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But Whether There's Some Grand Design Really Matters Little To Me. My Only Hope Was This: To See What Might Be, To Believe That It Should Be, And Then To Do All I Could To Bring It To Pass, Whatever The Cost.

-Orson Scott Card

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But Whether There's Some

Orson Scott Card

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But Whether There's Some Grand Design Really Matters Little To Me. My Only Hope Was This: To See What Might Be, To Believe That It Should Be, And Then To Do All I Could To Bring It To Pass, Whatever The Cost.

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But The Truth Is That No Person Ever Understands Another, From Beginning To End Of Life, There Is No Truth That Can Be Known, Only The Story We Imagine To Be True, The Story They Really Believe To Be True About Themselves; And All Of Them Lies.

Nature Can't Evolve A Species That Hasn't The Will To Survive. Individuals Might Be Bred To Sacrifice Themselves, But The Race As A Whole Can Never Cease To Exist.

Will To Survive

Sometimes Lies Were More Dependable Than The Truth.

Short Stories Are Designed To Deliver Their Impact In As Few Pages As Possible. A Tremendous Amount Is Left Out, And A Good Short Story Writer Learns To Include Only The Most Essential Information.

Twisted And Perverse Are The Ways Of The Human Mind," Jane Intoned. "pinocchio Was Such A Dolt To Try To Become A Real Boy. He Was Much Better Off With A Wooden Head.

If The Church Has No The Authority To Tell Its Members That They May Not Engage In Homosexual Practices, Then It Has No Authority At All. And If We Accept The Argument Of The Hypocrites Of Homosexuality That Their Sin Is Not A Sin, We Have Destroyed Ourselves.

So The Whole War Is Because We Can't Talk To Each Other.

When I Am Drunk I Am At My Best. It Is The National Knack Of The French.

The Essence Of Training Is To Allow Error Without Consequence.

I Think Santa Claus Is, By And Large, Quite Beneficial, For When The Child Is Finally Allowed -- Or Forced -- To Recognize The Nonexistence Of Santa Claus, Then The Child Is Able To Go Through The Vital Intellectual Process Of Reconstructing Reality In Light Of New Evidence, Complete With Back-forming New Stories To Account For Past Events. This Prepares The Child For Many Other Disillusionments And Gives Her Vital And Well-supported Experience In Maintaining Her Grip On Reality Independent Of The Stories Told To Her At Any Given Time.

Doesn't It Make You Wonder About Your Own Sexual Identity, Not To Mention Your Sanity, That The Two Women You Love Are, Respectively, A Virtual Woman Existing Only In The Transient Ansible Connections Between Computers And A Woman Whose Soul Is In Fact That Of A Man Who Is The Husband Of Your Mother?

Someday Stars Will Wind Down Or Blow Up. Someday Death Will Cover Us All Like The Water Of A Lake And Perhaps Nothing Will Ever Come To The Surface To Show That We Were Ever There. But We Were There, And During The Time We Lived, We Were Alive. That's The Truth - What Is, What Was, What Will Be - Not What Could Be, What Should Have Been, What Never Can Be.

I Always Tell The Truth About What I’m Selling, And Then Nobody Buys It.

Telling The Truth

The Most Noble Title Any Child Can Have, Demosthenes Wrote, Is Third.

I Buy Way Too Many Books.

Ulysses, Obviously. It Was An Elaborate Prank, And Our Supposed Intellectual Elite Continue To Fall For It.

Mom," Said Peter, "nobody Thinks You're A Lackwit, If That's What You're Worried About." Lackwit? In What Musty Drawer Of Some Dead English Professor's Dust-covered Desk Did You Find That Word? I Assure You That Never In My Worst Nightmares Did I Ever Suppose That I Was A Lackwit.

Bean Could See The Hunger In Their Eyes. Not The Regular Hunger, For Food, But The Real Hunger, The Deep Hunger, For Family, For Love, For Belonging.

How Long Before Married People Answer The Dictators Thus: Regardless Of Law, Marriage Has Only One Definition, And Any Government That Attempts To Change It Is My Mortal Enemy. I Will Act To Destroy That Government And Bring It Down, So It Can Be Replaced With A Government That Will Respect And Support Marriage, And Help Me Raise My Children In A Society Where They Will Expect To Marry In Their Turn.

No Matter How Sexually Attracted A Man Might Be Toward Other Men, Or A Woman Toward Other Women, And No Matter How Close The Bonds Of Affection And Friendship Might Be Within Same-sex Couples, There Is No Act Of Court Or Congress That Can Make These Relationships The Same As The Coupling Between A Man And A Woman.

