Sherif Ali Quotes in Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Sherif Ali: Truly, for some men nothing is written unless THEY write it.

Sherif Ali: Have you no fear, English?

T.E. Lawrence: My fear is my concern.

Prince Feisal: Gasim's time has come, Lawrence. It is written.

T.E. Lawrence: Nothing is written.

Sherif Ali: You will not be at Aqaba, English! Go back, blasphemer... but you will not be at Aqaba!

T.E. Lawrence: I shall be at Aqaba. That, IS written.

[pointing to forehead]

T.E. Lawrence: In here.

Auda abu Tayi: It is Auda of the Howitat who speaks.

Sherif Ali: It is Ali of the Harith who answers.

Auda abu Tayi: Harith! Ali, does your father still steal?

Sherif Ali: No. Does Auda take me for one of his own bastards?

Auda abu Tayi: No, there is no resemblance. Alas, you resemble your father.

Sherif Ali: Auda flatters me.

Auda abu Tayi: You're easily flattered. I knew your father well.

Sherif Ali: Did you know your own?

Sherif Ali: What is your name?

T.E. Lawrence: My name is for my friends. None of my friends is a murderer!

Sherif Ali: I do not understand this. Your father's name is Chapman...

T.E. Lawrence: Ali, he didn't marry my mother.

Sherif Ali: I see.

T.E. Lawrence: I'm sorry.

Sherif Ali: It seems to me that you are free to choose your own name, then.

Sherif Ali: What are you looking for?

T.E. Lawrence: Some way to announce myself.

Sherif Ali: Be patient with him, God.

Sherif Ali: There is the railway. And that is the desert. From here until we reach the other side, no water but what we carry with us. For the camels, no water at all. If the camels die, we die. And in twenty days they will start to die.

T.E. Lawrence: There's no time to waste, then, is there?

[Arabs are looting a train after blowing it up]

Sherif Ali: It is their payment, Colonel.

Colonel Brighton: Payment?

Sherif Ali: Truly, are not British soldiers paid?

Colonel Brighton: They don't go home when they've been paid!

Sherif Ali: They are not free to!

Sherif Ali: Does it surprise you, Mr Bentley? Surely, you know the Arabs are a barbarous people. Barbarous and cruel. Who but they! Who but they!

T.E. Lawrence: The Law says the man must die... If he dies, would that content the Howitat?

Auda abu Tayi: Yes.

T.E. Lawrence: Sherif Ali. If none of lord Auda's men harms any of yours, will that content the Harith?

Sherif Ali: Yes.

T.E. Lawrence: Then I will execute the Law. I have no tribe and no one is offended.

Auda abu Tayi: What ails the Englishman?

Sherif Ali: The one he killed is the one he brought out of the Nafud.

Auda abu Tayi: It was written then. Better to have left him there.

[Lawrence and Ali watch as British cannons fire in the distance]

Sherif Ali: God help the men that lie under that.

T.E. Lawrence: They are Turks.

Sherif Ali: God help them.

T.E. Lawrence: Look, Ali. If any of your Beduin arrived in Cairo and said: "We've taken Aqaba" the generals would laugh.

Sherif Ali: I see. In Cairo you will put off these funny clothes. You'll wear trousers and tell stories of our quaintness and barbarity and then they will believe you.

T.E. Lawrence: You're an ignorant man.

Sherif Ali: [Ali shots Tafas dead while riding his camel. He stops his camel and jumps down to see Tafas' body] He is dead.

T.E. Lawrence: yes... why?

Sherif Ali: this is my well.

[mentioning the well Lawrence and Tafas just used for resting]

T.E. Lawrence: I have drunk from it.

Sherif Ali: You are welcome.

T.E. Lawrence: He was my friend.

Sherif Ali: That?

[mentioning Tafas]

T.E. Lawrence: Yes, that.

Sherif Ali: [Ali walks towards peter and grabs tafas' gun lying on the sand] This pistol yours?

T.E. Lawrence: No, his.

Sherif Ali: [Ali places the pistol to his waist and walks towards the well] His?

[mentioning the tincup near the well]

T.E. Lawrence: Mine.

Sherif Ali: hen i will use it.

[pulls some water out of well]

Sherif Ali: ... your friend... was a Hazimi of the Beni Salem.

T.E. Lawrence: I know.

Sherif Ali: [Ali salutes Lawrence and drinks his water] I am Ali ibn el Kharish.

T.E. Lawrence: I have heard of you.

Sherif Ali: So... What was a Hazimi doing here?

T.E. Lawrence: He was taking me to help Prince Feisal.

Sherif Ali: You've been sent from Cairo?

T.E. Lawrence: Yes.

Sherif Ali: I have been in Cairo for my schooling. I can both read and write... my Lord Feisal already has an Englishman.

T.E. Lawrence: Yes.

Sherif Ali: What is your name?

T.E. Lawrence: My name is for my friend.

[Ali walks away]

T.E. Lawrence: None of my friends is a murderer.

Sherif Ali: You are angry, English.

[Ali climbs his camel]

Sherif Ali: He was nothing. The well is everything... The Hazimi may not drink at our wells. He knew that... Salaam.

T.E. Lawrence: Sherif Ali!. So long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people, a silly people. Greedy, barbarous and cruel, as you are.

Sherif Ali: Come. I will take you to Feisal.

T.E. Lawrence: I do not want your company, sherif.

Sherif Ali: Wadi Safra is another day from here. You will not find it, and not finding it you will die.

T.E. Lawrence: I will find it with this.

[showing the compass]

Sherif Ali: [Ali suddenly takes the compass with his stick] Good army compass. How if I take it?

T.E. Lawrence: Then you would be a thief.

Sherif Ali: Have you no fear, English?

T.E. Lawrence: My fear is my concern.

Sherif Ali: Truly.

[Ali gives back the compass to Lawrence]

Sherif Ali: God be with you English.

[And he rides away]