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And So The Children Of The Revolution Were Faced With The Age-old Problem: It Wasn't That You Had The Wrong Kind Of Government, Which Was Obvious, But That You Had The Wrong Kind Of People. As Soon As You Saw People As Things To Be Measured, They Didn't Measure Up.

-Terry Pratchett

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And So The Children

Terry Pratchett

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And So The Children Of The Revolution Were Faced With The Age-old Problem: It Wasn't That You Had The Wrong Kind Of Government, Which Was Obvious, But That You Had The Wrong Kind Of People. As Soon As You Saw People As Things To Be Measured, They Didn't Measure Up.

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It Is A Popular Fact That Nine-tenths Of The Brain Is Not Used And, Like Most Popular Facts, It Is Wrong. Not Even The Most Stupid Creator Would Go To The Trouble Of Making The Human Head Carry Around Several Pounds Of Unnecessary Gray Goo If Its Only Real Purpose Was, For Example, To Serve As A Delicacy For Certain Remote Tribesmen In Unexplored Valleys.

There's Some Things That You Wouldn't Tackle In A Children's Book Because It Would Be Beyond, Not The Mental Capabilities, But The Experience Of Someone Under The Age Of Say Ten Or Eleven To Encompass. But That Field Is Smaller Than You Might Think. They Can Easily Cope With Death And Things Like That; They Know About It And It's A Subject That Often Preoccupies Them.

Priests Were Metal-reinforced Overshoes. They Saved Your Soles. This Is An Assassin Joke.

If You Had Enough Money, You Could Hardly Commit Crimes At All. You Just Perpetrated Amusing Little Peccadilloes.

He Had About The Same Life Expectancy As A Three Legged Hedgehog On A Six Lane Motorway.

And, While It Was Regarded As Pretty Good Evidence Of Criminality To Be Living In A Slum, For Some Reason Owning A Whole Street Of Them Merely Got You Invited To The Very Best Social Occasions.

It Is At This Point That Normal Language Gives Up, And Goes And Has A Drink.

There Isn't A Way Things Should Be. There's Just What Happens, And What We Do.

I Didn't Go To University. Didn't Even Finish A-levels. But I Have Sympathy For Those Who Did.

A Witch Who Is Bored Might Do Anything. People Said Things Like 'we Had To Make Our Own Amusements In Those Days' As If This Signified Some Kind Of Moral Worth, And Perhaps It Did, But The Last Thing You Wanted A Witch To Do Was Get Bored And Start Making Her Own Amusements, Because Witches Sometimes Had Famously Erratic Ideas About What Was Amusing.

It's An Interesting Fact That Fewer Than 17 % Of Real Cats End Their Lives With The Same Name They Started With. Much Family Effort Goes Into Selecting One At The Start ("she Looks Like A Winnifred To Me"), And The As The Years Roll By It Suddenly Finds Itself Being Called Meepo Or Ratbag.

Although The Scythe Isn't Pre-eminent Among The Weapons Of War, Anyone Who Has Been On The Wrong End Of, Say, A Peasants' Revolt Will Know That In Skilled Hands It Is Fearsome.

Interesting Thing, These Fellows Never Seem To Get The Idea Of Perspective-' The Bursar Thought, Or Received The Thought: That's Because Perspective Is A Lie. If I Know A Pond Is Round Then Why Should I Draw It Oval? I Will Draw It Round Because Round Is True. Why Should My Brush Lie To You Just Because My Eye Lies To Me?

That's The Ankh-morpork Instinct, Vimes Thought. Run Away, And Then Stop And See If Anything Interesting Is Going To Happen To Other People.

I Know That I Am A Small, Weak Man, But I Have Amassed A Large Library; I Dream Of Dangerous Places.

The Thief, As Will Become Apparent, Was A Special Type Of Thief. This Thief Was An Artist Of Theft. Other Thieves Merely Stole Everything That Was Not Nailed Down, But This Thief Stole The Nails As Well.

Perhaps The Magic Would Last, Perhaps It Wouldn't. But Then Again, What Does?

Let's See, Now... In Hogfather There Are A Number Of Stabbings, Someone's Killed By A Man Made Of Knives, Someone's Killed By The Dark, And Someone Just Been Killed By A Wardrobe. It's A Book About The Magic Of Childhood. You Can Tell.

Why Do You Go Away? So That You Can Come Back. So That You Can See The Place You Came From With New Eyes And Extra Colors. And The People There See You Differently, Too. Coming Back To Where You Started Is Not The Same As Never Leaving.

It Was Long After Midnight And The Stars Looked Damp And Chilly; The Air Was Full Of The Busy Silence Of The Night, Which Is Created By Hundreds Of Small Furry Things Treading Very Carefully In The Hope Of Finding Dinner While Avoiding Being The Main Course.