You Want To Make Me The Best Soldier Possible. Go Down And Look At The Standings. Look At The All-time Standings. So Far You're Doing An Excellent Job With Me. Congratulations. Now When Are You Going To Put Me Up Against A Good Army?

Congratulations

Personal Affection Is A Luxury You Can Have Only After All Your Enemies Are Eliminated. Until Then, Everyone You Love Is A Hostage, Sapping Your Courage And Corrupting Your Judgment.

America's Intellectual Community Has Never Been Very Bright. Or Honest. They're All Sheep, Following Whatever The Intellectual Fashion Of The Decade Happens To Be. Demanding That Everyone Follow Their Dicta In Lockstep. Everyone Has To Be Open-minded And Tolerant Of The Things They Believe, But God Forbid They Should Ever Concede, Even For A Moment, That Someone Who Disagrees With Them Might Have Some Fingerhold Of Truth.

An Eye For An Eye? How Christian Of You.' Unbelievers Always Want Other People To Act Like Christians.

It's What I Was Born For, Isn't It? If I Don't Go, Why Am I Alive?

The Only Way To Learn Is By Changing Your Mind.

Knowing Something May Be A Terrible Burden To Bear, But It Holds No Danger To Them As Aren't Afraid Of Truth.

I Always Think Of Books As Being Like People. Even The Dull Ones Are Worthy Of Decent Respect, But You Don't Have To Seek Them Out And Spend Time With Them.

The Only People Who Think Children Are Carefree Are The Ones Who've Forgotten Their Own Childhood.

It Is A Weak Man Who Blames His Failures On The Strength Of Others.

That's The Problem With Winning Right From The Start, Thought Ender. You Lose Friends.

If Words Can Be Lethal Weapons, I Must Provide Them With An Arsenal.

The Only Process You've Mastered Is The Process Of Elimination, And The Only Reason You've Mastered That Is Because You Can Do It In The Toilet.

Thank God For You, Ender. Thank God.

We Don't Admit It To Ourselves, Not Until The Very Moment Of Death, But In That Moment, We See All Life Before Us And We Understand How We Chose, Every Day Of Our Lives, The Manner Of Our Death.

Even The Most Introverted Person Alive Is Constantly Hungry For Human Association

A Broken Clock Is Right Two Times A Day.

Someone's Sent A Loving Note In Lines Of Returning Geese And As The Moon Fills My Western Chamber As Petals Dance Over The Flowing Stream Again I Think Of You The Two Of Us Living A Sadness Apart A Hurt That Can't Be Removed Yet When My Gaze Comes Down My Heart Stays Up

If You Listen Very Carefully, You Can Hear The Good Fairy Come In The Night And Leave Our Assignment For Tomorrow.

The Best Thing About My Job, Though, Is Stopping At The End Of The Day And Rejoining The Human Universe.

The End Of The Day

Welcome To The Human Race. Nobody Controls His Own Life, Ender. The Best You Can Do Is Choose To Fill The Roles Given You By Good People, By People Who Love You.

The Priests Say That God Created Our Souls, And That Just Puts Us Under The Control Of Another Puppeteer. If God Created Our Will, Then He's Responsible For Every Choice We Make.

Ender Stepped Under The Water And Rinsed Himself, Took The Sweat Of Combat And Let It Run Down The Drain. All Gone, Except They Recycled It And We'll Be Drinking Bonzo's Blood Water In The Morning. All The Life Gone Out Of It, But His Blood Just The Same, His Blood And My Sweat, Washed Down In Their Stupidity Or Cruelty Or Whatever It Was That Made Them Let It Happen.

What Else Should You Be? Human Beings Didn't Evolve Brains In Order To Lie Around On Lakes. Killing's The First Thing We Learned. And A Good Thing We Did, Or We'd Be Dead, And The Tigers Would Own The Earth.

Death Is Not A Tragedy To The One Who Dies; To Have Wasted The Life Before That Death, That Is The Tragedy.

...you Believe That The Kind Of Story You Want To Tell Might Be Best Received By The Science Fiction And Fantasy Audience. I Hope You're Right, Because In Many Ways This Is The Best Audience In The World To Write For. They're Open-minded And Intelligent. They Want To Think As Well As Feel, Understand As Well As Dream. Above All, They Want To Be Led Into Places That No One Has Ever Visited Before. It's A Privilege To Tell Stories To These Readers, And An Honour When They Applaud The Tale You Tell.

People Love To Hear The Brag Of The Local Boy, Because They Want Him To Be Great, But The Foreigner Must Deny That He Has Any Outstanding Virtue - This Is What Will Endear Him To The Locals.

I Am A Creature Of Chemicals.

It Is Possible To Have Words Come To Your Mind, And Still Refrain From Speaking Them Aloud.

