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The Secret Is Not To Dream," She Whispered. "the Secret Is To Wake Up. Waking Up Is Harder. I Have Woken Up And I Am Real. I Know Where I Come From And I Know Where I'm Going. You Cannot Fool Me Any More. Or Touch Me. Or Anything That Is Mine.

-Terry Pratchett

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The Secret Is Not

Terry Pratchett

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The Secret Is Not To Dream," She Whispered. "the Secret Is To Wake Up. Waking Up Is Harder. I Have Woken Up And I Am Real. I Know Where I Come From And I Know Where I'm Going. You Cannot Fool Me Any More. Or Touch Me. Or Anything That Is Mine.

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They Were Also Slightly Less Intelligent Than He Was. This Is A Quality You Should Always Pray For In Your Would-be Murderer.

I Dare Say That Quite A Few People Have Contemplated Death For Reasons That Much Later Seemed To Them To Be Quite Minor.

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

At Least Nine-tenths Of All The Original Reality Ever Created Lies Outside The Multiverse, And Since The Multiverse By Definition Includes Absolutely Everything That Is Anything, This Puts A Bit Of A Strain On Things. Outside The Boundaries Of The Universe Lie The Raw Realities, The Could-have-beens, The Might-bes, The Never-weres, The Wild Ideas, All Being Created And Uncreated Chaotically Like Elements In Fermenting Supernovas. Just Occasionally Where The Walls Of The Worlds Have Worn A Bit Thin, They Can Leak In.

They Obeyed, As Wise Men Do When A Woman Puts Her Foot Down . . .

Bringing About Armageddon Can Be Dangerous. Do Not Attempt It In Your Own Home.

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.

They Suffered From The Terrible Delusion That Something Could Be Done. They Seemed Prepared To Make The World The Way They Wanted It Or Die In The Attempt, And The Trouble With Dying In The Attempt Was That You Died In The Attempt.

Sham Harga Had Run A Successful Eatery For Many Years By Always Smiling, Never Extending Credit, And Realizing That Most Of His Customers Wanted Meals Properly Balanced Between The Four Food Groups: Sugar, Starch, Grease, And Burnt Crunchy Bits.

Needless To Say, They Refused To Submit To The Empire, Conducting Such A Persistent Guerrilla War That The Romans Gave Up Hope Of Conquering Scotland, And The Wee Free Men Remained Both Wee And Free.

Walter Plinge Said: "you Know She Asked Me A Very Silly Question Mrs Ogg! It Was A Silly Question Any Fool Knows The Answer!" "oh, Yes," Said Nanny. "about Houses On Fire, I Expect..." "yes! What Would I Take Out Of Our House If It Was On Fire!" "i Expect You Were A Good Boy And Said You'd Take Your Mum," Said Nanny. "no! My Mum Would Take Herself!" "what Would You Take Out Then, Walter?" Nanny Said. "the Fire!

A Push-and-go Wooden Duck On Wheels Can Cause Quite A Lot Of Damage If Wielded With Enough Force.

In The Ramtops Village Where They Dance The Real Morris Dance, For Example, They Believe That No-one Is Finally Dead Until The Ripples They Cause In The World Die Away - Until The Clock He Wound Up Winds Down, Until The Wine She Made Has Finished Its Ferment, Until The Crop They Planted Is Harvested. The Span Of Someone's Life, They Say, Is Only The Core Of Their Actual Existence.

Nothing Has To Be True Forever. Just For Long Enough, To Tell You The Truth.

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!

It's A Guilty Secret Of A Lot Of Writers, As You Get Older You Don't Read As Much Fiction As You Used To, Mainly Because It's Like You Are Deconstructing It All The Time.

See A Pin And Pick It Up, And, All Day Long, You'll Have A Pin.

If You Really Want To Upset A Witch, Do Her A Favor Which She Has No Means Of Repaying. The Unfulfilled Obligation Will Nag At Her Like A Hangnail.

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.

