- Prince Dolgoruchov: I was just describing what happened when the emperor of the French, as he chooses to call himself, received me in his quarters yesterday.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: What is he like, really?
- Prince Dolgoruchov: A man in a gray coat, anxious to be called Your Majesty. But he got no title from me.
- Mikhail Kutuzov: However, before every battle, a great deal of discussion must take place. In my experience, such discussion achieves very little, because once a battle starts, one usually has very little choice. Still it seems we all feel better because of it. So let us have it and get it over.
- Nikolai Rostov: But tell me. How are you?
- Boris Drubetskoy: Just as you see. Everything's turning out really quite well. Though, I confess, I wouldn't mind being made an adjutant.
- Nikolai Rostov: But why? It's so dull.
- Boris Drubetskoy: Oh. Oh no. No. I think if you are going to go into a military career, you should try to make it as brilliant as you can.
- Nikolai Rostov: You're still the same old diplomat.
- Boris Drubetskoy: Yes, well, I had a good training.
- Nikolai Rostov: Where?
- Boris Drubetskoy: Living in your house. Oh, I didn't mean that unkindly, Nicky. Your family have been wonderful to me, to my mother. But when you're the poor relation, no matter how kind people are...
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: You were talking of the affair at Schongraben.
- Nikolai Rostov: Yes.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: You were there?
- Nikolai Rostov: I was.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: Please go on. One hears so few stories from people who actually took part. And that's because they're usually the most reticent, I suppose. When you've done the thing, you rarely feel the need to talk about it. Don't you agree? You were saying what it was like to be in a charge.
- Nikolai Rostov: I had finished.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: Oh. I had the impression there was still a great deal to tell. I've heard so many stories from people who weren't there. I'd have been delighted to hear one from someone who was.
- Nikolai Rostov: I dare say, our stories carry some weight. They're not the tales of little staff upstarts who get decorations for doing nothing.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: In which group you include me?
- Nikolai Rostov: I don't know you, and frankly I don't wish to. I'm talking about staff officers in general.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: You seem bent on insulting me. However, since we're all likely tomorrow to be involved in a much more serious duel, I won't allow myself to be provoked. And if you have any sense, neither will you. I am sorry, Drubetskoy. Your friend seems to have taken a dislike to me. However, that's his affair.
- Napoleon: However, a battle lost is a battle lost. We have one to win here. And win by a few brilliant strokes.
- Nikolai Rostov: What's this damn thing? Oh, no.
- Boris Drubetskoy: What is it?
- Nikolai Rostov: Isn't that just... A note of recommendation to General Bagration. What am I supposed to do with this?
- Boris Drubetskoy: What? Use it.
- Nikolai Rostov: What nonsense. That's mama for you. God knows how much trouble she went to get it.
- Boris Drubetskoy: Now look. That can be useful to you.
- Nikolai Rostov: What for? To get some adjutant's job at staff HQ?
- Boris Drubetskoy: You could do worse.
- Nikolai Rostov: Rubbish. I'm nobody's lackey.
- Boris Drubetskoy: Still the same old idealist.
- Nikolai Rostov: But then they started to ask me about the charge at Schongraben. Then, when I embroidered a bit and felt disgusted with myself afterwards.
- Denisov: Oh, don't worry, old chap. We all do it.
- Nikolai Rostov: Really? You too, Denisov?
- Denisov: All the time, dear boy. I'm the biggest liar in the camp. Everyone knows.
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: Suppose I am killed tomorrow. What then? Does it matter? Tomorrow may be my chance of glory. Why do I want it so? Oh God, what am I to do if all I care for is fame? Much as I love my father, my sister, my wife, I would exchange them all tomorrow for one moment of glory. Why is that? Why? Why do I find it so hard to love someone, truly and deeply love them? Why, why, why?
- Prince Dolgoruchov: It is the opinion of all of us here that it would be criminal folly not to take this opportunity to deliver a once for all lesson to this Corsican upstart.
- Napoleon: How did the tsar Alexander look? In good health?
- Gen. Savary: Pale and drawn, I thought. As though he had not been sleeping well.
- Napoleon: Ah. A commander who doesn't sleep well doesn't fight well.
- Gen. Savary: He's not as used as Your Majesty to living in the field.
- Napoleon: Why should he be? It's my profession, not his. His is to be a figurehead. And I must say, he does it very well.
- Gen. Savary: You're more than generous to your enemies, Sire.
- Napoleon: I don't regard him as my enemy. The English, they're my enemies. They won't rest till they've destroyed me, or I've destroyed them.
- Denisov: You seem a bit down in the mouth, old friend. Anything wrong?
- Nikolai Rostov: No.
- Denisov: You seem to be brooding over something.
- Nikolai Rostov: Oh, it's nothing. You know, I went up to see my cousin a couple of days ago. I thought it was going to be a lot of fun, and it turned out to be awful.
- Denisov: Nearly always is with one's relations.
- Napoleon: Fine young men. All of them. Fine deaths. Their country can be proud of them. It wasn't their fault they lost the day. They died bravely on the field of Austerlitz.
- Tsar Alexander I: Why don't you begin, Mikhail Illarionovich?
- Mikhail Kutuzov: I was waiting, Your Majesty.
- Tsar Alexander I: Waiting?
- Mikhail Kutuzov: Not all the columns have formed up yet, Sire.
- Tsar Alexander I: We are not on the Empress Field, you know, Mikhail Illarionovich, where the parade is not begun till all regiments are present.
- Mikhail Kutuzov: That is the reason I do not begin, Sire. Because we are not on parade. And not on the Empress Field. However, if it be Your Majesty's command...
- Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: How quiet. How peaceful. Quite different from when I was running. Ah. How was it I didn't see the sky before? So lofty. So limitless. And how happy I am to have seen it at last. Yes. All is vanity. All is delusion. Except the sky. That is wide, wide sky.