...the Thing With Brothers Is, You're Supposed To Take Turns Being The Keeper. Sometimes You Get To Sit Down And Be The Brother Who Is Kept.

It's About Me, Or People Wouldn't Be So Anxious To Keep Me From Knowing About It. The Absence Of Information Is Information. ~ Ender

If You Did Not In Your Own Mind Distinguish Between Useful And Erroneous Information, Then You Were Not Learning At All, You Were Merely Replacing Ignorance With False Belief, Which Was No Improvement.

The Lord Took Twice The Time Making Thee, Alvin Smith, Cause It Took That Long To Put The Mischief In.

When You Really Know Somebody You Can’t Hate Them. Or Maybe It’s Just That You Can’t Really Know Them Until You Stop Hating Them.

If The Other Fellow Can't Tell You His Story, You Can Never Be Sure He Isn't Trying To Kill You.

In Order To Learn, One Must Change One's Mind.

I Think It's Impossible To Really Understand Somebody, What They Want, What They Believe, And Not Love Them The Way They Love Themselves.

I Think You Don't Grow Up Until You Stop Worrying About Other People's Purposes Or Lack Of Them And Find The Purposes You Believe In For Yourself.

It's Easy To Manipulate Your Children When They're Absolutely Sure You're Stupid.

You Can't Write A Novel All At Once, Any More Than You Can Swallow A Whale In One Gulp. You Do Have To Break It Up Into Smaller Chunks. But Those Smaller Chunks Aren't Good Old Familiar Short Stories. Novels Aren't Built Out Of Short Stories. They Are Built Out Of Scenes.

To Reach Out To You When I'm In Need, And To Try To Be Here For You When You Need Me Back. And To Feel Such Tenderness When I Look At You That I Want To Stand Between You And All The World: And Yet Also To Lift You Up And Carry You Above The Strong Currents Of Life; And At The Same Time, I Would Be Glad To Stand Always Like This, At A Distance, Watching You, The Beauty Of You.

I Looked For Perfection, And I Found Something Better.

Something Better

Where Loyalty Bound Creatures Together, They Became Something Larger, Something New And Whole And Inexplicable.

I've Lived Too Long With Pain. I Won't Know Who I Am Without It

Ender Wiggin Must Believe That No Matter What Happens, No Adult Will Ever, Ever Step In To Help Him In Any Way.

A Library Is The First Step Of A Thousand Journeys, Portal To A Thousand Worlds.

And Then He Thought: Is This How Idiots Rationalize Their Stupidity To Themselves?

It Was Just Him And Me. He Fought With Honor. If It Weren't For His Honor, He And The Others Would Have Beaten Me Together. They Might Have Killed Me, Then. His Sense Of Honor Saved My Life. I Didn't Fight With Honor . . . I Fought To Win.

A Man Always Assumes That Others Are As Virtuous As Himself

There Were Crimes And Quarrels, Alongside Kindness And Cooperation; There Were People Who Loved Each Other And People Who Did Not; It Was A Human World.

Parents Always Make Their Worst Mistakes With Their Oldest Children. That's When Parents Know The Least And Care The Most, So They're More Likely To Be Wrong And Also More Likely To Insist That They're Right.

The Only Way To Retrieve A Secret,once Known, Is To Replace It With A Lie.

It's Called Civilization. Women Invented It, And Every Time You Men Blow It All To Bits, We Just Invent It Again.

Regardless Of Law, Marriage Has Only One Definition, And Any Government That Attempts To Change It Is My Mortal Enemy. I Will Act To Destroy That Government And Bring It Down.

The Opposite Of The Happy Ending Is Not Actually The Sad Ending-the Sad Ending Is Sometimes The Happy Ending. The Opposite Of The Happy Ending Is Actually The Unsatisfying Ending.

We Spend Our Lives Guessing At What's Going On Inside Everybody Else, And When We Happen To Get Lucky And Guess Right, We Think We 'understand.' Such Nonsense. Even A Monkey At A Computer Will Type A Word Now And Then.

If Human Beings Are All Monsters, Why Should I Sacrifice Anything For Them?" "because They Are Beautiful Monsters..., And When They Live In A Network Of Peace And Hope, When They Trust The World And Their Deepest Hungers Are Fulfilled, Then Within That System, That Delicate Web, There Is Joy. That Is What We Live For, To Bind The Monsters Together, To Murder Their Fear And Give Birth To Their Beauty.

Perhaps Every Writer Who Thoroughly Creates A Fictional World Will Inevitably Create A Mirror Of His Own Time And Yet Also Create A World That No One Else But Him Has Ever Visited.