You Get All Sorts Of People In The Library, And The Librarian Gets It All.

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.

Peace?' Said Vetinari. 'ah, Yes, Defined As Period Of Time To Allow For Preparation For The Next War.

You're Allowed To Grant People Into The Darkness, But You Must Allow Them To Come Out Again.

He Says Gods Like To See An Atheist Around. Gives Them Something To Aim At.

I've Lost Both Parents In The Last Two Years, So You Pick Up On That Stuff. That's The Most Terrible Thing About Being An Author - Standing There At Your Mother's Funeral, But You Don't Switch The Author Off. So Your Own Innermost Thoughts Are Grist For The Mill.

Just Because Things Are Obvious Doesn't Mean They're True.

You See The Lighted Windows And What You Want To Think Is That There May Be Many Interesting Stories Behind Them, But What You Know Is That Really There Are Just Dull, Dull Souls, Mere Consumers Of Food, Who Think Their Instincts Are Emotions And Their Tiny Lives Of More Account Than A Whisper Of Wind.

I Can't Stand Any Music That Requires Its Singers To Be So Dumb They Wear Their Baseball Caps Backwards.

You Have To Have Really Wide Reading Habits And Pay Attention To The News And Just Everything That's Going On In The World: You Need To. If You Get This Right, Then The Writing Is A Piece Of Cake.

The Thing Is, 'discworld' Had Been Going On For A Very Long Time, And I've Written Children's Books As Well. Usually When People Have A Really Big Series They Franchise It, Which I Thought Is A Bit Of A No-no, So I Thought What I'd Do Is I'd Franchise It To Myself.

There Are Many Horrible Sights In The Multiverse. Somehow, Though, To A Soul Attuned To The Subtle Rhythms Of A Library, There Are Few Worse Sights Than A Hole Where A Book Ought To Be.

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.

Words Are The Litmus Paper Of The Minds. If You Find Yourself In The Power Of Someone Who Will Use The Word "commence" In Cold Blood, Go Somewhere Else Very Quickly. But If They Say "enter", Don't Stop To Pack.

Finding Yourself

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.

Good And Bad Is Tricky," She Said. "i Ain't Too Certain About Where People Stand. P'raps What Matters Is Which Way You Face." (pp. 348-349)

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

Joy Is To Fun What The Deep Sea Is To A Puddle. It’s A Feeling Inside That Can Hardly Be Contained.

Stand Before Your God, Bow Before Your King, Kneel Before Your Man.

I Found While Driving In Wyoming That Wearing A Stetson And Driving A Beat-up Pickup Meant You Could Go As Fast As You Like, While The Police Picked Up Californian Winnebagos That Went One Mph Over 55. After All, They Wanted To Bring Money Into The State, Not Merely Circulate It.

All Assassins Had A Full-length Mirror In Their Rooms, Because It Would Be A Terrible Insult To Anyone To Kill Them When You Were Badly Dressed.

There's A Lot Of Science In It, And As Slartibartfast [in The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy] Said: 'i Am A Great Fan Of Science, But I Cannot Do A Quadratic Equation.' I've Never, Ever Been Able To Do One. I Remember One Occasion At Warwick University, When Jack And Ian Were At Their Wits' End Because I Couldn't Get It. I Felt Totally Ashamed.

Quadratic Equation

When People Say "how Do You Write A Book, How Does It All Happen?" I Say, You Line Things Up, And You Line Them Up As Actually As You Possibly Can, But Sooner Or Later The Book Has Got Momentum And It's Moving Along Under That Momentum. It's Like A Sculpture, If You're Working With The Grain Of The Wood, The Wood Will Start Defining What Shape It's Going To Become.

Even Our Fears Make Us Feel Important, Because We Fear We Might Not Be.

Consider The Situation. There You Are, Forehead Like A Set Of Balconies, Worrying About The Long-term Effects Of All This New 'fire' Stuff On The Environment, You're Being Chased And Eaten By Most Of The Planet's Large Animals, And Suddenly Tiny Versions Of One Of The Worst Of Them Wanders Into The Cave And Starts To Purr.

