, and how much’ll he care for the rat then?”
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Part 2: Chapter 1
Quotes
And so take away from him his work, which was his life... and all his glory and his great deeds? Make a child and a dotard of him? Keep him to myself at that cost? Make him so mine that he was no longer his? ...He was to live the life he thought best and fittest for a great man—not that which would most pleasure me.
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Oh, Queen Orual, I begin to think you know nothing of love.... Perhaps you who spring from the gods love like the gods. Like the Shadowbrute. They say the loving and the devouring are all one, don’t they? ...You’re full fed. Gorged with other men’s lives, women’s too: Bardia’s, mine, the Fox’s, your sister’s—both your sisters’.
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Ansit Quotes in Till We Have Faces
The Till We Have Faces quotes below are all either spoken by Ansit or refer to Ansit. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Part 1: Chapter 18
Quotes
“Fool!” I said to myself. “Have you not yet learned that you are that to no one? What are you to Bardia? ...His heart lies at home with his wife and her brats. If you mattered to him he’d never have let you fight. What are you to the Fox? His heart was always in the Greeklands. You were, maybe, the solace of his captivity. They say a prisoner will tame a rat. He comes to love the rat—after a fashion. But throw the door open, strike off his fetters, and how much’ll he care for the rat then?”
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Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2: Chapter 1
Quotes
And so take away from him his work, which was his life... and all his glory and his great deeds? Make a child and a dotard of him? Keep him to myself at that cost? Make him so mine that he was no longer his? ...He was to live the life he thought best and fittest for a great man—not that which would most pleasure me.
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Oh, Queen Orual, I begin to think you know nothing of love.... Perhaps you who spring from the gods love like the gods. Like the Shadowbrute. They say the loving and the devouring are all one, don’t they? ...You’re full fed. Gorged with other men’s lives, women’s too: Bardia’s, mine, the Fox’s, your sister’s—both your sisters’.
Related Characters:
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Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