Fictional Worlds

In The Moment When I Truly Understand My Enemy, Understand Him Well Enough To Defeat Him, Then In That Very Moment I Also Love Him. I Think It’s Impossible To Really Understand Somebody, What They Want, What They Believe, And Not Love Them The Way They Love Themselves. And Then, In That Very Moment When I Love Them.... I Destroy Them.

He Jumped At The Giants Face, Clambered Up His Lip And Nose, And Began To Dig In The Giant's Eye.

The World Was Full Of Locked Doors, And He Had To Get His Hand On Every Key.

Your Work Is First, Learning Is First, Winning Is Everything Because Without It There Is Nothing.

You Will Learn To Defeat The Enemy.

That Night Demosthenes Published A Scathing Denunciation Of The Population Limitation Laws. People Should Be Allowed To Have As Many Children As They Like, And The Surplus Population Should Be Sent To Other Worlds, To Spread Mankind So Far Across The Galaxy That No Disaster, No Invasion Could Ever Threaten The Human Race With Annihilation. "the Most Noble Title Any Child Can Have," Demosthenes Wrote, "is Third.

There Are Times When The World Is Rearranging Itself, And At Times Like That, The Right Words Can Change The World.

Ender Didn't Like Fighting. He Didn't Like Peter's Kind, The Strong Against The Weak, And He Didn't Like His Own Kind Either, The Smart Against The Stupid.

Dona Crista Laughed A Bit. "oh, Pip, I'd Be Glad For You To Try. But Do Believe Me, My Dear Friend, Touching Her Heart Is Like Bathing In Ice." I Imagine. I Imagine It Feels Like Bathing In Ice To The Person Touching Her. But How Does It Feel To Her? Cold As She Is, It Must Surely Burn Like Fire.

It's The Problem With Age. You Have All These Rusty Arguments, And No Quarrel To Use Them In. My Brain Is A Museum, But Alas, I'm The Only Visitor, And Even I Am Not Terribly Interested In The Displays.

Ender's Game Is Set More Than A Century In The Future And Has Nothing To Do With Political Issues That Did Not Exist When The Book Was Written In 1984... It Will Be Interesting To See Whether The Victorious Proponents Of Gay Marriage Will Show Tolerance Toward Those Who Disagreed With Them When The Issue Was Still In Dispute.

Surely You're Not Saying That God Had To Choose Between Long Life And Intelligence For Human Beings! It's There In Your Own Bible, Carlotta. Two Trees - Knowledge And Life. You Eat Of The Tree Of Knowledge And You Will Surely Die. You Eat Of The Tree Of Life And You Remain A Child In The Garden Forever, Undying.

Music Isn't Just A Pleasure, A Transient Satisfaction. It's A Need, A Deep Hunger; And When The Music Is Right, It's Joy. Love. A Foretaste Of Heaven. A Comfort In Grief. Is It Too Much To Think That Perhaps God Speaks To Us Sometimes Through Music? How, Then, Could I Be So Ungrateful As To Refuse The Message?

It Just Gripes Me Hollow, The Way God Always Sneaks In To Take The Credit.

If Only We Were Wiser Or Better People, Perhaps The Gods Would Explain To Us The Mad, Unbearable Things They Do.

It's As If Every Conversation With A Woman Was A Test, And Men Always Failed It, Because They Always Lacked The Key To The Code And So They Never Quite Understood What The Conversation Was Really About.

The Only Teacher That's Worth Anything To You Is Your Enemy.

It Is The Essence Of Dignity To Pretend To Desire What You Cannot Prevent.

You Understand That The Piggies Are Animals, And You No More Condemn Them For Murdering Libo And Pipo Than You Condemn A Cabra For Shewing Up Capim." That's Right," Said Miro. Ender Smiled. "and That's Why You'll Never Learn Anything From Them. Because You Think Of Them As Animals.

Oh, I'll Live Ender's Life, Too. It's So Much More Interesting Than My Own." ~val

For It Is In The Millions Of Small Melodies That The Truth Of History Is Always Found, For History Only Matters Because Of The Effects We See Or Imagine In The Lives Of The Ordinary People Who Are Caught Up In, Or Give Shape To, The Great Events.

The Society Whose Citizens Are Willing To Stand And Fight Is The One With The Best Chance Of Surviving Long Enough For History To Even Notice.

Home Is Where The People Who Live There Need Me To Come Home To Them, And Worry About Me When I'm Gone. There's No Such Place On This Earth, No Matter How Far I Drive.

And What? What's The Other Choice? To Passively Let Things Happen And Then Say: "tut-tut, What At Botch That Was"? Don't We All Manipulate People? Even If We Openly Ask Them To Make A Choice, Don't We Try To Frame It So They'll Chose As We Think They Should?