Granny Bit Her Lip. She Was Never Quite Certain About Children, Thinking Of Them-when She Thought About Them At All-as Coming Somewhere Between Animals And People. She Understood Babies. You Put Milk In One End And Kept The Other As Clean As Possible. Adults Were Even Easier, Because They Did The Feeding And Cleaning Themselves. But In Between Was A World Of Experience That She Had Never Really Inquired About. As Far As She Was Aware, You Just Tried To Stop Them Catching Anything Fatal And Hoped That It Would All Turn Out All Right.

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.

The Trouble Is You Can Shut Your Eyes But You Can’t Shut Your Mind.

Most Gods Throw Dice, But Fate Plays Chess, And You Don't Find Out Til Too Late That He's Been Playing With Two Queens All Along.

If Words Had Weight, A Single Sentence From Death Would Have Anchored A Ship.

A True Beanie Should Have A Propellor On The Top.

You Were The Kind Of Kid Who Couldn't See The Difference Between Throwing Rocks At A Cat And Setting It On Fire.

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.

People Flock In, Nevertheless, In Search Of Answers To Those Questions Only Librarians Are Considered To Be Able To Answer, Such As "is This The Laundry?" "how Do You Spell Surreptitious?" And, On A Regular Basis, "do You Have A Book I Remember Reading Once? It Had A Red Cover And It Turned Out They Were Twins.

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

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

It Doesn't Matter How You Live And Die, It's How The Bards Wrote It Down.

There Is No Doubt That Being Human Is Incredibly Difficult And Cannot Be Mastered In One Lifetime.

You Did Something Because It Had Always Been Done, And The Explanation Was, ‘but We’ve Always Done It This Way.’ A Million Dead People Can’t Have Been Wrong, Can They?

Nigel Gave The Lamp A Cautious Buff And Small Smoking Red Letters Appeared In The Air. "hi," Nigel Read Aloud, "do Not Put Down The Lamp Because Your Custom Is Important To Us. Please Leave A Wish After The Tone And, Very Shortly, It Will Be Our Command. In The Meantime, Have A Nice Eternity."

It Had A Very Long Pendulum, And The Pendulum Swung With A Slow Tick-tock That Set His Teeth On Edge, Because It Was The The Kind Of Delibrate, Annoying Ticking That Wanted To Make It Abundantly Clear That Every Tick And Every Tock Was Stripping Another Second Off Your Life.

I Think It's Impossible For Anyone Famous To Come From Here, Because Everyone Around Here Is Insane.

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?

Monsters Are Getting More Uppity, Too (...) I Heard Where This Guy, He Killed This Monster In This Lake, No Problem, Stuck Its Arm Up Over The Door (...) And You Know What? Its Mum Come And Complained. Its Actual Mum Come Right Down To The Hall Next Day And Complained. Actually Complained. That's The Respect You Get.

Sometimes You Had To Take A Look At Yourself And Then Look Away.

Look At Yourself

The Days Followed One Another Patiently. Right Back At The Beginning Of The Multiverse They Had Tried All Passing At The Same Time, And It Hadn't Worked.

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

Carpe Jugulum," Read Agnes Aloud. "that's... Well, Carpe Diem Is 'sieze The Day,' So This Means-" "go For The Throat

It Is True That Words Have Power, And One Of The Things They Are Able To Do Is Get Out Of Someone’s Mouth Before The Speaker Has The Chance To Stop Them.

As They Say In Discworld, We Are Trying To Unravel The Mighty Infinite Using A Language Which Was Designed To Tell One Another Where The Fresh Fruit Was.

Once Upon A Time The Plural Of 'wizard' Was 'war'.

Once Upon A Time

What Was The Point Of Education, He Thought, If People Went Out Afterward And Used It?

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.

I Reckon Responsible Behavior Is Something To Get When You Grow Older. Like Varicose Veins.