Few Things Are Hidden From A Quiet Child With Good Eyesight.

It's Always Surprising To Be Reminded That While You're Watching And Thinking About People, All Knowing And Superior, They're Watching And Thinking About You, Right Back At You.

Thinking About You

You Had To Deal Every Day With People Who Were Foolish And Lazy And Untruthful And Downright Unpleasant, And You Could Certainly End Up Thinking That The World Would Be Considerably Improved If You Gave Them A Slap.

Given Enough Coffee I Could Rule The World

At Least I Know I'm Bewildered About The Really Fundamental And Important Facts Of The Universe.

This Is Space. It's Sometimes Called The Final Frontier. (except That Of Course You Can't Have A Final Frontier, Because There'd Be Nothing For It To Be A Frontier To, But As Frontiers Go, It's Pretty Penultimate . . .)

Night Poured Over The Desert. It Came Suddenly, In Purple. In The Clear Air, The Stars Drilled Down Out Of The Sky, Reminding Any Thoughtful Watcher That It Is In The Deserts And High Places That Religions Are Generated. When Men See Nothing But Bottomless Infinity Over Their Heads They Have Always Had A Driving And Desperate Urge To Find Someone To Put In The Way.

Writing, For Me, Is A Little Like Wood Carving. You Find The Lump Of Tree (the Big Central Theme That Gets You Started), And You Start Cutting The Shape That You Think You Want It To Be. But You Find, If You Do It Right, That The Wood Has A Grain Of Its Own (characters Develop And Present New Insights, Concentrated Thinking About The Story Opens New Avenues). If You're Sensible, You Work With The Grain And, If You Come Across A Knot Hole, You Incorporate That Into The Design. This Is Not The Same As 'making It Up As You Go Along'; It's A Very Careful Process Of Control.

Sometimes I Think A Man Could Wander Across The Disc All His Life And Not See Everything There Is To See,' Said Twoflower. 'and Now It Seems There Are Lots Of Other Worlds As Well. When I Think I Might Die Without Seeing A Hundredth Of All There Is To See It Makes Me Feel,' He Paused, Then Added, 'well, Humble, I Suppose. And Very Angry, Of Course.

I Don't See What's So Triffic About Creating People As People And Then Gettin' Upset 'cos They Act Like People.

Most People Who Have Found That They Are More Intelligent Than Most Around Them, Have Yet To Learn That One Of The Most Intelligent Things They Can Do Is Prevent Said People Ever Finding This Out.

Don't Stick Your Nose Where Someone Can Pull It Off And Eat It.

They Were Small, Brightly Coloured, Happy Little Creatures Who Secreted Some Of The Nastiest Toxins In The World, Which Is Why The Job Of Looking After The Large Vivarium Where They Happily Passed Their Days Was Given To First-year Students, On The Basis That If They Got Things Wrong There Wouldn't Be Too Much Education Wasted.

Cheery Was Aware That Commander Vimes Didn't Like The Phrase 'the Innocent Have Nothing To Fear', Believing The Innocent Had Everything To Fear, Mostly From The Guilty But In The Longer Term Even More From Those Who Say Things Like 'the Innocent Have Nothing To Fear'.

Botswana Is Also The Only Country In The World With A Colour In Its Flag Meant To Represent Rain (a Sort Of Blue-grey). Not Many People Know This.

There Have Been Times, Lately, When I Dearly Wished That I Could Change The Past. Well, I Can’t, But I Can Change The Present, So That When It Becomes The Past It Will Turn Out To Be A Past Worth Having.

Aziraphale Collected Books. If He Were Totally Honest With Himself He Would Have To Have Admitted That His Bookshop Was Simply Somewhere To Store Them. He Was Not Unusual In This. In Order To Maintain His Cover As A Typical Second-hand Book Seller, He Used Every Means Short Of Actual Physical Violence To Prevent Customers From Making A Purchase. Unpleasant Damp Smells, Glowering Looks, Erratic Opening Hours - He Was Incredibly Good At It.

Just Erotic. Nothing Kinky. It's The Difference Between Using A Feather And Using A Chicken.

Progress Just Means Bad Things Happen Faster.

Gods Play Games With The Fates Of Men. But First They Have To Get All The Pieces On The Board And Look All Over The Place For The Dice.

Why Bother With A Cunning Plan When A Simple One Will Do?

Rings Try To Find Their Way Back To Their Owner. Someone Ought To Write A Book About It.

The Second Mouse Gets The Cheese!

I Believe In Reincarnation,” [bjorn] Said. I Know. “i Tried To Live A Good Life. Does That Help?” That’s Not Up To Me. Death Coughed. Of Course... Since You Believe In Reincarnation... You’ll Be Bjorn Again.

