The Essex Serpent Best Quotes (TV Series)

Our list of the best quotes from Apple TV+ period romantic drama TV series, The Essex Serpent (2022), based on the novel of the same name by Sarah Perry. Set in Victorian England, the story follows London widow Cora Seaborne (Claire Danes), who moves to a small village in Essex to investigate reports of a mythical serpent. She forms a surprising bond of science and skepticism with the local pastor, Will Ransome (Tom Hiddleston), but when tragedy strikes, locals accuse her of attracting the creature.

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1. The Blackwater

'It's when we're most lost that the source of light is closest.' - Will Ransome (The Essex Serpent) Click To Tweet

Michael Seaborne: I intend to leave the world as I entered it. Unscarred.

Cora Seaborne: Frankie. Your father’s died.
Frankie Seaborne: Are you sad?
Frankie Seaborne: [as Cora nods] But you’re not crying.
Cora Seaborne: I’m so sorry, Frankie.

Cora Seaborne: You know, we’re following the course of the river. It’s right beneath our feet. The eels used to swim upstream all the way from Sargasso Sea. They’d come here to breed. Now instead of mud and reeds, all they find is iron and concrete.
Luke Garrett: Nothing wrong with iron and concrete.

Cora Seaborne: How does it feel to cut into a living body? No, I’m curious, that’s all.
Luke Garrett: It’s exciting. Terrifying. Every operation, a leap of faith. It’s a high-wire act, Mrs. Seaborne.
Cora Seaborne: It sounds fascinating. I’d love to learn more about it.

Cora Seaborne: So what edge do you hope to cut into next, Luke?
Luke Garrett: The heart.
Cora Seaborne: How?
Luke Garrett: Well, the main challenge is keeping the patient alive once I open the chest cavity. Just need the right patient.
Martha: You’re an animal.
Luke Garrett: The hospital board agree with you. No idea why.

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George Spencer: We can all be skeptical about new ideas.
Martha: Oh, no. I’m all for progress.
Cora Seaborne: Martha’s a socialist.
Luke Garrett: A socialist and a naturalist?
Cora Seaborne: And what of it?
Luke Garrett: Nothing. It’s delightful.
Cora Seaborne: It’s delightful?

Cora Seaborne: Is your heart surgery delightful?
Luke Garrett: More of a vocation.
Cora Seaborne: Well, if we were welcomed into the professions, we might have vocations too.
Luke Garrett: Well, perhaps we were not welcomed either.
Cora Seaborne: We must all follow our passions.
Luke Garrett: I couldn’t agree more.

Luke Garrett: I brought you something.
Cora Seaborne: Wow, it’s beautiful. What is it?
Luke Garrett: A slice of human heart.
Cora Seaborne: From the operating theater?
Luke Garrett: No. No. I got it from the mortuary. Research cadaver.
Cora Seaborne: It’s the oddest present I’ve ever received. Thank you.

Cora Seaborne: [referring to Essex] A sea creature’s been spotted.
Luke Garrett: I read about that.
Cora Seaborne: I’ve done some research.
Luke Garrett: Into a mythical beast?
Cora Seaborne: Not mythical. Real. I think this serpent could be some sort of plesiosaur. As Darwin says in The Origin, there may well be species that have been insulated from the usual competitive pressures.

Luke Garrett: Essex. Don’t go.
Cora Seaborne: I thought I should follow my passions.
Luke Garrett: Yes, of course. But from a medical point of view, you’re grieving. Cora…
Cora Seaborne: I can do what I want now he’s dead.

Will Ransome: Where are you headed?
Cora Seaborne: Aldwinter.
Will Ransome: You’ve heard the stories. You want to go and have a look. There’s nothing to see. Go home.

Henry Banks: [referring to Naomi] She’s been listening to the rumors about the serpent.
Will Ransome: Now you know as well as I do, it’s a myth.

Cora Seaborne: Charles. What are you doing here?
Charles Ambrose: I heard you’d left London. I was worried about you.
Cora Seaborne: I’m here to research the sea dragon.
Charles Ambrose: Couldn’t you have found a hobby in town? Helped Martha with her campaigns? I promised Michael I’d look after you.
Cora Seaborne: Well, Martha looks after me.

Charles Ambrose: Will Ransome. We offered him a safe seat. Lost him to God. He’s got a parish near the coast. He could keep an eye on you.
Cora Seaborne: What, a vicar?