How Clever Of Me. I Have Found Such A Pathway Into Hell That I Can Never Get Back Out.

I'm Not A Liar, Sir,' She Said. "'no, I'm Sure You Sincerely Become Whatever It Is You're Pretending To Be.

"we've Devoted Our Lives To Learning About Them!" Miro Said. Ender Stopped. "not From Them."

Thanks From Keeping Me From Being A Liar," Said Nikolai. "what?" "about Your Having Diarrhea." "for You I'd Get Dysentery." "now That's Friendship.

It's All Just Fictions Anyway. We Do What We Do And Then We Make Up Reasons For It Afterward But They're Never The True Reasons, The Truth Is Always Just Out Of Reach.

He Could See Bonzo's Anger Growing Hot. Hot Anger Was Bad. Ender's Anger Was Cold, And He Could Use It. Bonzo's Was Hot, And So It Used Him.

Sometimes Happiness Consists Of Finding The Right Balance Of Misery.

The Difference Between Raman And Varelse Is Not In The Creature Judged, But In The Creature Judging. When We Declare An Alien Species To Be Raman, It Does Not Mean That They Have Passed A Threshold Of Moral Maturity. It Means That We Have.

This Emotion I'm Feeling Now, This Is Love, Right?

Your Dream Is A Good One. [. . .] The Desire That Is The Very Root Of Life Itself: To Grow Until All The Space You Can See Is Part Of You, Under Your Control. It's The Desire For Greatness.

The World Is Always A Democracy In Times Of Flux, And The Man With The Best Voice Will Win.

In A Way, Being A Mormon Prepares You To Deal With Science Fiction, Because We Live Simultaneously In Two Very Different Cultures. The Result Is That We All Know What It's Like To Be Strangers In A Strange Land. It's Not Just A Coincidence That There Are So Many Effective Mormon Science Fiction Writers. We Don't Regard Being An Alien As An Alien Experience. But It Also Means That We're Not Surprised When People Don't Understand What We're Saying Or What We Think.

I Love You Ender. More Than Ever. No Matter What You Decide.

And If You're Going To Criticize Me For Not Finishing The Whole Thing And Tying It Up In A Bow For You, Why, Do Us Both A Favor And Write Your Own Damn Book, Only Have The Decency To Call It A Romance Instead Of A History, Because History's Got No Bows On It, Only Frayed Ends Of Ribbons And Knots That Can't Be Untied. It Ain't A Pretty Package, But Then It's Not Your Birthday That I Know Of So I'm Under No Obligation To Give You A Gift.

Miro, I'm So Sorry. I Always Felt Such Pity For You Humans Because You Could Only Think Of One Thing At A Time And Your Memories Were So Imperfect And . . . Now I Realize That Just Getting Through The Day Without Killing Somebody Can Be An Achievement." It Gets To Be A Habit. Most Of Us Manage To Keep Our Body Count Quite Low. It's The Neighborly Way To Live.

Any Decent Person Who Knows What Warfare Is Can Never Go Into Battle With A Whole Heart.

I've Watched Through His Eyes, I've Listened Through His Ears, And I Tell You He's The One.

Poke Gave Him Life. Ender Gave It Meaning.

There Is A Myth That Homosexuals Are 'born That Way,' And We Are Pounded With This Idea So Thoroughly That Many People Think That Somebody, Somewhere, Must Have Proved It.

Darkness Bound Them Closer Than Light.

But If You Caught My Informant,' Said Achilles, 'why In The World Would Chamrajnagar—or Graff, If It Was Him—launch The Shuttle Anyway? Was Catching Me Doing Something Naughty So Important They’d Risk A Shuttle And It’s Crew Just To Catch Me? I Find That Quite… Flattering. Sort Of Like Winning The Nobel Prize For Scariest Villain.

There Was No Doubt Now In Ender's Mind. There Was No Help For Him. Whatever He Faced, Now And Forever, No One Would Save Him From It. Peter Might Be Scum, But Peter Had Been Right, Always Right; The Power To Cause Pain Is The Only Power That Matters, The Power To Kill And Destroy, Because If You Can't Kill Then You Are Always Subject To Those Who Can, And Nothing And No One Will Ever Save You.

Welcome To The Human Race. Nobody Controls His Own Life, Ender.

Maybe She Couldn't Know Who She Was Today. Maybe It Was Enough To Know That She Was No Longer Who She Was Before.

Everybody Dies. What Matters Is What You Do Between Now And When It Happens To You.

Where Ideas Are Real And Reality Is Shadow.

It Will Hurt." Said Petra. "but Let's Make The Most Of What We Have, And Not Let Future Pain Ruin Present Happiness.

