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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.

-Terry Pratchett

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They May Be Called

Terry Pratchett

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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.

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

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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.

An Author Writes A Book, And That's The Book At That Point. And If The Author Writes The Book Again, Then Somehow Something Has Gone Wrong, If You See What I Mean.

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What Did I Tell You About Mister Safety Catch?' Said Vimes Weakly. When Mister Safety Catch Is Not On, Mister Crossbow Is Not Your Friend,' Recited Detritus, Saluting.

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.

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

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The People Who Guard The Rainbow Don't Like Those Who Get In The Way Of The Sun.

I Believe It Should Be Possible For Someone Stricken With A Serious And Ultimately Fatal Illness To Choose To Die Peacefully With Medical Help, Rather Than Suffer.

Many An Ancient Lord's Last Words Have Been, 'you Can't Kill Me Because I've Got Magic Aaargh.'

[...] The Awesome Splendor Of The Universe Is Much Easier To Deal With If You Think Of It As A Series Of Small Chunks.

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

It Was Sci-fi And Fantasy That Got Me Reading, And Sci-fi Writers In Particular Have Pack Rat Minds. They Introduce All Sorts Of Interesting Themes And Ideas Into Their Books, And So For Me It Was A Short Leap To Go From The Fantasy And Sci-fi Genres To Folklore, Mythology, Ancient History And Philosophy. I Did Not Read Philosophy Because I Set Out To Become A Philosopher; I Read It Because It Looked Interesting.

I Wonder If It's Like This For Mountain Climbers, He Thought. You Climb Bigger And Bigger Mountains And You Know That One Day One Of Them Is Going To Be Just That Bit Too Steep. But You Go On Doing It, Because It’s So-o Good When You Breathe The Air Up There. And You Know You'll Die Falling.

There Was This About Vampires : They Could Never Look Scruffy. Instead, They Were... What Was The Word... Deshabille. It Meant Untidy, But With Bags And Bags Of Style.

The Key To Winning, As Always, Was Looking As If You Had Every Right, Nay, Duty To Be Where You Were. It Helped If You Could Also Suggest In Every Line Of Your Body That No One Else Had Any Rights To Be Doing Anything, Anywhere, Whatsoever.

If My Father Could Have Sat Up In Bed And Said Goodbye, I'd Have Pressed The Button. I Wouldn't Have Been Able To See For Crying, But I Would Have Considered That A Duty.

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

At Some Time In The Recent Past Someone Had Decided To Brighten The Ancient Corridors Of The University By Painting Them, Having Some Vague Notion That Learning Should Be Fun. It Hadn’t Worked. It’s A Fact Known Throughout The Universes That No Matter How Carefully The Colors Are Chosen, Institutional Decor Ends Up As Either Vomit Green, Unmentionable Brown, Nicotine Yellow Or Surgical Appliance Pink. By Some Little-understood Process Of Sympathetic Resonance, Corridors Painted In Those Colors Always Smell Slightly Of Boiled Cabbage—even If No Cabbage Is Ever Cooked In The Vicinity.

Now That Their Long War Was Over, They Could Get On With The Proper Concern Of All Civilised Nations, Which Is To Prepare For The Next One.

It's A Sword. Said The Hogfather. They're Not Meant To Be Safe.

Knowledge Is Dangerous, Which Is Why Governments Often Clamp Down On People Who Can Think Thoughts Above A Certain Caliber.

Fresh Wounds," Said Angua. "but One Of Them Did Shoot One Of The Other In The Leg By Accident." "i Think You'd Better Put In Your Report As -self Inflicted- Wounds While Resisting Arrest," Said Vimes.

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

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

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.

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.

It's No Wonder Most Religions Are Born In The Desert, Because When Men Lay Beneath That Boundless Night Sky And Look Up At The Infinite Expanse Of Creation They Have An Uncontrollable Urge To Put Something In The Way .

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Jeremy Tried To Be An Interesting Person. The Trouble Was That He Was The Kind Of Person Who, Having Decided To Be An Interesting Person, Would First Of All Try To Find A Book Called How To Be An Interesting Person And Then See Whether There Were Any Courses Available.

I Don't Think About The End Game. I've Got Lots To Occupy My Mind. It's The Rage That Keeps Me Going.

