“What did I want?
I wanted a Roc's egg. I wanted a harem loaded with lovely odalisques less than the dust beneath my chariot wheels, the rust that never stained my sword,. I wanted raw red gold in nuggets the size of your fist and feed that lousy claim jumper to the huskies! I wanted to get u feeling brisk and go out and break some lances, then pick a like wench for my droit du seigneur--I wanted to stand up to the Baron and dare him to touch my wench! I wanted to hear the purple water chuckling against the skin of the Nancy Lee in the cool of the morning watch and not another sound, nor any movement save the slow tilting of the wings of the albatross that had been pacing us the last thousand miles.
I wanted the hurtling moons of Barsoom. I wanted Storisende and Poictesme, and Holmes shaking me awake to tell me, "The game's afoot!" I wanted to float down the Mississippi on a raft and elude a mob in company with the Duke of Bilgewater and the Lost Dauphin.
I wanted Prestor John, and Excalibur held by a moon-white arm out of a silent lake. I wanted to sail with Ulysses and with Tros of Samothrace and eat the lotus in a land that seemed always afternoon. I wanted the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be what they had promised me it was going to be--instead of the tawdry, lousy, fouled-up mess it is.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“I was not offended, my love. An insult is like a drink; it affects one only if accepted. And pride is too heavy baggage for my journey...”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“There are things which cannot be taught in ten easy lessons, nor popularized for the masses; they take years of skull sweat.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“Yes, sir, there are things to see and do on the French Riviera without spending money.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“What did I want? I wanted a Roc's egg. I wanted a harem loaded with lovely odalisques less than the dust beneath my chariot wheels, the rust that never stained my sword. I wanted raw red gold in nuggets the size of your fist, and feed that lousy claim jumper to the huskies! I wanted to get up feeling brisk and go out and break some lances, then pick a likely wench for my droit du seigneur - I wanted to stand up to the Baron and dare him to touch my wench! I wanted to hear the purple water chuckling against the skin of the Nancy Lee in the cool of the morning watch and not another sound, nor any movement save the slow tilting of the wings of the albatross that had been pacing us the last thousand miles. I wanted the hurtling moons of Barsoom. I wanted Storisende and Poictesme, and Holmes shaking me awake to tell me, "The game's afoot!" I wanted to float down the Mississippi on a raft and elude a mob in company with the Duke of Bilgewater and Lost Dauphin. I wanted Prester John, and Excalibur held by a moon-white arm out of a silent lake. I wanted to sail with Ulysses and with Tros of Samothrace and to eat the lotus in a land that seemed always afternoon. I wanted the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be the way they had promised me it was going to be, instead of the tawdry, lousy, fouled-up mess it is. I had had one chance - for ten minutes yesterday afternoon. Helen of Troy, whatever your true name may be - and I had known it and I had let it slip away. Maybe one chance is all you ever get.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“I object to conscription the way a lobster objects to boiling water: it may be his finest hour but it’s not his choice.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“Logic is a feeble reed, friend. “Logic” proved that airplanes can’t fly and that H-bombs won’t work and that stones don’t fall out of the sky. Logic is a way of saying that anything that didn’t happen yesterday won’t happen tomorrow.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“Do you speak English?" "Certainly. And I understand American.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“The fact is I am a compulsive reader. Thirty-five cents’ worth of Gold Medal Original will put me right to sleep. Or Perry Mason. But I’ll read the ads in an old Paris-Match that has been used to wrap herring before I’ll do without.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“But it’s a hell of a note when you can’t even kill a dragon and feel lighthearted afterwards.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“A magician is a rule-of-thumb engineer.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“I don't gamble, if you will concede that poker is a game of skill.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“But I didn’t go to sleep. The truth is, I’ve got a monkey on my back, a habit worse than marijuana though not as expensive as heroin. I can stiff it out and get to sleep anyway—but it wasn’t helping that I could see light in Star’s tent and a silhouette that was no longer troubled by a dress. The fact is I am a compulsive reader. Thirty-five cents’ worth of Gold Medal Original will put me right to sleep. Or Perry Mason. But I’ll read the ads in an old Paris-Match that has been used to wrap herring before I’ll do without.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, quote from Glory Road
“Is there anything more frightening than people?”
― Svetlana Alexievich, quote from Voces de Chernóbil: Crónica del futuro
“So understood, anarchism is the inheritor of the classical liberal ideas that emerged from the Enlightenment. It is part of a broader range of libertarian socialist thought and action that ranges from the left anti-Bolshevik Marxism of Anton Pannekoek, Karl Korsch, Paul Mattick, and others, to the anarcho-syndicalism that crucially includes the practical achievements of revolutionary Spain in 1936, reaching further to worker-owned enterprises spreading today in the Rust Belt of the United States, in northern Mexico, in Egypt, and in many other countries, most extensively in the Basque country in Spain, also encompassing the many cooperative movements around the world and a good part of feminist and civil and human rights initiatives.”
― Noam Chomsky, quote from What Kind of Creatures Are We?
“From the front row of the balcony, I look out over the Uptown Cinema. The red velvet seats are emptying, the credits scrolling up the screen. Ginger Rogers married a Nazi, but Cary Grant got her out of it. Their ship is sailing to America; sun burns away the fog and the wind blows free. Now they are gone and I am coming back to reality, breathing a harsher air. It is how I always feel when a movie ends.”
― Kermit Roosevelt III, quote from Allegiance
“It's impossible to say a thing exactly the way it was, because of what you say can never be exact, you always have to leave something out, there are too many parts, sides, crosscurrents, nuances; too many gestures, which could mean this or that, too many shapes which can never be fully described, too many flavors, in the air or on the tongue, half-colors, too many.”
― Margaret Atwood, quote from The Handmaid's Tale (Contemporary Classics)
“Are you fucking someone else?”
“We haven’t spoken in weeks.” I grit my teeth. “I haven’t seen you in weeks, and this is the first thing you ask me? How about, ‘Hello, Gillian. It’s been a long time since we last spoke. How are you?’”
“Hello, Gillian.” He mocks me, locking his eyes on mine. “It’s been a long time since we last spoke. How are you?” He doesn’t give me a chance to answer. “Are you fucking someone else?”
― Whitney G., quote from Turbulence
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