Since When Do You Have To Tell The Enemy When He Has Won?

You're A Monster. Thanks. Does This Mean I Get A Raise? No, Just A Medal. The Budget Isn't Inexhaustable.

Being Young Is An 18 Year Prison Sentence For A Crime Your Parents Committed. But You Do Get Time Off For Good Behavior.

The Old Tale Of Sleeping Beauty Might End Happily In French Or English, But He Was In Russia, And Only A Fool Would Want To Live Through The Russian Version Of Any Fairy Tale.

Laws Against Homosexual Behavior Should Remain On The Books.

Into The The Air, Into The Earth, Into The Fire, I Am With You.

I Think That Most Of Us, Anyway, Read These Stories That We Know Are Not "true" Because We're Hungry For Another Kind Of Truth: The Mythic Truth About Human Nature In General, The Particular Truth About Those Life-communities That Define Our Own Identity, And The Most Specific Truth Of All: Our Own Self-story. Fiction, Because It Is Not About Someone Who Lived In The Real World, Always Has The Possibility Of Being About Oneself. --from The Introduction

Maybe We're The Fools, For Thinking We Know Things. Maybe Humans Are The Only Ones Who Can Deal With The Fact That Nothing Can Ever Be Known At All.

War Was Never So Careful As To Inflict Suffering Only Where It Was Merited.

No Human Being, When You Understand His Desires, Is Worthless. No One's Life Is Nothing. Even The Most Evil Of Men And Women, If You Understand Their Hearts, Had Some Generous Act That Redeems Them, At Least A Little, From Their Sins.

Let's Fly Away And Live Forever

I Doubt That America Will Come To Europe Again. You'll Be On Your Own Against Militant Islam.

And Enough For Me That When My Hand Touched Your Shoulder, You Leaned On Me; And When You Felt Me Slip Away, You Called My Name.

It's Simple. Nothing Exists Except In Relation To Something Else.

Aw, Poke, You Poor, Kind, Decent, Stupid Girl. You Saved Me And I Let You Down.

You Grow A Whole Lot More As A Writer By Getting Old Stories Out Of The House And Letting New Ones Come In And Live With You Until They Grow Up And Are Ready To Go. Don't Let The Old Ones Stay There And Grow Fat And Cranky And Eat All The Food Out Of The Refrigerator. You Have Dozens Of Generations Of Stories Inside You, But The Only Way To Make Room For The New Ones Is To Write The Old Ones And Mail Them Off.

It Wasn't So Bad Being A Slave When Your Owner Was Yourself And Stood Up For You.

I've Seen Australia And I've Lived On An Asteroid And I'd Take The Asteroid.

Ender Nodded. It Was A Lie, Of Course, That It Wouldn’t Hurt A Bit. But Since Adults Always Said It When It Was Going To Hurt, He Could Count On That Statement As An Accurate Prediction Of The Future. Sometimes Lies Were More Dependable Than The Truth.

Whenever The Law Gets Its Hands On You, Those Who Use The Law To Their Own Advantage Will Also Turn It Against You. Don't Put Your Trust In The Laws Of Men, Alvin. They Were Designed By Strong Men To Improve Their Power Over Weaker Ones.

But In The Meantime I Became Accustomed To The Writing Life And It Would Be Hard To Change Now - Partly Because Of The Salary Cut If I Went To My Other Love, Teaching; And Partly Because I Still Have Stories To Tell, Even Though It Isn't All That Fun Doing The Work Anymore.

I Don't Care If I Pass Your Test, I Don't Care If I Follow Your Rules. If You Can Cheat, So Can I. I Won't Let You Beat Me Unfairly - I'll Beat You Unfairly First. - Ender

My Hands Are Clean, But Not Because I Wasn't Prepared To Bloody Them.

Anything Can Become A Children's Book If You Give It To A Child...children Are Actually The Best (and Worst) Audience For Literature Because They Have No Patience With Pretence.

From Now On The Enemy Is More Clever Than You. From Now On The Enemy Is Stronger Than You. From Now On You Are Always About To Lose.

The Ways Of Love Are Strange And Hard: The Love You Want Is Always Barred; The Love You Have You Want To Change. The Ways Of Love Are Hard And Strange.

When You Have Faith In Something A Lot Of Other People Believe Then You A Member Of The Church" Said Ceas, "when You Have Faith In Something Nobody Believes, Then You A Complete Wacko

You Take A Step, Then Another. That's The Journey. But To Take A Step With Your Eyes Open Is Not A Journey At All, It's A Remaking Of Your Own Mind.

He Is Dangerous, He Is Beautiful, I Could Drown In His Understanding.