When A Man Is Tired Of Ankh-morpork, He Is Tired Of Ankle-deep Slurry.

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

There Are Thousands Of Good Reasons Why Magic Doesn't Rule The World. They're Called Witches And Wizards.

Your Average Witch Is Not, By Nature, A Social Animal As Far As Other Witches Are Concerned. There's A Conflict Of Dominant Personalities. There's A Group Of Ringleaders Without A Ring. There's The Basic Unwritten Rule Of Witchcraft, Which Is 'don't Do What You Will, Do What I Say.' The Natural Size Of A Coven Is One. Witches Only Get Together When They Can't Avoid It.

You Get A Wonderful View From The Point Of No Return.

And Sam Vimes Thought: Why Is Young Sam's Nursery Full Of Farmyard Animals Anyway? Why Are His Books Full Of Moo-cows And Baa-lambs? He Is Growing Up In The City. He Will Only See Them On A Plate! They Go Sizzle!

Tomorrow Is The First Day Of The Rest Of Our Lives.

If Anyone Wants One My Advise Is To Go Where The Orthodox Jews Shop, Because When It Comes To A Big Black Fedora, The Guys With Ringlets And Long Black Coats Definitely Know A Stylish Hat When They See One. You Want To Get It Home And Use A Hot Steaming Kettle, And Bob's Your Uncle - You Have A Hat With All The Right Curves!

The Best Research Is The Research That You Don't Know That You Are Doing.

He'd Been An Angel Once. He Hadn't Meant To Fall. He'd Just Hung Around With The Wrong People.

As Far As I'm Concerned, I'm A Writer Who's Writing Books, And Therefore, I Don't Want To Die. You'd Miss The End Of The Book, Wouldn't You? You Can't Die With An Unfinished Book.

Sometimes I Feel That The World Is Made Up Of Sensible People Who Know The Plot And Bloody Idiots Who Don't.

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.

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

Divers Alarums And Excursions', She Read, Uncertainly. 'that Means Lots Of Terrible Happenings, Said Magrat. 'you Always Put That In Plays.' Alarums And What?', Said Nanny Ogg, Who Hadn't Been Listening. Excursions', Said Magrat Patienly. Oh.' Nanny Ogg Brightened A Bit. 'the Seaside Would Be Nice,' She Said. Oh Do Shut Up, Gytha,' Said Granny Weatherwax. 'they're Not For You. They're Only For Divers, Like It Says. Probably So They Can Recover From All Them Alarums.

There Are Hardly Any Excesses Of The Most Crazed Psychopath That Cannot Easily Be Duplicated By A Normal Kindly Family Man Who Just Comes In To Work Every Day And Has A Job To Do.

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

That, Lad," He Said Proudly, "was Some Of The Worst Poetry I Have Heard For A Long Time. It Was Offensive To The Ear And A Torrrture To The Soul....we'll Make A Gonnagle Out Of Ye Yet!

Stupid Men Are Often Capable Of Things The Clever Would Not Dare To Contemplate.

It Was Octarine, The Colour Of Magic. It Was Alive And Glowing And Vibrant And It Was The Undisputed Pigment Of The Imagination, Because Wherever It Appeared It Was A Sign That Mere Matter Was A Servant Of The Powers Of The Magical Mind. It Was Enchantment Itself. But Rincewind Always Thought It Looked A Sort Of Greenish-purple.

Life Is A Trick, And You Get One Chance To Learn It.

I Mistrust The Term Graphic Novel Because It Sounds Like A Good Thing To Put On A Tee-shirt. That's Why The French Like Them.

He'd Noticed That Sex Bore Some Resemblance To Cookery: It Fascinated People, They Sometimes Bought Books Full Of Complicated Recipes And Interesting Pictures, And Sometimes When They Were Really Hungry They Created Vast Banquets In Their Imagination - But At The End Of The Day They'd Settle Quite Happily For Egg And Chips. If It Was Well Done And Maybe Had A Slice Of Tomato.