A Good Man Will Kill You With Hardly A Word.

There Is Always A Choice." "you Mean I Could Choose Certain Death?" "a Choice Nevertheless, Or Perhaps An Alternative. You See I Believe In Freedom. Not Many People Do, Although They Will Of Course Protest Otherwise. And No Practical Definition Of Freedom Would Be Complete Without The Freedom To Take The Consequences. Indeed, It Is The Freedom Upon Which All The Others Are Based.

Nothing I Can Say Or Devise, And Nothing Anybody Else Can Say Or Devise, Is Going To Be Perfect.

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.

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People Who Are Rather More Than Six Feet Tall And Nearly As Broad Across The Shoulders Often Have Uneventful Journeys. People Jump Out At Them From Behind Rocks Then Say Things Like, "oh. Sorry. I Thought You Were Someone Else.

Witches Aren’t Like That. We Live In Harmony With The Great Cycles Of Nature, And Do No Harm To Anyone, And It’s Wicked Of Them To Say We Don’t. We Ought To Fill Their Bones With Hot Lead.

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Another Priest Said,"is It True You've Said You'll Believe In Any God Whose Existence Can Be Proved By Logical Debate?""yes."vimes Had A Feeling About The Immediate Future And Took A Few Steps Away From Dorfl."but The Gods Plainly Do Exist," Said A Priest."it Is Not Evident."a Bolt Of Lightning Lanced Down Through The Clouds And Hit Dorfl's Helmet. There Was A Sheet Of Flame And Then A Trickling Noise. Dorfl's Molten Armour Formed Puddles Around His White-hot Feet."i Don't Call That Much Of An Argument," Said Dorfl Calmly, From Somewhere In The Clouds Of Smoke.

She Heard Him Mutter, 'can You Take Away This Grief?' 'i'm Sorry,' She Replied. 'everyone Asks Me. And I Would Not Do So Even If I Knew How. It Belongs To You. Only Time And Tears Take Away Grief; That Is What They Are For.

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.

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I Am Death, Not Taxes. I Turn Up Only Once.

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It Was Then That Marvin Got Religion. Not The Quiet, Personal Kind, That Involves Doing Good Deeds And Living A Better Life; Not Even The Kind That Involves Putting On A Suit And Ringing People's Doorbells; But The Kind That Involves Having Your Own Tv Network And Getting People To Send You Money.

She Was Also, By The Standards Of Other People, Lost. She Would Not See It Like That. She Knew Where She Was, It Was Just That Everywhere Else Didn't.

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The Kraken Stirs. And Ten Billion Sushi Dinners Cry Out For Vengeance.

This Is Where The Gods Play Games With The Lives Of Men, On A Board Which Is At One And The Same Time A Simple Playing Area And The Whole World. And Fate Always Wins.

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.

They Say That The Eyes Of Some Paintings Can Follow You Around The Room, A Fact That I Doubt, But I Am Wondering Whether Some Music Can Follow You For Ever.

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It's Amazing How Fast Gold Works.

Putting Up A Statue To Someone Who Tried To Stop A War Is Not Very, Um, Statuesque. Of Course, If You Had Butchered Five Hundred Of Your Own Men Out Of Arrogant Carelessness, We'd Be Melting The Bronze Already.

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It Wasn't That Nanny Ogg Sang Badly. It Was Just That She Could Hit Notes Which, When Amplified By A Tin Bath Half Full Of Water, Ceased To Be Sound And Became Some Sort Of Invasive Presence.

I Don't Really Plan. I'm Almost Intuitive About Things.

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.

I Hate Cats." Death's Face Became A Little Stiffer, If That Were Possible. The Blue Glow In His Eye Sockets Flickered Red For An Instant. "i See," He Said. The Tone Suggested That Death Was Too Good For Cat Haters.

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Correct Observation Followed By Meticulous Deduction And The Precise Visualization Of Goals Is Vital To The Success Of Any Enterprise.

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.

Either All Days Are Holy Or None Are.

You Know I've Never Agreed With Baths. Sittin' Around In Your Own Dirt Like That.

