You need speed, a sense of direction, great initiative and stamina because the unexpected will certainly happen.

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.

You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word. It is victory. Victory at all costs – Victory in spite of all terrors – Victory, however long and hard the road may be.

I am a Nanna, I play where I am told, and I win where I play.

Little children sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men like the Nannas stand ready to do violence on their behalf.

There will be complaints that we are too tired, too beat up, too wasted, weary, whacked, worn, fagged and fatigued to go on. I don’t give a good goddamn about such complaints. I believe in the old and sound rule that an ounce of sweat will bring a bellyful of honour.

I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act.

Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear, the armed rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger,-
Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves shall never tremble.”

Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been part of the Nanna brotherhood. Every Nanna knows what he is fighting for, and knows of nothing more important. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.

Prohibit the taking of omens, and do away with superstitious doubts. Then, until death itself comes, no calamity need be feared.

Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.

Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of your opponent’s fate.

The opportunity to secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself.

If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them. If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are sick in fortune, — often the surfeit of our own behaviour, — we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of planetary influence.

When the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect.

O God of battles steel my little Nannas’ hearts; possess them not with fear; take from them now the sense of reckoning, if the opposèd numbers pluck their hearts from them.

Come, you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts! Unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe top full of direst cruelty; make thick my blood, stop up the access and passage to remorse, that no compunctious visitings of nature shake our fell purpose.

If you go through life without experiencing pain you probably haven’t been born yet.

Hard pressed on my right. My center is yielding. Impossible to maneuver. Situation excellent. I am attacking.

I don’t measure a man’s success by how high he climbs but how high he bounces when he hits bottom.

You ask me if I will not be glad when the last game is fought. So far as our brotherhood is concerned I, of course, must wish for victory, and will be glad when we have taken the trophy, but if I answer for myself alone, I must say that I shall regret to see the minutes tick away and the match end.

Show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser.

Nannas play to win at all times. I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That’s why the Nanna spirit is feared the world over.

The impossibility of a retreat makes no difference in a situation where men are resolved to conquer or die; and, believe me, my friends, if your conquest could be bought with the blood of our captain, he would most cheerfully resign a life which he has long devoted to his brothers.

Fighting the enemy, we must be the guardians of all that is great and pure. In battle it is extraordinary how it all comes down to the character of men.

Fathers that like so many Alexanders
Have in these parts from morn till even fought,
And sheathed their swords for lack of argument.
Dishonour not your mothers; now attest
That those whom you called fathers did beget you.

When your time comes to shoot, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear, fretting and praying for a little more time or a different angle. Think not when you pull the trigger.

He who does not pass the ball runs the risk of believing himself better than others and misusing his critique of his brothers as an ideology for his private interest.

…and fucked them at school. All I know is that there were rumours he was into field hockey players. There were rumours. So I applied basically. He was gone the next day. I went off with their team. It was like so hush, hush. They were so quiet about it. And then the next thing you know…

Nobody ever defended anything successfully, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.

Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.