“There are times when you can't do the sensible thing, when you can't act like a responsible adult at all; you just have to do whatever insane thing comes into your head. When bad people do it they end up murderers, when good people do it they end up heroes, and when the rest of do it we end up looking like total idiots. But when's that ever stopped us?”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“The sunset was really over, but a thunderously deep stain of red still lay across the furthest limit of the western sky. I looked out to it for a moment. Skye was somewhere out there, more felt than seen.”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“... as fur sneak nuclear attacks on anithir country, there was only wan state in history had ever done that, an it wiznae the fuckin Soviet Union.' - McCann”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“He was one of those men ... who know in their hearts that for all their edgy, belligerent hardness they are just unhappy kids, emotional retards.”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“There's this sloth in the jungle walking from one tree to another, and it's mugged by a gang of snails, and when the police ask the sloth if it could identify any of its attackers, it says, 'I don't know; it all happened so quickly...”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“And even a small amount of talent can go an appallingly long way, these days.”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“Aye,’ McCann said ruefully, ‘if yer rich yer just eccentric; if yer poor yer a nutcase an they stick ye in the bin.”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“Peddle one of the least harmful drugs humanity's ever discovered, and you get twenty years. Peddle something that kills a hundred thousand a year... and you get a knighthood.”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
“I still don't understand fashion. Why do people dress up in new styles in the first place if they're only going to act all embarrassed and ashamed about them later?”
― Iain Banks, quote from Espedair Street
Iain Banks
Born place: in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland
Born date February 16, 1954
See more on GoodReads
“In time, all will be well - for all of us."
"You sound as if you truly believe that it will."
"Why shouldn't I? For Arman has given us the end of the story, has he not? Shamayim will be a wonderful home, even if this one remains dark.”
― Jill Williamson, quote from From Darkness Won
“In his own mind, it was never a matter of courage. But courage it was.”
― Carl Hiaasen, quote from Chomp
“Who would condescend to strike down the mere things that he does not
fear? Who would debase himself to be merely brave, like any common
prizefighter? Who would stoop to be fearless--like a tree? Fight the
thing that you fear. You remember the old tale of the English clergyman
who gave the last rites to the brigand of Sicily, and how on his
death-bed the great robber said, 'I can give you no money, but I can
give you advice for a lifetime: your thumb on the blade, and strike
upwards.' So I say to you, strike upwards, if you strike at the stars.”
― G.K. Chesterton, quote from The Man Who Was Thursday
“Someone once wrote that in between the lives we lead and the lives we fantasize about living is the place in our heads where most of us actually live.”
― Kim Gordon, quote from Girl in a Band
“The white men on the Brinkley set were trying not to grin, like cheap lawyers at a ten-car pileup: Uh, did that mean Senator Dole didn’t think all the facts were out? Didn’t he believe the White House, that North and Poindexter were the only ones who knew? The Bobster dropped an eyebrow and rasped: “Aghh, don’t think Ripley’d believe that.”
― Richard Ben Cramer, quote from What It Takes: The Way to the White House
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