This Looks Like A Job For Inadvisably Applied Magic If Ever I Saw One.

If Per Capita Was A Problem, Decapita Could Be Arranged.

A Lot Hinges On The Fact That, In Most Circumstances, People Are Not Allowed To Hit You With A Mallet. They Put Up All Kinds Of Visible And Invisible Signs That Say, 'do Not Do This' In The Hope That It'll Work, But If It Doesn't, Then They Shrug, Because There Is, Really, No Real Mallet At All.

Granddad Was Superstitious About Books. He Thought That If You Had Enough Of Them Around, Education Leaked Out, Like Radioactivity.

If You Have Let Pride Get The Better Of You, Then You Have Already Lost, But If You Grab Pride By The Scruff Of The Neck And Ride It Like A Stallion, Then You May Have Already Won.

We Sleepwalk Through Our Lives, Because How Could We Live If We Were Always This Awake?

Some Pirates Achieved Immortality By Great Deeds Of Cruelty Or Derring-do. Some Achieved Immortality By Amassing Great Wealth. But The Captain Had Long Ago Decided That He Would, On The Whole, Prefer To Achieve Immortality By Not Dying.

Tʜᴇʀᴇ's ɴᴏ ᴊᴜsᴛɪᴄᴇ, ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ's ᴊᴜsᴛ ᴍᴇ. —death

I've Never Really Liked The Yanks. ... You Can't Trust People Who Pick Up The Ball All The Time When They Play Football.

If Women Were As Good As Men They'd Be A Lot Better!

Whut's The Plan, Rob?" Said One Of Them. "okay, Lads, This Is What We'll Do. As Soon As We See Somethin', We'll Attack It. Right?" This Caused A Cheer. "ach, 'tis A Good Plan," Said Daft Wullie.

What Is Magic? There Is The Wizard's Explanation... Wizards Talk About Candles, Circles, Planets, Stars, Bananas, Chants, Runes And The Importance Of Having At Least Four Good Meals Every Day.

She Had Heard It Said That, Before You Could Understand Anybody, You Needed To Walk A Mile In Their Shoes, Which Did Not Make A Whole Lot Of Sense, Because Probably After You Had Walked A Mile In Their Shoes, You Would Understand That They Were Chasing You And Accusing You Of The Theft Of A Pair Of Shoes--although, Of Course, You Could Probably Outrun Them, Owing To Their Lack Of Footwear.

The Nice Thing About Your Police Procedural As Opposed To Your Classic Murder Mystery Is That In A Murder Mystery You Don't Know Who Did It. Whereas In A Police Procedural You Know, You Know Everything Often And You're Watching The Police Home In.

Murder Mysteries

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.

Neither Of My Parents Went To Church, But They Did Everything That You Needed To Do To Be Christian. That's Something A Quaker Would Call An Intimation Of The Divine.

Maurice Watched Them Argue Again. Humans, Eh? Think They're Lords Of Creation. Not Like Us Cats. We Know We Are. Ever See A Cat Feed A Human? Case Proven.

Light Died In The West. Night And Tears Took The Nation. The Star Of Water Drifted Among The Clouds Like A Murderer Softly Leaving The Scene Of The Crime.

I Certainly Don't Sit Down And Plan A Book Out Before I Write It. There's A Phrase I Use Called "the Valley Full Of Clouds." Writing A Novel Is As If You Are Going Off On A Journey Across A Valley. The Valley Is Full Of Mist, But You Can See The Top Of A Tree Here And The Top Of Another Tree Over There. And With Any Luck You Can See The Other Side Of The Valley. But You Cannot See Down Into The Mist. Nevertheless, You Head For The First Tree.

Don't Do Anything I Wouldn't Do, If You Ever Find Anything I Wouldn't Do.

The Sun Rose Slowly, As If It Wasn't Sure It Was Worth All The Effort.

The Oldest Fan Letter I've Had Is From Someone Aged Eighty-five.