If Cats Looked Like Frogs We'd Realize What Nasty, Cruel Little Bastards They Are. Style. That's What People Remember.

Guilt Was The Grease In Which The Wheels Of The Authority Turned.

And Our Lady Friend, She Thinks Life Works Like A Fairy Tale.' Well, That’s Harmless, Isn’t It?' Yeah, But In Fairy Tales, When Someone Dies... It’s Just A Word.

You Must Learn The Compassion Proper To Your Trade" "and What's That?" "a Sharp Edge.

Where's My Cow? Are You My Cow?

There Are No Medium-sized Trees In The Deep Forest. There Are Only The Towering Ones, Whose Canopy Spreads Across The Sky. Below, In The Gloom, There's Light For Nothing But Mosses And Ferns. But When A Giant Falls, Leaving A Little Space ... Then There's A Race - Between The Trees On Either Side, Who Want To Spread Out, And The Seedlings Below, Who Race To Grow Up. Sometimes, You Can Make Your Own Space.

She Walked Quickly Through The Darkness With The Frank Stride Of Someone Who Was At Least Certain That The Forest, On This Damp And Windy Night, Contained Strange And Terrible Things And She Was It.

You Can't Remember The Plot Of The Dr Who Movie Because It Didn't Have One, Just A Lot Of Plot Holes Strung Together. It Did Have A Lot Of Flashing Lights, Though.

Gravity Is A Habit That Is Hard To Shake Off.

[y]ou Weren't Born With A Talent For Witchcraft: It Didn't Come Easily; You Worked Hard At It Because You Wanted It. You Forced The World To Give It To You, No Matter The Price, And The Price Is And Always Will Be High... People Say You Don't Find Witchcraft; Witchcraft Finds You. But You've Found It, Even If At The Time You Didn't Know What It Was You Were Finding, And You Grabbed It By Its Scrawny Neck And Made It Work For You.

Geography Is Just Physics Slowed Down, With A Couple Of Trees Stuck In It.

These People Were Not Only Cheering, They Were Throwing Flowers And Hats. The Hats Were Made Of Stone, But The Thought Was There.

Sam Vimes Could Parallel Process. Most Husbands Can. They Learn To Follow Their Own Line Of Thought While At The Same Time Listening To What Their Wives Say. And The Listening Is Important, Because At Any Time They Could Be Challenged And Must Be Ready To Quote The Last Sentence In Full. A Vital Additional Skill Is Being Able To Scan The Dialogue For Telltale Phrases Such As "and They Can Deliver It Tomorrow" Or "so I've Invited Them For Dinner?" Or "they Can Do It In Blue, Really Quite Cheaply.

He's Probably Their Battle Poet, Too." "you Mean He Makes Up Heroic Songs About Famous Battles?" "no, No. He Recites Poems That Frighten The Enemy....when A Well-trained Gonnagle Starts To Recite, The Enemy's Ears Explode.

Other People Salted Away Money For Their Old Age, But Nanny Preferred To Accumulate Memories.

This Time It Had Been Magic. And It Didn't Stop Being Magic Just Because You Found Out How It Was Done.

Insanity Is Catching.

That's Why It's Always Worth Having A Few Philosophers Around The Place. One Minute It's All Is Truth Beauty And Is Beauty Truth, And Does A Falling Tree In The Forest Make A Sound If There's No One There To Hear It, And Then Just When You Think They're Going To Start Dribbling One Of 'em Says, Incidentally, Putting A Thirty-foot Parabolic Reflector On A High Place To Shoot The Rays Of The Sun At An Enemy's Ships Would Be A Very Interesting Demonstration Of Optical Principles.

Death: Human Beings Make Life So Interesting. Do You Know, That In A Universe So Full Of Wonders, They Have Managed To Invent Boredom.

I Taught Myself More In The Library Than School Taught Me.

I Know It’s Not The Right Thing To Say To A Lady, Miss, But You Are Sweating Like A Pig!" "my Mother Always Said That Horses Sweat, Men Perspire, And Ladies Merely Glow…" "is That So? Well, Miss, You Are Glowing Like A Pig!

... All Reputable Falconers Agreed That For Hunting Purposes The Only Way You Could Reliably Bring Down Prey With A Wowhawk Was By Using It In A Slingshot.

Quit While You're A Head, That's What I Say.

And What Had He Wanted? He'd Never Sat Down To Think About It. But Mostly, He Wanted Yesterday To Be Different From Today.

The Storm Was Really Giving It Everything It Had. This Was Its Big Chance. It Had Spent Years Hanging Around The Provinces, Putting In Some Useful Work As A Squall, Building Up Experience, Making Contacts, Occasionally Leaping Out On Unsuspecting Shepherds Or Blasting Quite Small Oak Trees. Now An Opening In The Weather Had Given It An Opportunity To Strut Its Hour, And It Was Building Up Its Role In The Hope Of Being Spotted By One Of The Big Climates.