Unseen University Was Much Bigger On The Inside. Thousands Of Years As The Leading Establishment Of Practical Magic In A World Where Dimensions Were Largely A Matter Of Chance In Any Case Had Left It Bulging In Places Where It Shouldn't Have Places. There Were Rooms Containing Rooms Which, If You Entered Them, Turned Out To Contain The Room You'd Started With, Which Can Be A Problem If You Are In A Conga Line.

She Was Not, Herself, Hugely In Favour Of Motherhood In General. Obviously It Was Necessary, But It Wasn't Exactly Difficult. Even Cats Managed It. But Women Acted As If They'd Been Given A Medal That Entitled Them To Boss People Around. It Was As If, Just Because They'd Got The Label Which Said "mother," Everyone Else Got A Tiny Part Of The Label That Said "child".

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.

You Can't Trample Infidels When You're A Tortoise. I Mean, All You Could Do Is Give Them A Meaningful Look.

My Name Is Immaterial,' She Said. That's A Pretty Name,' Said Rincewind.

No One Knew Where You Were Before You Were Born, But When You Were Born, It Wasn't Long Before You Found You'd Arrived With Your Return Ticket Already Punched.

Animals Never Spend Time Dividing Experience Into Little Bits And Speculating About All The Bits They've Missed. The Whole Panoply Of The Universe Has Been Neatly Expressed To Them As Things To (a) Mate With, (b) Eat, (c) Run Away From, And (d) Rocks.

Certainly The Americans Want To Buy Rights, But Have No Idea What To Do With Them.

I Would Advise Budding Writers Some Other Kind Of Job, Unless They Think They're Very, Very Lucky.

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.

Too Much Magic Could Wrap Time And Space Around Itself, And That Wasn't Good News For The Kind Of Person Who Had Grown Used To Things Like Effects Following Things Like Causes.

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

Bill Door Was Impressed. Miss Flitworth Could Actually Give The Word "revenue", Which Had Two Vowels And One Diphthong, All The Peremptoriness Of The Word "scum.

Granny Weatherwas Was Not A Jouster In The Lists Of Love, But, As An Intelligent Onlooker, She Knew How The Game Was Played.

I Just Rearrange Words Into A Pleasing Order For Money.

Every Procedure For Getting A Cat To Take A Pill Works Fine - Once. Like The Borg, They Learn.

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

The Kappamaki, A Whaling Research Ship, Was Currently Researching The Question: How Many Whales Can You Catch In One Week?

And Gears," Said Anathema. "my Bike Didn't Have Gears. I'm Sure My Bike Didn't Have Gears." Crowley Leaned Over To The Angel. "oh Lord, Heal This Bike," He Whispered Sarcastically. "i'm Sorry, I Just Got Carried Away," Hissed Aziraphale.

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

It Was The Heart Of Any Scam Or Fiddle -- Keep The Punter Uncertain, Or, If He Is Certain, Make Him Certain Of The Wrong Thing.

Writing Is The Most Fun You Can Have By Yourself.

"god Does Not Play Games With His Loyal Servants," Said The Metatron, But In A Worried Tone Of Voice. "whooo-eee," Said Crowley. "where Have You Been?"

He Said It Was Better To Belong Where You Don't Belong Than Not To Belong Where You Used To Belong, Remembering When You Used To Belong There.

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.

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.

The Yen Buddhists Are The Richest Religious Sect In The Universe. They Hold That The Accumulation Of Money Is A Great Evil And A Burden To The Soul. They Therefore, Regardless Of Personal Hazard, See It As Their Unpleasant Duty To Acquire As Much As Possible In Order To Reduce The Risk To Innocent People.

A European Says: I Can't Understand This, What's Wrong With Me? An American Says: I Can't Understand This, What's Wrong With Him? I Make No Suggestion That One Side Or Other Is Right, But Observation Over Many Years Leads Me To Believe It Is True.

His Progress Through Life Was Hampered By His Tremendous Sense Of His Own Ignorance, A Disability Which Affects All Too Few.

And That's When I First Learned About Evil. It Is Built In To The Very Nature Of The Universe. Every World Spins In Pain. If There Is Any Kind Of Supreme Being, I Told Myself, It Is Up To All Of Us To Become His Moral Superior.

