“The way to deal with an impossible task was to chop it down into a number of merely very difficult tasks, and break each one of them into a group of horribly hard tasks, and each of them into tricky jobs, and each of them...”
“There's some things we can't think because we don't know the words.”
“The important thing about being a leader is not being right or wrong but being certain. Of course it helps to be right as well, the Abbot conceeded.”
“How many books are there?" said Masklin.
"Hundreds! Thousands!"
"Do you know what they're all about?"
Gurder looked at him blankly. "Do you know what you're saying?" he said.
"No. But I want to find out."
"They're about everything! You'd never believe it! They're full of words even I don't understand!"
"Can you find a book which tells you how to understand words you don't understand?" said Masklin.
Gurder hesitated. "It's an intriguing thought," he said.”
“The monk solved his immediate problem by giving a little whimper and fainting.”
“ If you ask 10 nomes to push four will pull and two will say pardon”
“I will endeavor to clarify my statement," said the Thing. A few lights flashed.
"Jolly good," said Masklin.
"Big-fella Store him go Bang along plenty soon enough chop-chop?" said the Thing, hopefully.
The nomes watched one another's faces. There didn't seem to be any light dawning.
The Thing cleared it's throat again. "Do you know the meaning of the word 'destroyed'?" it said.
"Oh, yes," said Dorcas.
"That's what is going to happen to the Store. In twenty-one days.”
“I. Woe unto you, Ironmongri and Haberdasheri; woe unto you, Millineri and Del Icatessen; woe unto you, Young Fashions, and unto you, you the bandits of Corsetry. And even unto you, Stationeri.
II. For the Store is but a Place inside the Outside.
III. Woe unto you, for Arnold Bros (est. 1905) has opened the Last Sale. Everything Must Go.
IV. But they mocked him and said, You are an Outsider, You don't even Exist.
From The Book of Nome, Goods Inward v.I-IV”
“I think all we really want is to go home and be safe," said Masklin.
"Go home."
"That's right."
"And be safe."
"Yes.”
“I’m really not certain about threatening people with antelopes ...”
“There are few things in this life more bamboo-under-fingernails than good poetry read aloud badly-unless it is bad poetry read aloud badly.”
“Come to Me and we will blow the world back together WITH INCREDIBLE NOISE AND FURY.”
“(...) one man will look another in the face, with the impudent assurance that he will never see anything but a miserable resemblance of himself; and this is just what he will see, as he cannot grasp anything beyond it. Hence the bold way in which one man will contradict another.”
“Ocultarme no está en mi naturaleza, prefiero enfrentar las cosas de frente. Supongo”
“bodies becoming like prisons with the person stuck inside. Screaming, or not screaming, but staring at you like you should do something.”
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