Luke Garrett: [reading Cora’s letter] “I have been digging down by the estuary, but no evidence of the plesiosaur yet.”
George Spencer: Very romantic.
Luke Garrett: “However, the countryside is beautiful, and the pub is charming. I still have your heart. Yours sincerely, Cora.” Spencer. What does that mean?
George Spencer: She still has your present?
Luke Garrett: No, I think she likes me. She does, doesn’t she?

Cora Seaborne: So, what are you really doing here?
Luke Garrett: I lost a patient on the table.
Cora Seaborne: I’m sorry.
Luke Garrett: Ah, it happens when trying a new procedure. What about you? Any sign of the beast?
Cora Seaborne: Not yet. But I’m going to Aldwinter to find out more.
Luke Garrett: Who from?
Cora Seaborne: God knows. Some boring vicar.
Luke Garrett: Oh. How awful.
Cora Seaborne: I know.
Luke Garrett: He’ll make you say grace.
Cora Seaborne: I’ll refuse, and it’ll be painful.

Jo Ransome: Who’s coming to dinner?
Stella Ransome: A friend of Charles. A widow and her son, all the way from London.
Will Ransome: She’ll be old and wrinkled. And she’ll bore us all with the latest talk from society drawing rooms.
Stella Ransome: And her son?
Will Ransome: What do you think, Jo? A young student? Down from Oxford?
Jo Ransome: Yes. He’ll fall in love with me, and then propose. And I will refuse, and break his heart.

Naomi Banks: Can I ask you a question about the Scriptures, Father?
Will Ransome: Of course.
Naomi Banks: Why does the serpent tempt Eve?
Will Ransome: Well, it’s an allegory. The serpent is really the devil.
Naomi Banks: That’s what I thought.
Will Ransome: There is no serpent in Essex. I promise you, Naomi. There’s nothing here.

Stella Ransome: You’re too young to be a widow. And so beautiful.
Cora Seaborne: Well, I feel a little overdressed. I expected dinner at the vicarage to be more formal.

Cora Seaborne: You’re the vicar?
Will Ransome: Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Seaborne.

Will Ransome: John, do you remember the day I cut my face?
John Ransome: She’s the strange lady from the marshes.
Will Ransome: I’m sorry. I was rude. I don’t know what I would have done without you.
Cora Seaborne: You were a monster.
Will Ransome: I’m sure I was.

Stella Ransome: So you’re here to look for fossils?
Martha: Cora is obsessed with the serpent.
Will Ransome: Well, the only serpent here is on a pew in church. It’s been there for two hundred years.
Jo Ransome: And now it’s come back to life.

Will Ransome: The serpent is not real.
Cora Seaborne: But what if it is?

Cora Seaborne: [referring to Charles Lyell] He wrote about animals that escaped evolution. Perhaps your serpent’s one of them.
Will Ransome: No. No, the serpent is an invention. It’s a symptom of the times we live in.
Cora Seaborne: Well, exciting times.
Will Ransome: Of great change that bring real fears with them.
Cora Seaborne: So you’re against progress?
Will Ransome: You’re determined to see me in a very narrow light.
Cora Seaborne: Well, maybe I fear your judgment.

Cora Seaborne: Perhaps I’m an outcast. At least in the eyes of your church.
Will Ransome: Jesus was an outcast.
Cora Seaborne: Once upon a time. But these days, he’s very establishment.
Will Ransome: True.
Cora Seaborne: I’d rather believe in a creature people have actually seen than an invisible god. Is that blasphemy?
Stella Ransome: You won’t get Will to judge you. No matter how hard you try.
Will Ransome: But speak to my curate. He’d happily condemn you to hellfire.

Cora Seaborne: Well, none of you are as I expected.
Jo Ransome: Likewise.

Cora Seaborne: The Essex serpent here in the heart of your church.
Will Ransome: A myth carved in oak.
Cora Seaborne: I saw a bloodied sheep’s head on the marshes this morning. Killed by the creature?
Will Ransome: Carrion for an eel trap. One of the fishermen must have dropped it.
Cora Seaborne: How can you be so sure?
Will Ransome: If I were to let in any doubt, how would I look after my flock?

Will Ransome: Every one of us lives with doubt and fear. Even me. That is where God lives. In our uncertainty and in love. And now is the time for us to come together. For my part, I will listen to your fears, and try my hardest to understand them. Don’t be scared. It’s when we’re most lost that the source of light is closest.

Matthew Evansford: [as Gracie’s dead body is washed ashore from the river] The devil. The devil has come.
Will Ransome: Not now. Please, Matthew.

