- Gustav Palm: You can't expect us to sit idly by white Sweden's future goes down the drain.
- Fredrik Bergström: I wonder what would happen, if you and all the other bachelors with good salaries were to try to save the future and birthrate by marrying? But no, you don't want that. You won't even hear of it. Neither that nor the bachelor tax.
- Gustav Palm: Now you listen, if all the married people in Sweden were to do as much for the birthrate as we bachelors do, there would be no need to worry about our country.
- Lena Bergström: Aunt Lena will always be a Bergström, you'll see.
- Fredrik Bergström: Fiddlesticks. Why, you could have any fellow you want.
- [first lines]
- Gustav Palm: There are hundreds of reasons, no, thousands, that demand a quick solution to the birthrate problem, or Sweden will begin depopulating in 20 years. Sweden must be saved.
- Johan Borg: When I married you, Clary, I thought I was getting a wife.
- Clary Borg: I'm still a young woman. I have a right to enjoy life even if I happen to be married.
- Maid: Pardon me, Mrs. Bergström, but our little boy will need a fresh change of diapers.
- Johan Borg: [to her sister-in-law] Please let me do it. You know I enjoy it so.
- Svensson: Morning! Some great news items! A stonemason got run over on Östermalmstorg at 6:00 AM. Five ribs, his femur and 25 bottles of beer shot to hell. The bottles were empty.
- Gustav Palm: All right. Svensson, it's 50 öre a piece for the ribs and 1.25 krona for his femur. The empty beer bottles you'll throw in for free. Here you are.
- Svensson: I see. I forgot the most important part. He was run over by a society dame, a drunken countess.
- Gustav Palm: Are you serious?
- Svensson: Sure! She's sleeping it off at the precinct, while the police check out Thalia, the nightclub she visited before the mason came into her sights.
- Gustav Palm: You get 20 kroner extra for the drunken countess. There you are.
- Johan Borg: Are you dead set on killing any love that remains in my heart for you?
- Clary Borg: Love? Huh. I know what you mean by love.
- Johan Borg: You never did know that.
- Fredrik Bergström: That's the trouble with you young people. You know so damn much, but understand so damn little.
- Johan Borg: Why don't you and I watch the Spring celebration together. Then we'll have a farewell supper at Hasselbacken. There's a table waiting anyway.
- Lena Bergström: No, I couldn't.
- Johan Borg: Is it a problem that I'm your boss? Remember, I'm not anymore.
- Lena Bergström: It's not only that. You yourself know full well why it wouldn't be appropriate.
- Speaker at Walpurgis Celebration: Oh, burn brightly, bonfire of Spring, Let hope return with birds on the wing, The winter is sounding its retreat, Spring is coming, so light on its feet, And go and tell them even so, That just as our sun melts the snow, Our hearts will be warmed also.
- Johan Borg: It will be awfully empty without you here. I mean, we'd gotten so used to you. We hadn't figured on losing you so soon.
- Lena Bergström: I'm very sorry, sir, but I can't stay any longer.
- Johan Borg: I guess I may catch a glimpse of you in the street now and again.
- Fredrik Bergström: [looking at a photo of his late wife] Here we are once again, all on our own on Walpurgis night, my love. Do you recall that night 35 years ago and the words I wrote? "Love is more than a kiss in springtime. It's tenderness, a lifetime of sacrifice and caring." Sure, you remember.
- Maid: [on the dance floor] It never hurts to get the lowdown on the socialites. That's VP Borg over there, with the rose in his lapel. It seems he's got a real honey tonight.
- Photographer: Everyone knows VP Borg.
- Fredrik Bergström: You know him, do you?
- Photographer: A friend of my sister knew someone who worked for him. All the girls were nuts about him! But he was anything but a Don Juan. He never returned their flirty looks. But look at that sweet girl. She's got the devil in her eyes.
- Johan Borg: I had but one wish. To find happiness with her.
- Fredrik Bergström: You sure chose a strange way to find happiness.
- Fredrik Bergström: Didn't you once say that a man's morals are never lower than when his wife has made their marriage miserable?
- Fredrik Bergström: Lena is the very image of her mother. The same tender, devoted little lady, but she's also just as hot-blooded as she was.
- Gustav Palm: You can drive a man crazy with your Spring poetry when we're so short on space. A story like this drunken countess is real news, but we have Spring and Walpurgis every year. People get tired of it.
- Fredrik Bergström: People never get tired of Spring.
- Gustav Palm: Well, all right, have your three columns, and we'll cut the cultural page. But the countess will not be cut down, you Spring zealot, you!
- Fredrik Bergström: You're a ruthless egotist, who never knew what love is, a scoundrel who would sacrifice a young girl's happiness, just because she made the mistake of falling in love with you.
- Johan Borg: You ruined everything we had. Everything!
- Clary Borg: You seem to forget that you owe me your life.
- Johan Borg: My life! What's my life worth now?
- Lena's Friend: Hey, does he only write once a day?
- Lena Bergström: Yes, only once a day; but, of course, he calls every night.
- Lena's Friend: When it costs less. How touching.
- Lena's Friend: Is he fair-haired?
- Lena Bergström: Ash-blond.
- Lena's Friend: Do I know him?
- Lena Bergström: I won't say. I won't tell you anything until all's ready.
- Lena's Friend: For the engagement? When will it be?
- Lena Bergström: On Walpurgis night, that's the plan.
- Gustav Palm: We're awfully thin on real news. Just theater gossip and stale old royal engagement rumors. Not even one measly robbery to lend it some color. In deed, it's enough to make a man want to take a drink.
- Fredrik Bergström: Good heavens. Is that milk you're drinking?
- Gustav Palm: Shh. Don't shout it out for all the world to hear. I happened to try a glass the other day, the first since I was a toddler. I quite enjoyed it, as a matter of fact. But, I pour it into a beer bottle to avoid comments.
- Fredrik Bergström: You're not being sensible, Lena. You're hurting yourself by living in isolation like this. In order to live you need something to live for.
- Fredrik Bergström: Such a fool I've been. A damned, silly fool! For not knowing that my daughter was no better than a common trollop!
- Clary Borg: I know you've helped others, Doctor. Why won't you help me?
- Clary's Doctor: Mrs. Borg, I truly regret that you have such a mistaken view about a doctor's responsibilities in cases like these. You're young, healthy, and well off. There's no reason whatsoever for medical intervention.
- Clary Borg: The pregnancy wasn't my fault. I was always against it. I don't want my youth spoiled.
- Clary's Doctor: Motherhood grants a woman a certain nobility unrivaled by anything else on earth.
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