I'll Have That Someday, Thought Peter. Someone Who'll Kiss Me Good-bye At The Door. Or Maybe Just Someone To Put A Blindfold Over My Head Before They Shoot Me. Depending On How Things Turn Out.

She Likes Us,” Said Umbo. “i Know, I Could Feel It Too,” Said Rigg. “she’s Really Glad To Have Us Here. I Think She Loves Us Like Her Own Children.” “whom She Murdered And Cut Up Into The Stew.” “they Were Delicious.

There's A Sort Of Rage A Man Feels When He's Been Deceived Where He Most Trusted. It Compares To No Other Anger.

Oh, Val," Said Father. "all You Have To Do Is Live Your Life, And Everyone Around You Will Be Happier." "no Greatness, Then." "val," Said Mother, "goodness Trumps Greatness Any Day." "not In The History Books," Said Valentine. "then The Wrong People Are Writing History, Aren't They?" Said Father.

[it] Was Written And Sold. I Knew It Was A Strong Story Because I Cared About It And Believed In It. I Had No Idea That It Would Have The Effect It Had On The Audience. While Most People Ignored It, Of Course, And Continue To Live Full And Happy Lives Without Reading It Or Anything Else By Me, There Was Still A Surprisingly Large Group Who Responded To The Story With Some Fervency.

Folks Always Seemed To Think That As Long As They Didn't Know About Something Bad, It Wasn't Happening, So Whoever Told Them Actually Caused It To Be True.

An Enemy, Ender Wiggin," Whispered The Old Man. "i Am Your Enemy, The First One You've Ever Had Who Was Smarter Than You. There Is No Teacher But The Enemy. No One But The Enemy Will Tell You What The Enemy Is Going To Do. No One But The Enemy Will Ever Teach You How To Destroy And Conquer. Only The Enemy Shows You Where You Are Weak. Only The Enemy Tells You Where He Is Strong. And The Rules Of The Game Are What You Can Do To Him And What You Can Stop Him From Doing To You. I Am Your Enemy From Now On. From Now On I Am Your Teacher.

We Were All Fated To Die, And So It Is Good That At Least We Can Be Sure Our Deaths Today Might Bring About A Good End, Might Make The World A Better Place.

Perhaps You Don't Desire Poetry As Much As You Would Like To Have My Torchy Knowledge Of Your Possible Futures, But I Dare Say Poetry Will Do You Far More Good. For Knowing The Future Only Makes You Timid And Complacent By Turns, While Poetry Can Shape You Into The Kind Of Souls Who Can Face Any Future With Boldness And Wisdom And Nobility, So That You Need Not Know The Future At All, So That Any Future Will Be An Opportunity For Greatness, If You Have Greatness In You.

In The Moment When I Truly Understand My Enemy, Understand Him Well Enough To Defeat Him, Then In That Very Moment I Also Love Him.

I Don't Believe That There Are Aliens. I Believe There Are Really Different People.

If I Wanted To Doubt, Then I Could Doubt Endlessly, But At Some Point A Person Has To Stop Questioning And Act, And At That Point You Have To Trust Something To Be True. You Have To Act As If Something Is True, And So You Choose The Thing You Have The Most Reason To Believe In, You Have To Live In The World That You Have The Most Hope In.

But Whether There's Some Grand Design Really Matters Little To Me. My Only Hope Was This: To See What Might Be, To Believe That It Should Be, And Then To Do All I Could To Bring It To Pass, Whatever The Cost.

Do Not Shout At Me, Mr. Quill," Said John [adams]. "justice May Be Blind, But She Is Not Deaf.

The Future Is A Hundred Thousand Threads, But The Past Is A Fabric That Can Never Be Rewoven.

The Selective Voluntary Blindness Of Human Beings Allows Them To Ignore The Moral Consequences Of Their Choices. It Has Been One Of The Species' Most Valuable Traits, In Terms Of The Survival Of Any Particular Human Community.

A Duel Is Just Two Murders Who Agree To Take Turns Trying To Kill Each Other.

No Human Being, When You Understand His Desires, Is Worthless. No One's Life Is Nothing.

Like Running The Hurdles. Work So Hard, Jump Over Every One, Fast, High Enough But No Higher, Because You Can't Afford To Hang In The Air. And Then, When The Race Is Over, You're Dripping With Sweat, Either They Beat You Or You Beat Them ... And Then A Couple Of Guys Come Out And Move The Hurdles Out Of The Way. Turns Out They Were Nothing. All That Work To Jump Over Them, But Now They're Gone.