(about Sweeping).... What He Was In Fact Doing Was Moving The Dirt Around With A Broom, To Give It A Change Of Scenery And A Chance To Make New Friends.

I Decided At School That The Only Sensible Way To Make A Living By Arranging Words In A Pleasing Order Was By Working On Newspapers, Because You Got Paid At The End Of The Week Or The End Of The Month.

After You've Been Working Fairly Intensively On A Novel For Six Months You Never Want To See The Damn Thing Again.

Don't You Understand?" Snarled Rincewind. "we Are Going Over The Edge, Godsdammit!" "can't We Do Anything About It?" "no!" "then I Can't See The Sense In Panicking," Said Twoflower Calmly.

Some Of Them Wanted To Sell Me Snake Oil And I'm Not Necessarily Going To Dismiss All Of These, As I Have Never Found A Rusty Snake.

In Ancient Times Cats Were Worshiped As Gods; They Have Not Forgotten This.

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.

There Are Some Things That Are More Appropriate To A Children's Than An Adult Book But There's A Huge Overlapping Area And Most Kids Read An Age Group Up Anyway.

Not All Questions Are Answered, But Fortunately Some Answers Are Questioned.

This Is A Lovely Party," Said The Bursar To A Chair, "i Wish I Was Here.

Give Anyone A Lever Long Enough And They Can Change The World. It's Unreliable Levers That Are The Problem.

Perhaps, If You Knew You Were Going To Die, Your Senses Crammed In As Much Detail As They Could While They Still Had The Chance.

A Witch Ought Never To Be Frightened In The Darkest Forest ... Because She Should Be Sure In Her Soul That The Most Terrifying Thing In The Forest Was Her.

Humans Need Fantasy To Be Human. To Be The Place Where The Falling Angel Meets The Rising Ape.

And That's What I Don't Like About Magic, Captain. 'cos It's *magic*. You Can't Ask Questions, It's Magic. It Doesn't Explain Anything, It's Magic. You Don't Know Where It Comes From, It's Magic! That's What I Don't Like About Magic, It Does Everything By Magic!

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

In The First Book Of My Discworld Series, Published More Than 26 Years Ago, I Introduced Death As A Character; There Was Nothing Particularly New About This - Death Has Featured In Art And Literature Since Medieval Times, And For Centuries We Have Had A Fascination With The Grim Reaper.

It Takes Forty Men With Their Feet On The Ground To Keep One Man With His Head In The Air.

Rincewind Gave His Fingers A Long Shocked Stare, As One Might Regard A Gun That Has Been Hanging On The Wall For Decades And Has Suddenly Gone Off And Perforated The Cat.

Taxation, Gentlemen, Is Very Much Like Dairy Farming. The Task Is To Extract The Maximum Amount Of Milk With The Minimum Amount Of Moo.

You'll See! We're Going To The Palace. Fetch Angua. We Might Need Her. And Bring The Search Warrant. You Mean The Sledgehammer, Sir? Yes.

Mort Was Hurt By This. It Was One Thing Not To Want To Marry Someone, But Quite Another To Be Told They Didn't Want To Marry You.

Any Fool Could Be A Witch With A Runic Knife, But It Took Skill To Be One With An Apple Corer.

It Was Nice To Hear The Voices Of Little Children At Play, Provided You Took Care To Be Far Enough Away Not To Hear What They Were Actually Saying.

The Wages Of Sin Is Death But So Is The Salary Of Virtue, And At Least The Evil Get To Go Home Early On Fridays.

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

His Sister Had Been Sent Down To The Village To Ask Mistress Garlick The Witch How You Stopped Spelling Recommendation.

Sometimes You Can Think That 'i've Had Enough Of Wizards!' And Sometimes Fantasy Is Not Just About Wizards.

She Was A Beefy Young Woman And, Whatever Piece Of Music She Was Playing, It Was Definitely Losing.

I’m Not Superstitious. I’m A Witch. Witches Aren’t Superstitious. We Are What People Are Superstitious Of.

