“And therefore education at the University mostly worked by the age-old method of putting a lot of young people in the vicinity of a lot of books and hoping that something would pass from one to the other, while the actual young people put themselves in the vicinity of inns and taverns for exactly the same reason.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“There is a curse.
They say:
May you live in interesting times.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“He’d always felt he had a right to exist as a wizard in the same way that you couldn’t do proper maths without the number 0, which wasn’t a number at all but, if it went away, would leave a lot of larger numbers looking bloody stupid.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Probably the last sound heard before the Universe folded up like a paper hat would be someone saying, “What happens if I do this?”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Many things went on at Unseen University and, regrettably, teaching had to be one of them. The faculty had long ago confronted this fact and had perfected various devices for avoiding it. But this was perfectly all right because, to be fair, so had the students.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“It was impossible for him to get bored. He just didn't have the imagination.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“I heard the Empire has a tyrannical and repressive government!"
"What form of government is that?" said Ponder Stibbons.
"A tautology," said the Dean, from above.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“The Empire's got something worse than whips all right. It's got obedience. Whips in the soul. They obey anyone who tells them what to do. Freedom just means being told what to do by someone different.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“You could say to the universe this is not fair. And the universe would say: Oh, isn’t it? Sorry.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Most of the gods throw dice but Fate plays chess, and you don't find out until too late that he's been using two queens all along. Fate wins.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“In life, as in breakfast cereal, it is always best to read the instructions on the box.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“He wanted to say: how could you be so nice and yet so dumb? The best thing you could do with the peasents was to leave them alone. Let them get on with it. When people who can read and write start fighting for those who can't, you just end up with another kind of stupidity. If you want to help them, build a big library or something somewhere and leave the door open.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“They stole from rich merchants and temples and kings. They didn't steal from poor people; this was not because there was anything virtuous about poor people, it was simply because poor people had no money.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Oh, no," said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, pushing his chair back. "Not that. That's meddling with things you don't understand."
"Well, we are wizards," said Ridcully. "We're supposed to meddle in things we don't understand. If we hung around waitin' till we understood things we'd never get anything done.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“And when in doubt, take all your clothes off,' said Caleb. 'What for?' 'Sign of a good berserk, taking all your clothes off. Frightens the hell out of the enemy. If anyone starts laughing, stab 'em one.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Ricewind had always relied on running away. But somerimes, perhaps, you had to stand and fight, if only because there was nowhere left to run.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“A foot on the neck is nine points of the law.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“with the expression of one who knows that the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Do teachers go anywhere special when they die?’ said Cohen. ‘I don’t think so,’ said Mr Saveloy gloomily. He wondered for a moment whether there really was a great Free Period in the sky. It didn’t sound very likely. Probably there would be some marking to do.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Look, I don’t mind summoning some demon and asking it,” said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. “That’s normal. But building some mechanical contrivance to do your thinking for you, that’s … against Nature.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“They were probably descended from people who learned that if you look too hard at anyone on horseback you receive a sharp stinging sensation such as might be obtained by a stick around the ear. Not looking up at people on horseback had become hereditary. People who stared at people on horseback in what was considered to be a funny way never survived long enough to breed.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“with one mighty bound, you could be free. Provided you realized it was one of your options.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“The Four Horsemen whose Ride presages the end of the world are known to be Death, War, Famine, and Pestilence. But even less significant events have their own Horsemen. For example, the Four Horsemen of the Common Cold are Sniffles, Chesty, Nostril, and Lack of Tissues; the Four Horsemen whose appearance foreshadows any public holiday are Storm, Gales, Sleet, and Contra-flow.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Cohen looked at the forest of lances and pennants. Hundreds of thousands of men looked like quite a lot of men when you saw them close to.
"I suppose," he said, slowly, "that none of you has got some amazing plan you've been keeping quiet about?"
"We thought you had one," said Truckle.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“No one likes a poor thief.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“I am not frightened,' said Lord Tang. 'I am ashamed.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Adventure! People talked about the idea as if it was something worthwhile, rather than a mess of bad food, no sleep, and strange people inexplicably trying to stick pointed objects in bits of you.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“I feel like a million dollars don't you? ... Good, Lets go get some.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
“Three Pink Pig and Five White Fang were, loosely speaking, privates, and not just because they were pale, vulnerable, and inclined to curl up and hide when danger threatened.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Interesting Times
Terry Pratchett
Born place: in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, England, The United Kingdom
Born date April 28, 1948
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“Some things you remember, and some you forget. Of the things you remember, you have to wonder what’s real and what’s translated into a memory from a story you heard.”
― Bill Konigsberg, quote from The Porcupine of Truth
“Foxy girls know that silence may be golden-but only for four seconds. Anything longer and you're heading for Awkward Avenue.”
― Meg Cabot, quote from Prom Nights from Hell
“Her Lips Are Copper Wire”
whisper of yellow globes
gleaming on lamp posts that sway
like bootleg licker drinkers in the fog
and let your breath be moist against me
like bright beads on yellow globes
telephone the power-house
that the main wires are insulate
(her words play up and down
dewy corridors of billboards)
then with your tongue remove the tape
and press your lips to mine
till they are incandescent”
― Jean Toomer, quote from Cane
“A man's perishing here, a man's vanishing from his own sight here, and can't control himself--what sort of wedding can there be!”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, quote from The Double
“Commitment is a word invented in our abstract modernity to signify the absence of any real motives in the soul for moral dedication.”
― Allan Bloom, quote from The Closing of the American Mind
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Dreams from My Fathe...BookQuoters 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.
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