"i'm Sorry, I Just Got Carried Away," Hissed Aziraphale.

First Sight Means You Can See What Really Is There, And Second Thoughts Mean Thinking About What You Are Thinking. And In Tiffany's Case, There Were Sometimes Third Thoughts And Fourth Thoughts Although These...sometimes Led Her To Walk Into Doors.

In The End The Problem Isn't That You Have The Wrong Sort Of Government For The People, But That You Have The Wrong Sort Of People.

They May Be Called The Palace Guard, The City Guard, Or The Patrol. Whatever The Name, Their Purpose In Any Work Of Heroic Fantasy Is Identical: It Is, Round About Chapter Three (or Ten Minutes Into The Film) To Rush Into The Room, Attack The Hero One At A Time, And Be Slaughtered. No One Ever Asks Them If They Want To. This Book Is Dedicated To Those Fine Men.

I'm Not The World's Greatest Expert, But I Would Have Thought That The Wizards, Witches, Trolls, Unicorns, ... Broomsticks And Spells Would Have Given Her A Clue?' - When J.k. Rowling Insisted She Wasn't Writing Fantasy.

Thou Shalt Not Submit Thy God To Market Forces.

Because No Man Wants To Be A Coward In Front Of A Cheese.

Nanny Ogg Could See The Future In The Froth On A Beer Mug. It Invariably Showed That She Was Going To Enjoy A Refreshing Drink Which She Almost Certainly Was Not Going To Pay For.

And What Do You Really Do? Asked Tiffany. The Thin Witch Hesitatied For A Moment, And Then: We Look To ... The Edges, Said Mistress Weatherwax. There's A Lot Of Edges, More Than People Know. Between Life And Death, This World And The Next, Night And Day, Right And Wrong ... An' They Need Watchin'. We Watch 'em, We Guard The Sum Of Things. And We Never Ask For Any Reward. That's Important.

She Was Beautiful, But She Was Beautiful In The Way A Forest Fire Was Beautiful: Something To Be Admired From A Distance, Not Up Close.

I See Evil When I Look In My Shaving Mirror. It Is, Philosophically, Present Everywhere In The Universe In Order, Apparently, To Highlight The Existence Of Good. I Think There Is More To This Theory, But I Tend To Burst Out Laughing At This Point.

Somewhere Around The Place I've Got An Unfinished Short Story About Schrodinger's Dog; It Was Mostly Moaning About All The Attention The Cat Was Getting.

I [...] Vowed That Rather Than Let Alzheimer's Take Me, I Would Take It. I Would Live My Life As Ever To The Full And Die, before The Disease Mounted Its Last attack, In My Own Home, In A Chair On The Lawn, With A Brandy In My Hand To Wash Down Whatever Modern version Of The "brompton Cocktail" Some helpful Medic Could Supply. And With thomas Tallis On My Ipod, I Would Shake Hands With Death.

An Ancient Proverb Summed It Up When A Wizard Is Tired Of Looking For Broken Glass In His Dinner, It Ran, He Is Tired Of Life.

Ritual And Ceremony In Their Due Times Kept The World Under The Sky And The Stars In Their Courses. It Was Astonishing What Ritual And Ceremony Could Do.

...no-one Is Finally Dead Until The Ripples They Cause In The World Die Away... The Span Of Someone's Life, They Say, Is Only The Core Of Their Actual Existence.

Drinks Like This Tend To Get Called Traffic Lights Or Rainbow's Revenge Or, In Places Where Truth Is More Highly Valued, Hello And Good-bye, Mr. Brain Cell.

You Know, You're Rather Amusingly Wrong.

And Then There Were Cats, Thought Dog. He'd Surprised The Huge Ginger Cat From Next Door And Had Attempted To Reduce It To Cowering Jelly By Means Of The Usual Glowing Stare And Deep-throated Growl, Which Had Always Worked On The Damned In The Past. This Time They Had Earned Him A Whack On The Nose That Had Made His Eyes Water. Cats, Dog Considered, Were Clearly A Lot Tougher Than Lost Souls. He Was Looking Forward To A Further Cat Experiment, Which He Planned Would Consist Of Jumping Around And Yapping Excitedly At It. It Was A Long Shot, But It Just Might Work.

When She Spoke Again It Was In The Thin, Careful And Above All Brave Voice Of Someone Who Has Pulled Themselves Together Despite Overwhelming Odds But Might Let Go Again At Any Moment.

I Have To Write Because If I Don't Get Something Down Then After A While I Feel It's Going To Bang The Side Of My Head Off.