When They're Standing Right In Front Of You, Kings Are A Kind Of Speech Impediment.

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.

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 Was An Old-fashioned Witch. She Didn’t Do Good For People, She Did Right By Them.

When Millions Of Tons Of Angry Elephant Come Spinning Through The Sky, And There Was No One There To Hear It, Does It - Philosopically Speaking - Make A Noise

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

I Read The 'old Testament' All The Way Through When I Was About 13 And Was Horrified. A Few Months Afterwards I Read 'the Origin Of Species', Hallucinating Very Mildly Because I Was In Bed With Flu At The Time. Despite That, Or Because Of That, It All Made Perfect Sense.

The Assassin Moved Quietly From Roof To Roof Until He Was Well Away From The Excitement Around The Watch House. His Movements Could Be Called Cat-like, Except That He Did Not Stop To Spray Urine Up Against Things.

Next Comes The Realist Phase ("after All, From A Purely Geometrical Point Of View A Cat Is Only A Tube With A Door At The Top.")

If He'd Been A Hero, He Would Have Taken The Opportunity To Say, "that's What I Call Sorted!" Since He Wasn't A Hero, He Threw Up.

It Takes A Special Kind Of Person To Fight Back.

‎no One Remembers The Singer. The Song Remains.

I Could Be Wrong. Not Being Certain Is What Being A Philosopher Is All About.

You Just Put That Sword Away, Sir, Please," Said The Voice Of Lance-constable Vimes. "you Will Not Shoot Me, You Young Idiot. That Would Be Murder," Said The Captain Calmly. "not Where I'm Aiming, Sir.

The Important Thing About Having Lots Of Things To Remember Is That You’ve Got To Go Somewhere Afterwards Where You Can Remember Them, You See? You’ve Got To Stop. You Haven’t Really Been Anywhere Until You’ve Got Back Home.

Building A Temple Didn't Mean You Believed In Gods, It Just Meant You Believed In Architecture.

Cats Will Amusingly Tolerate Humans Only Until Someone Comes Up With A Tin Opener That Can Be Operated With A Paw.

William: "i'm Sure We Can All Pull Together, Sir." Vetinari: "oh, I Do Hope Not. Pulling Together Is The Aim Of Despotism And Tyranny. Free Men Pull In All Kinds Of Directions.

What Can The Harvest Hope For...

The Female Mind Is Certainly A Devious One, My Lord." Vetinari Looked At His Secretary In Surprise. "well, Of Course It Is. It Has To Deal With The Male One.

There’s No Point In Believing In Things That Exist.

You Know What I'd Really, Really Like? What I'd Pay Money For? A Zx81 With A Disc Drive. I Understood The Zx81. It Was So Easy To Interface Stuff To It.

Unlike Wizards, Who Like Nothing Better Than A Complicated Hierarchy, Witches Don't Go In Much For The Structured Approach To Career Progression. It's Up To Each Individual Witch To Take On A Girl To Hand The Area Over To When She Dies. Witches Are Not By Nature Gregarious, At Least With Other Witches, And They Certainly Don't Have Leaders. Granny Weatherwax Was The Most Highly-regarded Of The Leaders They Didn't Have.

Of Course, Like All The Informal Inhabitants Of The University The Roaches Were A Little Unusual, But There Was Something Particularly Unpleasant About The Sound Of Billions Of Very Small Feet Hitting The Stones In Perfect Time. Rincewind Stepped Gingerly Over The Marching Column. The Librarian Jumped It. The Luggage, Of Course, Followed Them With A Noise Like Someone Tapdancing Over A Bag Of Crisps.

It Was Amazing How Many Friends You Could Make By Being Bad At Things, Provided You Were Bad Enough To Be Funny.

Nanny's Philosophy Of Life Was To Do What Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time, And Do It As Hard As Possible. It Had Never Let Her Down.