Human Beings Are Free Except When Humanity Needs Them. Maybe Humanity Needs You. To Do Something. Maybe Humanity Needs Me—to Find Out What You're Good For. We Might Both Do Despicable Things, Ender, But If Humankind Survives, Then We Were Good Tools.

'so If We Can We'll Kill Every Last Of The Buggers, And If They Can They'll Kill Every Last One Of Us. As For Me,' Said Ender, 'i'm In Favor Of Surviving'.

I Am Especially Grateful, However, To Have Known The Fifties, Before We Began To Poison Our Own Civilization - Or At Least Before The Effects Of The Poison Began To Be Felt.

In War, Everyone Has Their Chance To Bleed.

You Accomplish Exactly As Much As The People Who Serve You Decide You'll Accomplish And Nothing More.

Quim," She Said, "don't Ever Try To Teach Me About Good And Evil. I've Been There, And You've Seen Nothing But A Map.

Science Fiction Has Rivets, Fantasy Has Trees.

The Most Important Training, Though, Is To Experience Life As A Writer, Questioning Everything, Inventing Multiple Explanations For Everything. If You Do That, All The Other Things Will Come; If You Don't, There's No Hope For You.

Who Would I Be, If Other Good Souls Did Not Make Up For My Shortcomings?

There's A Reason Why Every Human Society Has Fiction. It Teaches Us How To Be 'good,' To Behave In A Way That Is For The Benefit Of The Whole Community.

The Great Forces Of History Were Real, After A Fashion. But When You Examined Them Closely, Those Great Forces Always Came Down To The Dreams And Hungers And Judgments Of Individuals.

Once You Have The Gallows, You'll Find New Reasons To Hang People From It.

All Is Going Well, Very Well, I Couldn’t Ask For Anything Better— So Why Do I Hate My Life?

Let Me Be Loved Like That, By A Man Who Will Not Replace Me With Concubines When I'm Old And Ugly. Let Me Be Loved By A Man Who Loves God More Than Me.

You Want To Beat Peter?" She Asked "no," He Answered "beat The Buggers. Then Come Home And See Who Notices Peter Wiggen Anymore. Look Him In The Eye When All The World Loves And Reveres You. That'll Be Defeat In His Eyes, Ender, Thats How You Win" "you Don't Understand" He Said "yes I Do" "no You Don't. I Don't Want To Beat Peter" "then What Do You Want?" "i Want Him To Love Me

The Danger That Keeps Me Just A Little Frightened With Every Book I Write, However, Is That I'll Overreach Myself Once Too Often And Try To Write A Story That I'm Just Plain Not Talented Or Skilful Enough To Write. That's The Dilemma Every Storyteller Faces. It Is Painful To Fail. But It Is Far Sadder When A Storyteller Stops Wanting To Try.

I've Had Your Tears With Mine, And You've Had Mine With Yours. I Think That's More Intimate Even Than A Kiss.

I've Got A Pretty Good Idea What Children Are, And We're Not Children. Children Can Lose Sometimes, And Nobody Cares.

The Wise Are Not Wise Because They Make No Mistakes. They Are Wise Because They Correct Their Mistakes As Soon As They Recognize Them.

Evil People Naturally Assume That You Will Use That Power Exactly As They Would Use It.

Do You Know Why Satan Is So Angry All The Time? Because Whenever He Works A Particularly Clever Bit Of Mischief God Uses It To Serve His Own Rigteous Purposes." "so God Uses Wicked People As His Tools?" "god Gives Us The Freedom To To Do Great Evil, If We Choose, Then He Uses His Own Freedom To Create Goodness Out Of That Evil, For That Is What He Chooses." "so, In The Long Run, God Always Wins?" "yes, In The Short Run Though It Can Be Uncomfortable.

The Tribe Is Whatever We Believe It Is. If We Say The Tribe Is All The Little Ones In The Forest, And All The Trees, Then That Is What The Tribe Is. Even Though Some Of The Oldest Trees Here Came From Warriors Of Two Different Tribes, Fallen In Battle. We Become One Tribe Because We Say We're One Tribe." Ender Marveled At His Mind, This Small Raman [member Of Another Sentient Species]. How Few Humans Were Able To Grasp This Idea, Or Let It Extend Beyond The Narrow Confines Of Their Tribe, Their Family, Their Nation.

Isn't It Possible, He Wondered, For One Person To Love Another Without Trying To Own Each Other? Or Is That Buried So Deep In Our Genes That We Can Never Get It Out? Territoriality. My Wife. My Friend. My Lover. My Outrageous And Annoying Computer Personality Who's About To Be Shut Off At The Behest Of A Half-crazy Girl With Ocd On A Planet That I Never Heard Of And How Will I Live Without [her] When She's Gone?

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Jessica Mitford

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