Some People Believe That When You Die, You Cross The River Of Death And Have To Pay The Ferryman. People Don’t Seem To Worry About That These Days. Perhaps There’s A Bridge Now.

You Can’t Say ‘if This Didn’t Happen Then That Would Have Happened’ Because You Don’t Know Everything That Might Have Happened. You Might Think Something’d Be Good, But For All You Know It Could Have Turned Out Horrible. You Can’t Say ‘if Only I’d…’ Because You Could Be Wishing For Anything. The Point Is, You’ll Never Know. You’ve Gone Past. So There’s No Use Thinking About It.

Vimes Stalked Gloomily Through The Crowded Streets, Feeling Like The Only Pickled Onion In A Fruit Salad.

There Have Been Better Attempts At Marching, And They Have Been Made By Penguins.

The Rising Sun Managed To Peek Around The Vast Column Of Smoke That Forever Rose From Ankh-morpork, City Of Cities, Illustrating Almost Up To The Edge Of Space That Smoke Means Progress Or, At Least, People Setting Fire To Things.

Wisdom Is One Of The Few Things That Looks Bigger The Further Away It Is.

I Have No Fear Of Death Whatsoever. I Suspect That Few People Do, What They All Fear Is What Might Happen In The Years Or Months Before Death.

Moist Was Sure Doctors Keep Skeletons Around To Cow Patients. Nyer, Nyer, We Know What You Look Underneath.

You Were Safe On A Troll. Anyone Wanting To Mug A Troll Would Have To Use A Building On A Stick.

If You Want To Change A Whole People, Then You Start With The Girls. It Stands To Reason: They Learn Faster, And They Pass On What They Learn To Their Children.

The Battle Of Koom Valley Is The Only One Known To History Where Both Sides Ambushed Each Other.

Real Education Happens When You Pick Up A Fact Here, And Another Fact There, And Put Them Together And Get An Insight.

Fate Can Be One Mean God At Times.

The Truth May Be Out There, But Lies Are Inside Your Head.

They Say That The Prospect Of Being Hanged In The Morning Concentrates A Man's Mind Wonderfully; Unfortunately, What The Mind Inevitably Concentrates On Is That, In The Morning, It Will Be In A Body That Is Going To Be Hanged.

Privilege (to The Privileged) Means Having Private Laws.

When Much Is Taken, Something Is Returned.

Nac Mac Feegle! The Wee Free Men! Nae King! Nae Quin! Nae Laird! Nae Master! We Willna' Be Fooled Again!

Some People Think 'coven' Is A Word For A Group Of Witches, And It's True That's What The Dictionary Says. But The Real Word For A Group Of Witches Is 'an Argument'.

Every Intelligent Being, Whether It Breathes Or Not, Coughs Nervously At Some Time In Its Life.

People Were People, Even If They Had Four Legs And Had Called Themselves Names Like Dangerous Beans, Which Is The Kind Of Name You Gave Yourself If You Learned To Read Before You Understood What All The Words Actually Meant.

Although She Was Aware That Somewhere Under Her Complicated Strata Of Vests And Petticoats There Was Some Skin, That Didn't Mean To Say She Approved Of It.

Somewhere Under

There Are, Almost By Definition, An Unlimited Number Of Hells - Potentially At Least A Personal One For Every Living Sapient Being.

The Universe Danced Towards Life. Life Was A Remarkably Common Commodity. Anything Sufficiently Complicated Seemed To Get Cut In For Some, In The Same Way That Anything Massive Enough Got A Generous Helping Of Gravity. The Universe Had A Definite Tendency Towards Awareness. This Suggested A Certain Subtle Cruelty Woven Into The Very Fabric Of Space-time.

A Hardback's Harder At Christmas Time Because That's A Good Hardback Buying Time.

It's Not Worth Doing Something Unless You Were Doing Something That Someone, Somewere, Would Much Rather You Weren't Doing.

People Needed To Believe In Gods, If Only Because It Was So Hard To Believe In People.

The Baby Boomers Are Getting Older, And Will Stay Older For Longer. And They Will Run Right Into The Dementia Firing Range. How Will A Society Cope? Especially A Society That Can't So Readily Rely On Those Stable Family Relationships That Traditionally Provided The Backbone Of Care?

What're Quantum Mechanics?" "i Don't Know. People Who Repair Quantums, I Suppose.

An Assassin, A Real Assassin Had To Look Like One-black Clothes, Hood, Boots, And All. If They Could Wear Any Clothes, Any Disguise, Then What Could Anyone Do But Spend All Day In A Small Room With A Loaded Crossbow Pointed At The Door?