2. Matters of the Heart'Sometimes you have to make trouble to get change.' - Martha (The Essex Serpent) Click To Tweet

Martha: [as Cora wakes from a nightmare] It’s alright. Michael can’t hurt you anymore.

Martha: Cora, you saw a girl washed up in her sister’s arms. Why would you want to go back?
Cora Seaborne: I have to know what’s out there. And you want to stay in Essex, don’t you?
Frankie Seaborne: No, I hate fresh air.

'Science requires dreams just like your theology. To make a leap in the dark, from ignorance to understanding.' - Cora Seaborne (The Essex Serpent) Click To Tweet

Luke Garrett: Just come back to London.
Cora Seaborne: I’m really sorry, Luke. I can’t.
Luke Garrett: You’re in shock. Once we are back in London, you will start to feel yourself again.
Cora Seaborne: I’m myself now.
Luke Garrett: No. No. Trust me, I’ve seen this before.
Cora Seaborne: This?
Luke Garrett: Yes. Anxiety in a female. This compulsion to return to the scene of the trauma.

Cora Seaborne: I’m returning to help.
Luke Garrett: What do you mean?
Cora Seaborne: I can talk to people. Offer them a rational explanation.
Luke Garrett: You want to tell them your plesiosaur theory? Now? Cora, a young girl has died. I really think that…
Cora Seaborne: What? I should give up on my ideas? I don’t see you doing that.
Luke Garrett: I’m a qualified doctor.
Cora Seaborne: And I’m not your patient.

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George Spencer: How did you become so radical?
Martha: I was born in Bethnal Green. When everything around you is broken, you look for new ideas.
Luke Garrett: So how does Cora cope with a raging socialist in her home?
Martha: We’re not so different, she and I.
Luke Garrett: In her grand town house.
Martha: That came with her husband.
Luke Garrett: Along with her jewels?
Martha: She’s given them all away.

George Spencer: Do you think she’ll stay in Essex long?
Martha: I don’t know. Cora does what Cora wants from now on.
Luke Garrett: Does she now?
Martha: As you do, I’m sure, Dr. Garrett.

Henry Banks: Have you heard what they’re saying?
Will Ransome: No.
Henry Banks: Gracie was taken for her sins.
Will Ransome: No, Henry. No. No, she drowned. Alright? It was an accident. A tragic accident. God will look after her now.

Will Ransome: Stella and I, we didn’t think you’d come back.
Cora Seaborne: Well, I thought I could help. Be a voice of reason.
Will Ransome: How?
Cora Seaborne: Well, I could explain things.
Will Ransome: No, you came for your serpent.

Cora Seaborne: I’m not here to make trouble, Will.
Will Ransome: But you want to look into things, ask questions.
Cora Seaborne: I’d like to.
Will Ransome: People are scared, you need to be careful.
Cora Seaborne: Yes, of course.

Cora Seaborne: I hope you don’t disapprove of my coming.
Will Ransome: Well, you’re trying to understand. Trying to find the truth. I approve of that.

Cora Seaborne: I’m sorry if I intruded yesterday. I just wanted to offer my condolences. I’ve taken the cottage next door, so if there’s anything I could do to help. I’m so sorry for your loss. My own husband died recently, but to lose a daughter…
Henry Banks: You’re right. It’s not natural.

Cora Seaborne: Do you think there’s something out there?
Henry Banks: I think you should go.

Cracknell: Ah. The serpent-loving newcomers. And that’s my chicken.
Cora Seaborne: I’m sorry. I hope you didn’t think it had been stolen.
Cracknell: By some beast?
Cora Seaborne: Do you believe there’s something out there?
Cracknell: It’s not a question of belief for me.

Cracknell: If you don’t believe in God, you can’t believe in the devil either.
Cora Seaborne: So what do you think happened to Gracie Banks?
Cracknell: Someone dies on the marshes every year. Gets caught out by the tide.
Cora Seaborne: Have you ever seen anything out of the ordinary? A sea creature?
Cracknell: Not yet. Eels, seals. But no monster.

Naomi Banks: Can I tell you something, Father?
Will Ransome: Of course you can.
Naomi Banks: I saw the serpent.
Will Ransome: Are you sure?
Naomi Banks: Now I see it at night too. In the shadows like it’s waiting for me.
Will Ransome: No, Naomi.
Naomi Banks: I do. I can feel it.
Will Ransome: It’s just at night that we let our fears take hold.