Colon Thought Carrot Was Simple. Carrot Often Struck People As Simple. And He Was. Where People Went Wrong Was Thinking That Simple Meant The Same Thing As Stupid.

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.

A Good Bookshop Is Just A Genteel Black Hole That Knows How To Read.

They Felt, In Fact, Tremendously Bucked-up, Which Was How Lady Ramkin Would Almost Certainly Have Put It And Which Was Definitely Several Letters Of The Alphabet Away From How They Normally Felt.

Smaller-than-medium-jock-but-bigger-than-wee-jock-jock

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

This Wasn't Food - It Was What Food Became If It Had Been Good And Gone To Food Heaven.

You Have Reached The End Of Cake

People Look Down On Stuff Like Geography And Meteorology, And Not Only Because They're Standing On One And Being Soaked By The Other. They Don't Look Quite Like Real Science. But Geography Is Only Physics Slowed Down And With A Few Trees Stuck On It, And Meteorology Is Full Of Excitingly Fashionable Chaos And Complexity. And Summer Isn't A Time. It's A Place As Well. Summer Is A Moving Creature And Likes To Go South For The Winter.

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

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's Beautiful," Said Mort Softly. "what Is It?" The Sun Is Under The Disc, Said Death. "is It Like This Every Night?" Every Night, Said Death. Nature's Like That. "doesn't Anyone Know?" Me. You. The Gods. Good, Isn't It? "gosh!" Death Leaned Over The Saddle And Looked Down At The Kingdoms Of The World. I Don't Know About You, He Said, But I Could Murder A Curry.

You Fear To Die? "it's Not That I Don't Want... I Mean, I've Always...it's Just That Life Is A Habit That's Hard To Break.

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.

Everyone Should Occasionally Break The Law In Some Small And Delightful Way. It's Good For The Hygiene Of The Brain.

I Thought Unicorns Were More . . . Fluffy.

Ingenuity And Incongruity Always Cheer Me Up.

Ninety Percent Of Most Magic Merely Consists Of Knowing One Extra Fact.

You Can't Go Around Building A Better World For People. Only People Can Build A Better World For People. Otherwise It's Just A Cage. Besides You Don't Build A Better World By Choppin' Heads Off And Giving Decent Girls Away To Frogs.

Magrat Had Used A Lot Of Powder To Make Her Face Pale And Interesting. It Combined With The Lavishly Applied Mascara To Give The Guard The Impression That He Was Looking At Two Flies That Had Crashed Into A Sugar Bowl.

Don't Look Back!" "why Not?" "because I Just Did! Run Faster!

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

By The Time You Write The Last Page You Have Done Half The Book. The Other Half Tends To Get Done In About Five Weeks; I Do Several Drafts, Very, Very Furiously Rewriting. I Literally Do More Or Less Nothing Else And I Stick With It And Go Through It And I Begin To Hate It.

This Isn't Life In The Fast Lane, It's Life In The Oncoming Traffic.

Studies Have Shown That An Ant Can Carry One Hundred Times Its Own Weight, But There Is No Known Limit To The Lifting Power Of The Average Tiny Eighty-year-old Spanish Peasant Grandmother.

It Was Like Being In A Jane Austen Novel, But One With Far Less Clothing.

Things That Try To Look Like Things Often Do Look More Like Things Than Things.

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

Contrary To Popular Belief And Hope, People Don't Usually Come Running When They Hear A Scream. That's Not How Humans Work. Humans Look At Other Humans And Say, 'did You Hear A Scream?' Because The First Scream Might Have Been You Screaming Inside Your Head, Or A Horse Backfiring.

I Have A Suspicion - I Have To Be Careful What I Say - That You Might Actually Find The Best Comics Actually Written By People Who Are Comics Writers And Who Aren't Setting Out To Do Graphic Novels.

It Was Possibly The Most Circumspect Advance In The History Of Military Maneuvers, Right Down At The Bottom End Of The Scale That Things Like The Charge Of The Light Brigade Are At The Top Of.

Last Night There Seemed To Be A Chance. Anything Was Possible Last Night. That Was The Trouble With Last Nights. They Were Always Followed By This Mornings.

I Was Just A Kid Then. But I Won't Forget. Nor Will Others. There's Lots Of People With Reason To Hate The Church.