Rumour Is Information Distilled So Finely That It Can Filter Through Anything. It Does Not Need Doors And Windows -- Sometimes It Does Not Need People. It Can Exist Free And Wild, Running From Ear To Ear Without Ever Touching Lips.

Sometimes It Is Better To Light A Flamethrower Than Curse The Darkness.

I May Be Daft But I'm No' Stupid!

Ultimately, There Is The Freedom To Take The Consequences.

People Couldn't Become Truly Holy, He Said, Unless They Also Had The Opportunity To Be Definitively Wicked.

The Only Thing More Dangerous Then A Vampire Crazed With Blood Lust Was A Vampire Crazed With Anything Else. All The Meticulous Single-mindedness That Went Into Finding Young Women Who Slept With Their Bedroom Window Open Got Channeled Into Some Other Interest, With Merciless And Painstaking Efficiency.

I Thought Unicorns Were More . . . Fluffy.

Zoology, Eh? That's A Big Word, Isn't It." "no, Actually It Isn't," Said Tiffany. "patronizing Is A Big Word. Zoology Is Really Quite Short.

Some Humans Would Do Anything To See If It Was Possible To Do It. If You Put A Large Switch In Some Cave Somewhere, With A Sign On It Saying 'end-of-the-world Switch. Please Do Not Touch,' The Paint Wouldn't Even Have Time To Dry.

We've Strayed Into A Zone With A High Magical Index,' He Said. 'don't Ask Me How. Once Upon A Time A Really Powerful Magic Field Must Have Been Generated Here, And We're Feeling The After-effects.' Precisely,' Said A Passing Bush.

Once Upon A Time

Gods Don't Like People Not Doing Much Work. People Who Aren't Busy All The Time Might Start To Think.

There's A Saying That All Roads Lead To Ankh-morpork. And It's Wrong. All Roads Lead Away From Ankh-morpork, But Sometimes People Just Walk Along Them The Wrong Way.

People's Whole Lives Do Pass In Front Of Their Eye Before They Die. The Process Is Called "living".

It's A God-eat-god World.

The Librarian Considered Matters For A While. So…a Dwarf And A Troll. He Preferred Both Species To Humans. For One Thing, Neither Of Them Were Great Readers. The Librarian Was, Of Course, Very Much In Favor Of Reading In General, But Readers In Particular Got On His Nerves. There Was Something, Well, Sacrilegious About The Way They Kept Taking Books Off The Shelves And Wearing Out The Words By Reading Them. He Liked People Who Loved And Respected Books, And The Best Way To Do That, In The Librarian’s Opinion, Was To Leave Them On The Shelves Where Nature Intended Them To Be.

Currently, It Was Leading Him Through A Neighborhood That Was On The Downside Of Whatever Curve You Hoped You'd Bought Your Property On The Upside Of. Graffiti And Garbage Were Everywhere Here. They Were Everywhere In The City, If It Came To That, But Elsewhere The Garbage Was Better Quality, And The Graffiti Was Close To Being Correctly Spelled. The Whole Area Was Waiting For Something To Happen, Like A Really Bad Fire.

The Phrase "may You Live In Interesting Times" Is The Lowest In A Trilogy Of Chinese Curses That Continue "may You Come To The Attention Of Those In Authority" And Finish With "may The Gods Give You Everything You Ask For." I Have No Idea About Its Authenticity.

Books Bend Space And Time. One Reason The Owners Of Those Aforesaid Little Rambling, Poky Secondhand Bookshops Always Seem Slightly Unearthly Is That Many Of Them Really Are, Having Strayed Into This World After Taking A Wrong Turning In Their Own Bookshops In Worlds Where It Is Considered Commendable Business Practice To Wear Carpet Slippers All The Time And Open Your Shop Only When You Feel Like It.

Granny Weatherwax, Who Had Walked Nightly Without Fear In The Bandit-haunted Forests Of The Mountains All Her Life In The Certain Knowledge That The Darkness Held Nothing More Terrible Than She Was.

No! Please! I'll Tell You Whatever You Want To Know!" The Man Yelled. "really?" Said Vimes. "what's The Orbital Velocity Of The Moon?" "what?" "oh, You'd Like Something Simpler?

Do You Know How Wizards Like To Be Buried?" "yes!" "well, How?" Granny Weatherwax Paused At The Bottom Of The Stairs. "reluctantly.

It's Very Rare That I Ever Go And Research A Particular Subject. Mostly I Do Serendipitous Research, I Read Stuff, Things Spinning Out Of The Page.

Who Shall I Shoot? You Choose. Now, Listen Very Carefully: Where's Your Coffee? You've Got Coffee, Haven't You? C'mon, Everyone's Got Coffee! Spill The Beans!