Cora Seaborne: What are you doing?
John Ransome: Science. It’s so dull.
Jo Ransome: At least you get to do it.
Cora Seaborne: Girls don’t do science? We all need science to help us understand the world.
Jo Ransome: Could you give us a lesson? Tell everyone why you’re here?
Cora Seaborne: I’d be very happy to. I could bring my fossils. If you think it’s a good idea?
Stella Ransome: I don’t see why not.

Cora Seaborne: I never thought a country vicar would be so well-read.
Will Ransome: Oh. What a shocking lack of imagination.

Cora Seaborne: What are you doing here, Will?
Will Ransome: What do you mean?
Cora Seaborne: Well, a man like you out here on the marshes.
Will Ransome: I might ask the same of you.

Will Ransome: [referring to the fossil] Look what I found on my morning walk.
Cora Seaborne: I didn’t have you down as a collector.
Will Ransome: Well, you inspired me to look down as well as up.

George Spencer: [referring to Nev] You’d think he’d be a bit more cheerful at the thought of going home.
Martha: When you give him a long list of medicine and insist he take a month off work?
George Spencer: Minimum.
Martha: So how will they pay their rent?
George Spencer: You think they’ll be evicted?
Martha: Of course not. He’ll be packing gunpowder again first thing Monday morning.
George Spencer: No. No, Martha. That’ll endanger his recovery. He needs to be told.
Martha: What? That he can’t win? Shall I tell him or will you?

Will Ransome: [to Cora] I suppose if I played my cards right, I could be sitting in a backbench, debating some minor point of law. But really, I’d rather spend my time guiding Cracknell back to the God who never left him. Or what I really wanted was purpose, not achievement. You see the difference? And besides, I have an equal in Stella.

Will Ransome: What are you hoping to find?
Cora Seaborne: A tangible link to our past. To the creatures that came before us.
Will Ransome: To what you think is out there.
Cora Seaborne: Maybe.
Will Ransome: But how can a dead fossil prove the existence of a living one?
Cora Seaborne: It can’t. But it might give us hints. Clues.
Will Ransome: You really believe that?
Cora Seaborne: I think I believe. I’m never sure of the difference between thinking and believing. Perhaps one day you can teach me.
Will Ransome: I thought you favored hard evidence over supposition.
Cora Seaborne: Science requires dreams just like your theology. To make a leap in the dark, from ignorance to understanding.
Will Ransome: Faith.

Frankie Seaborne: Do you believe in the serpent?
Stella Ransome: I don’t know, Frankie. I’m not sure we have all the answers yet. But don’t tell my husband.
Frankie Seaborne: I can keep secrets.
Stella Ransome: So can I.

Will Ransome: I thought you were a city girl.
Cora Seaborne: No, I lived on the coast until I was sixteen. My father brought me to London to meet my husband.
Will Ransome: I’m sorry. You must miss him.
Cora Seaborne: The first thing you’d see if you came to my house is a Japanese kintsugi vase. It’s pottery that’s been broken and put back together with gold. It’s beautiful. Michael gave it to me when we met. He told me he wanted to break me and mend me with gold.
Will Ransome: Did he hurt you?

Martha: Sometimes you have to make trouble to get change.

Cora Seaborne: The wonders of science.
Will Ransome: And yet, it bothers me.
Cora Seaborne: Why?
Will Ransome: I don’t know. You and I, we think we see a boat sailing in the sky. And Naomi thinks she sees a serpent in the water. I don’t know.

Will Ransome: Cora, do you think there’s something strange going on here?
Cora Seaborne: Of course not.

Will Ransome: What would you like me to do?
Matthew Evansford: Convene the parish council.
Will Ransome: Absolutely not. A meeting will only entrench people’s fears.
Matthew Evansford: Then do it your way. And let the devil in.

Will Ransome: “I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears.”
Stella Ransome: What are you afraid of?
Will Ransome: Nothing.

Cora Seaborne: Buried in the mud, all around us, are the remnants of ancient creatures.
Matthew Evansford: Creatures that God put on this earth thousands of years ago.
Cora Seaborne: Well, creatures, I believe, evolved over time.
Boy: Does that mean in thousands of years, people will find the remnants of the serpent?
Matthew Evansford: Stupid question. Be quiet.
Cora Seaborne: No, it’s a good question.
Girl: You mean it might be real?
Cora Seaborne: Yes. If it’s a living fossil.

Naomi Banks: Is there a serpent or not? Just tell me the truth.
Cora Seaborne: Well, that’s what I’m here to find out. The truth is I honestly don’t know.
Boy: The serpent’s coming for us. The serpent’s coming for us.
Cora Seaborne: No, that’s not what I mean.
[then the children start accusing Naomi as she suffers a seizure]

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