Quotes from Men at Arms: The Play

“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.

Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.

But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.

This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

“Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

“We're dealing here," said Vimes, "With a twisted mind."
"Oh, no! You think so?"
"Yes."
"But... no... you can't be right. Because Nobby was with us all the time."
"Not Nobby," said Vimes testily. "Whatever he might do to a dragon, I doubt if he'd make it explode. There's stranger people in this world than Corporal Nobbs, my lad."
Carrot's expression slid into a rictus of intrigued horror.
"Gosh," he said.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

“Silverfish looked down.
"Oh. Are you a dwarf?"
Cuddy gave him a blank stare.
"Are you a giant?" He said.
"Me? Of course not!"
"Ah. Then I must be a dwarf, yes.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

“It was the way he wore the place. You expected him any moment to break into the kind of song that has suspicious rhymes and phrases like "my kind of town" and "I wanna be a part of it" in it; the kind of song where people dance in the street and give the singer apples and join in and a dozen lowly matchgirls suddenly show amazing choreographical ability and everyone acts like cheery lovable citizens instead of the murderous, evil-minded, self-centered people they suspect themselves to be. But the point was that if Carrot had erupted into a song, people WOULD have joined in. Carrot could have jollied up a circle of standing stones to form up behind him and do a rumba.”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

“Right!"
"Right!"
"You can get there!"
"I can get there!"
"You're a natural at counting to two!"
"I'm a nat'ral at counting to two!"
"If you can count to two, you can count to anything!"
"If I can count to two, I can count to anything!"
"And then the world is your mollusc!"
"My mollusc! What's a mollusc?”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from Men at Arms: The Play

About the author

Popular quotes

“pain, pleasure and death are no more than a process for existence. The revolutionary struggle in this process is a doorway open to intelligence”
― Frida Kahlo, quote from The Diary of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait

“You stole my loneliness. I may have given you wings, but you've become my gravity. I’ll never be free of your force.”
― Pepper Winters, quote from Quintessentially Q

“And then you opened your mouth. All that love, all that loyalty, all the innocence, even though life had kicked you around time and time again, and all I wanted to do was let some of that sweetness and light touch me. I’ve never had very clean hands, but the first time I touched you, that first gasp out of that perfect mouth, the first time I thrust into you, God, Dovie, you made me feel like I was the king in a land of second chances.” I was stunned.”
― Jay Crownover, quote from Better When He's Bad

“So you got fired?”
“I quit.”
“When I quit the Order, you told me I was besmirched.”
“That’s because you quit in a huff over some silliness like trying to save people’s lives. I quit to maximize my earning potential. Don’t you know being a hero is a losing bet? The pay is shit and people hate you for it.” Luther looked at Curran. “Who is the male specimen?”
Curran offered Luther his hand. “Lennart.”
Luther grabbed Curran’s hand and smelled it. “Shapeshifter, feline, probably a lion, but not the run-of-the-mill African Simba. You’ve got an odd scent about you.” He glanced at me. “Why do you always hang out with weirdos?”
― Ilona Andrews, quote from Magic Shifts

“Terms don't define our lives; our lives define our terms.”
― Joshua Harris, quote from Boy Meets Girl: Say Hello to Courtship

Interesting books

About BookQuoters

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.

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.