First Draft: Let It Run. Turn All The Knobs Up To 11. Second Draft: Hell. Cut It Down And Cut It Into Shape. Third Draft: Comb Its Nose And Blow Its Hair. I Usually Find That Most Of The Book Will Have Handed Itself To Me On That First Draft.

I'm Not Really Good At Fun-to-know, Human Interest Stuff. We're Not 'celebrities', Whose Life Itself Is A Performance. Good Or Bad Or Ugly, We Are Our Words. They're What People Meet.

I Imagine That Fish Have No Word For Water.

Everyone Knew There Were Wolves In The Mountains, But They Seldom Came Near The Village-the Modern Wolves Were The Offspring Of Ancestors That Had Survived Because They Had Learned That Human Meat Had Sharp Edges.

You Can't Die With An Unfinished Book.

Raising The Flag And Singing The Anthem Are, While Somewhat Suspicious, Not In Themselves Acts Of Treason.

So Much Paperwork To Read! So Much Paperwork To Push Away! So Much Paperwork To Pretend He Hadn't Received And That Might Have Been Eaten By Gargoyles.

Mere Animals Couldn’t Possibly Manage To Act Like This. You Need To Be A Human Being To Be Really Stupid.

I Read The Best Works Of Some Of The Best Satirists, And Indeed Best Writers From The Beginning Of The Victorian Era To About The 1960s. If You Want To Be A Blacksmith, You Go And Watch The Blacksmith Working, And You Work Out What The Blacksmith Does.

Letitia! What A Name. Halfway Between A Salad And A Sneeze.

He'd Been Wrong, There Was A Light At The End Of The Tunnel, And It Was A Flamethrower.

If Failure Had No Penalty Success Would Not Be A Prize.

One Of The Recurring Philosophical Questions Is: 'does A Falling Tree In The Forest Make A Sound When There Is No One To Hear?' Which Says Something About The Nature Of Philosophers , Because There Is Always Someone In A Forest. It May Only Be A Badger, Wondering What That Cracking Noise Was, Or A Squirrel A Bit Puzzled By All The Scenery Going Upwards, But Someone.

Tragic Heroes Always Moan When The Gods Take An Interest In Them, But It's The People The Gods Ignore Who Get The Really Tough Deals

It's Not Lying When You Do It To Officers!

The Point Is That If A Book That Had Been Published Three Years Ago Started To Sell Twice As Many All Of A Sudden It Probably Wouldn't Even Get Noticed. People Wouldn't Be Tracking It. The System Has Cleaned Up Its Act An Awful Lot But The Best-seller List System Is Not An Entirely Foolproof Thing.

If I Were You, I'd Sue My Face For Slander.

Naughty And Nice? Said Death. But It's Easy To Be Nice If You're Rich. Is This Fair? Albert Wanted To Argue. He Wanted To Say, Really? In That Case, How Come So Many Of The Rich Buggers Is Bastards? And Being Poor Don't Mean Being Naughty, Neither.

Truly, He Thought, The Way Of Enlightenment Is Like Unto Half A Mile Of Broken Glass.

Money Is An Unavoidable Consequence, But It Isn't The Reason I Write; If It Was, I Wouldn't Have Written Any Of The Ya Books, Because Advances In That Field Are Small Compared To What I'd Got Now For An 'adult' Dw.

It Is Always Useful To Face An Enemy Who Is Prepared To Die For His Country," He Read. "this Means That Both You And He Have Exactly The Same Aim In Mind.

Everything Makes Sense A Bit At A Time. But When You Try To Think Of It All At Once, It Comes Out Wrong.

When Mister Safety Catch Is Not On, Mister Crossbow Is Not Your Friend.

What Did They Feed The Lions And Tigers With In The Ark, Sir?

Ridcully Was To Management What King Herod Was To The Bethlehem Playgroup Association.

If You Have To Look Along The Shaft Of An Arrow From The Wrong End, If A Man Has You Entirely At His Mercy, Then Hope Like Hell That Man Is An Evil Man. Because The Evil Like Power... They Will Talk, They Will Gloat. So Hope Like Hell Your Captor Is An Evil Man. A Good Man Will Kill You With Hardly A Word.

Evolution Was Far More Thrilling To Me Than The Biblical Account. Who Would Not Rather Be A Rising Ape Than A Falling Angel? To My Juvenile Eyes, Darwin Was Proved True Every Day. It Doesn't Take Much To Make Us Flip Back Into Monkeys Again.

Winston Churchill Said 'in War Time, Truth Is So Precious That She Should Always Be Attended By A Bodyguard Of Lies'. Any Book Called The Truth Should Therefore Have One.

You Know, I Never Imagined There Were He-dryads. Not Even In An Oak Tree." One Of The Giants Grinned At Him. Druellae Snorted. "stupid! Where Do You Think Acorns Come From?