Only Ron's Dog Was Watching William. He Considered That It Had, For A Dog, A Very Offensive And Knowing Look. A Couple Of Months Ago Someaone Had Tried To Hand William The Old Story About There Being A Dog In The City That Could Talk. (...) The Dog In Front Of William Didn't Look As If It Could Talk, But It Did Look As If It Would Swear.

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

But Then Science Is Nothing But A Series Of Questions That Lead To More Questions.

Dark Fantasy Is Just Another Way Of Saying Horror.

The Worst Thing You Can Do Is Nothing.

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

Sheep Are Stupid, And Have To Be Driven. But Goats Are Intelligent, And Need To Be Led.

He Hated Games They Made The World Look Too Simple. Chess, In Particular, Had Always Annoyed Him. It Was The Dumb Way The Pawns Went Off And Slaughtered Their Fellow Pawns While The King Lounged About Doing Nothing. If Only The Pawns Would've United ... The Whole Board Could've Been A Republic In About A Dozen Moves.

Opera Happens Because A Large Number Of Things Amazingly Fail To Go Wrong.

This, Milord, Is My Family's Axe. We Have Owned It For Almost Nine Hundred Years, See. Of Course, Sometimes It Needed A New Blade. And Sometimes It Has Required A New Handle, New Designs On The Metalwork, A Little Refreshing Of The Ornamentation . . . But Is This Not The Nine Hundred-year-old Axe Of My Family? And Because It Has Changed Gently Over Time, It Is Still A Pretty Good Axe, Y'know. Pretty Good.

All I Am Really Promoting In The Books Is The Golden Rule, Which I Hope Everybody Knows To Be "do As You Would Be Done By." It Has One Or 2 Flaws, But It Is A Good Soundbite. Evil Starts When You Treat Other People As Things. There Are Perhaps Worse Crimes, But They Begin When You Treat Other People As Things.

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.

If You Were Going To Be Successful In The World Of Crime, You Needed A Reputation For Honesty.

History, Contrary To Popular Theories, Is Kings And Dates And Battles.

Everyone Is Reading What They Like And That's A Good Thing.

He Sighed. It Had Come To This. He Was A Responsible Authority, And People Could Use Terms Like "core Values" At Him With Impunity.

Gods Prefer Simple, Vicious Games, Where You Do Not Achieve Transcendence But Go Straight To Oblivion; A Key To The Understanding Of All Religion Is That A God's Idea Of Amusement Is Snakes And Ladders With Greased Rungs.

Imagination, Not Intelligence, Made Us Human.

He Moved On, In The Centre Of A Widening Circle. He Wasn't An Enemy, He Was A Nemesis.

Aliens Don't Get Stuck In Air Ducts. It's Practically A Well-known Fact.

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.

'educational' Refers To The Process, Not The Object. Although, Come To Think Of It, Some Of My Teachers Could Easily Have Been Replaced By A Cheeseburger.

Pride Is All Very Well, But A Sausage Is A Sausage.

For The First Time In Her Life Granny Wondered Whether There Might Be Something Important In All These Books People Were Setting Store By These Days, Although She Was Opposed To Books On Strict Moral Grounds, Since She Had Heard That Many Of Them Were Written By Dead People And Therefore It Stood To Reason Reading Them Would Be As Bad As Necromancy. Among The Many Things In The Infinitely Varied Universe With Which Granny Did Not Hold Was Talking To Dead People, Who By All Accounts Had Enough Troubles Of Their Own.

Humans! They Lived In A World Where The Grass Continued To Be Green And The Sun Rose Every Day And Flowers Regularly Turned Into Fruit, And What Impressed Them? Weeping Statues. And Wine Made Out Of Water! A Mere Quantum-mechanistic Tunnel Effect, That'd Happen Anyway If You Were Prepared To Wait Zillions Of Years. As If The Turning Of Sunlight Into Wine, By Means Of Vines And Grapes And Time And Enzymes, Wasn't A Thousand Times More Impressive And Happened All The Time.

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

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