“You have a mismatched pair of genetic characteristics. Either alone would have been useful, would have aided the survival of your species. But the two together are lethal. It was only a matter of time before they destroyed you."
[...]
Jdahya made a rustling noise that could have been a sigh, but that did not seem to comer from his mouth or throat. "You are intelligent," he said. "That's the newer of the two characteristics, and the one you might have put to work to save yourselves. You are potentially one of the most intelligent species we've found, though your focus is different from ours. Still, you had a good start in the life sciences, and even in genetics."
"What's the second characteristic?"
"You are hierarchical. That's the older and more entrenched characteristic. We saw it in your closest animal relatives and in your most distant ones. It's a terrestrial characteristic. When human intelligence served it instead of guiding it, when human intelligence did not even acknowledge it as problem, but took pride in it or din not notice it at all..." The rattling sounded again.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Yes,” he said, “intelligence does enable you to deny facts you dislike. But your denial doesn’t matter.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Your people contain incredible potential, but they die without using much of it.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“A partner must be biologically interesting, attractive to us, and you are fascinating. You are horror and beauty in rare combination. In a very real way, you've captured us, and we can't escape. But you're more than only the composition and the workings of your bodies. You are your personalities, your cultures.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Human beings are more alike than different—damn sure more alike than we like to admit. I wonder if the same thing wouldn’t have happened eventually, no matter which two cultures gained the ability to wipe one another out along with the rest of the world.” Lilith”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“There was no real comfort in being alone with her thoughts, her memories, but somehow the illusion of freedom lessened her despair.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Yes,” he said, “intelligence does enable you to deny facts you dislike.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Your body said one thing. Your words said another.” It moved a sensory arm to the back of his neck, looping one coil loosely around his neck. “This is the position,” it said. “I’ll stop now if you like.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“She had learned to keep her sanity by accepting things as she found them, adapting herself to new circumstances by putting aside the old ones whose memories might overwhelm her. She”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Let go of me.” It smoothed its tentacles again. “Be grateful, Joe. I’m not going to let go of you.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“You are hierarchical. That’s the older and more entrenched characteristic. We saw it in your closest animal relatives and in your most distant ones. It’s a terrestrial characteristic. When human intelligence served it instead of guiding it, when human intelligence did not even acknowledge it as a problem, but took pride in it or did not notice it at all …” The rattling sounded again. “That was like ignoring cancer. I think your people did not realize what a dangerous thing they were doing.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“What is it?” she asked. “Flesh. More like mine than like yours. Different from mine, too, though. It’s … the ship.” “You’re kidding. Your ship is alive?”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“First learning, then proving I’d learned. Knowing and using the knowledge aren’t the same thing.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Curt Loehr, the Oankali said, needed people to look after. People stabilized him, gave him purpose. Without them, he might have been a criminal—or dead.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Down on Earth,” she said carefully, “there are no people left to draw lines on maps and say which sides of those lines are the right sides. There is no government left. No human government, anyway.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“I can’t unfind you,” he said.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“We do what we do, Lilith.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
“Human beings are more alike than different—damn sure more alike than we like to admit. I wonder if the same thing wouldn’t have happened eventually, no matter which two cultures gained the ability to wipe one another out along with the rest of the world.”
― Octavia E. Butler, quote from Dawn
Octavia E. Butler
Born place: in Pasadena, California, The United States
Born date June 22, 1947
See more on GoodReads
“Now that you are here--now that we're together-- I can't imagine going back to the life I had before. I don't know what I'd do if I lost you now. I love you too much. ~Vincent Delacroix, Until I Die (ARC), Amy Plum p. 71”
― Amy Plum, quote from Until I Die
“He wasn't going to send her to any hospital. He knew that now. At a hospital they'd just start shooting her full of drugs and tell her to adjust. What they wouldn't see is that she is adjusting. That's what the insanity is. She's adjusting to something. The insanity is the adjustment. Insanity isn't necessarily a step in the wrong direction, it can be an intermediate step in a right direction. It wasn't necessarily a disease. It could be part of a cure.”
― Robert M. Pirsig, quote from Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals
“Even though she knew it wasn't biologically possible for her heart to rise into her throat, she swallowed it anyway.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Phantoms
“He was on his knees before this female, and he'd gladly stay there for the rest of his life.”
― Lara Adrian, quote from Veil of Midnight
“- You gave me a dead frog for my birthday!
- To remind you we all die and end up rotting underground eaten by maggots so we should enjoy our birthdays while we have them. I found it thoughtful.”
― Soman Chainani, quote from The School for Good and Evil
Our Chemical Hearts
Royally Matched
Broken Harbor
Devices and Desires
Beyond Words: What A...
The Alice NetworkBookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