That’s Mortals For You, Death Continued. They’ve Only Got A Few Years In This World And They Spend Them All In Making Things Complicated For Themselves. Fascinating.

He Moved In A Way That Suggested He Was Attempting The World Speed Record For The Nonchalant Walk.

All He Knew Was That You Couldn't Hope To Try For The Big Stuff, Like World Peace And Happiness, But You Might Just About Be Able To Achieve Some Tiny Deed That'd Make The World, In A Small Way, A Better Place. Like Shooting Someone.

Everything Is A Test.

Imagination Is Only Intelligence Having Fun. A Healthy Mind Knows How To Switch Between Worlds, And Which One You Need To Eat And Sleep In.

No Clowns Were Funny. That Was The Whole Purpose Of A Clown. People Laughed At Clowns, But Only Out Of Nervousness. The Point Of Clowns Was That, After Watching Them, Anything Else That Happened Seemed Enjoyable

People Are Bound To Get Excited When They See A Ten-million-ton Starship Trying To Fly Down The Street.

We Who Think We Are About To Die Will Laugh At Anything.

And Then Jack Chopped Down What Was The World's Last Beanstalk, Adding Murder And Ecological Terrorism To The Theft, Enticement, And Trespass Charges Already Mentioned, And All The Giant's Children Didn't Have A Daddy Anymore. But He Got Away With It And Lived Happily Ever After, Without So Much As A Guilty Twinge About What He Had Done...which Proves That You Can Be Excused For Just About Anything If You Are A Hero, Because No One Asks Inconvenient Questions.

Humans Need Fantasy In Order To Be Human.

It Was So Loud And So Deep, It Wasn't Really Sound At All, Just Something That Turned The Air Hard And Then Hit You With It.

I Must Confess The Activities Of The Uk Governments For The Past Couple Of Years Have Been Watched With Frank Admiration And Amazement By Lord Vetinari. Outright Theft As A Policy Had Never Occurred To Him.

Jesus Won't Cut You Off Before You're Through With Him You Won't Never Get A Crossed Line, And When Your Bill Comes It'll All Be Properly Itemised He's The Telephone Repairman On The Switchboard Of My Life. The Phone Line To The Saviour's Always Free Of Interference He's In At Any Hour, Day Or Night And When You Call J-e-s-u-s You Always Call Toll-free He's The Telephone Repairman On The Switchboard Of My Life.

Only In Our Dreams Are We Free. The Rest Of The Time We Need Wages.

Hello, Inner Child, I'm The Inner Babysitter!

He Talks Pretty Big For A Gutter Wizard," He Muttered. "you Don't Understand At All," Said The Wizard Wearily. "i'm So Scared Of You My Spine Has Turned To Jelly, It's Just That I'm Suffering From An Overdose Of Terror Right Now. I Mean, When I've Got Over That Then I'll Have Time To Be Decently Frightened Of You.

Them As Can Do Has To Do For Them As Can't. And Someone Has To Speak Up For Them As Has No Voices.

It Was One Of Those Problematic Occasions With Long Silences, Sporadic Coughs, And People Saying Isolated Things Like, "well, Isn't This Nice.

Last Hopeless Chances Have Got To Work. Nothing Makes Sense Otherwise. You Might As Well Not Be Alive.

The Mountains Of Madness Have Many Little Plateau Of Sanity.

The Sign, Which Says: "do Not, Under Any Circumstances, Open This Door!" - Of Course, I've Read It. Why Do You Think I Want It Opened?.. To See Why They Wanted It Shut, Of Course. This Exchange Contains Almost All You Need To Know About Human Civilization. At Least, Those Bits Of It That Are Now Under The Sea, Fenced Off Or Still Smoking.

They Called Themselves The Munrungs. It Meant The People, Or The True Human Beings. It's What Most People Call Themselves, To Begin With. And Then One Day The Tribe Meets Some Other People Or, If It's Not Been A Good Day, The Enemy. If Only They'd Think Up A Name Like Some More True Human Beings, It'd Save A Lot Of Trouble Later On

History Has A Habit Of Changing The People Who Think They Are Changing It

There's No Justice, Said Mort. Just Us.

I'm Up To My Neck In The Real World, Every Day. Just You Try Doing Your Vat Return With A Head Full Of Goblins.

You Can't Find A Hermit To Teach You Herming, Because Of Course That Rather Spoils The Whole Thing.

I Just Rearrange Words Into A Pleasing Order For Money.

The Dwarfs Can Turn Lead Into Gold... It Reached The Pointy Ears Of The Dwarfs. -can We? -damned If I Know. I Can't. -yeah, But If You Could, You Wouldn't Say. I Wouldn't Say, If I Could. -can You? -no! -ah-ha!

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Omar N. Bradley

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