All Was Black, Gloomy And Awful. There Was No Light At The End Of The Tunnel - Or If There Was, It Was An Oncoming Train.

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.

Welcome To Fear, Said Moist To Himself. It's Hope, Turned Inside Out. You Know It Can't Go Wrong, You're Sure It Can't Go Wrong... But It Might.

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

...the Proliferation Of Luminous Fungi Or Iridescent Crystals In Deep Caves Where The Torchlessly Improvident Hero Needs To See Is One Of The Most Obvious Intrusions Of Narrative Causality Into The Physical Universe.

Who'd Want A Pony When You Could Have The Whole Universe? It Was Far More Interesting And You Didn't Have To Muck It Out Once A Week.

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

Mum Had Done Everything You Need To Educate A Kid. She Made Me A Kid Who Likes Books And She Told Me About 'wind In The Willows' And Read It And I Thought This Is Weird, Rat, Mole, Toad And My First Ever Bolshie Thought - You Know About 'the Wind In The Willows.'

If You Have Enough Book Space, I Don't Want To Talk To You.

Veil, You See, If I Vas To Say Something Portentous Like "zer Dark Eyes Of Zer Mind" Back Home In Uberwald, Zer Would Be A Sudden Crash Of Thunder,' Said Otto. 'and If I Vas To Point At A Castle On A Towering Crag And Say "yonder Is . . . Zer Castle" A Volf Would Be Bound To Howl Mournfully.' He Sighed. 'in Zer Old Country, Zer Scenery Is Psychotropic And Knows Vot Is Expected Of It. Here, Alas, People Just Look At You In A Funny Vay.

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.

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.

Look At Satan. Created As An Angel, Grows Up To Be The Great Adversary. Hey, If You’re Going To Go On About Genetics, You Might As Well Say The Kid Will Grow Up To Be An Angel. After All, His Father Was Really Big In Heaven In The Old Days. Saying He’ll Grow Up To Be A Demon Just Because His Dad Became One Is Like Saying A Mouse With Its Tail Cut Off Will Give Birth To Tailless Mice. No. Upbringing Is Everything. Take It From Me.

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

Two Types Of People Laugh At The Law: Those That Break It And Those That Make It.

Inside Every Lump Of Coal There's A Diamond Waiting To Get Out.

My Idea Of A Good Novel Was One You Made Enough Money Out Of To Buy A Greenhouse.

We Live In A Science Fiction Universe. We Have Done For A Long Time.

If There Were Such A Thing As An Inter-city Thieving Contest, Ankh-morpork Would Bring Home The Trophy And Probably Everyone’s Wallets.

I Think That Sick People In Ankh-morpork Generally Go To A Vet. It's Generally A Better Bet. There's More Pressure On A Vet To Get It Right. People Say "it Was God's Will" When Granny Dies, But They Get Angry When They Lose A Cow.

A World Like That, Which Exists Only Because The Gods Enjoy A Joke, Must Be A Place Where Magic Can Survive. And Sex Too, Of Course.

I Wrote Three Books, I Had Three Greenhouses. It Seemed To Me To Be Very Satisfactory.

You Did What You Were Told Or You Didn't Get Paid, And If Things Went Wrong It Wasn't Your Problem. It Was The Fault Of Whatever Idiot Has Accepted This Message For Sending In The First Place. No One Cared About You, And Everyone At Headquarters Was An Idiot. It Wasn't Your Fault, No One Listened To You. Headquarters Had Even Started An Employee Of The Month Scheme To Show How Much They Cared. That Was How Much They Didn't Care.

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.

If You Are Going To Write, Say, Fantasy - Stop Reading Fantasy. You've Already Read Too Much. Read Other Things; Read Westerns, Read History, Read Anything That Seems Interesting, Because If You Only Read Fantasy And Then You Start To Write Fantasy, All You're Going To Do Is Recycle The Same Old Stuff And Move It Around A Bit.

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.

First Of All You Are A Writer, A Writer Is What You Are, So It Doesn't Actually Stop The Moment You Leave Your Desk, Your Computer, Your Keyboard, Whatever. Something Is Operating The Back Of Your Mind.

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

Look, He Said To His Imagination, If This Is How You're Going To Behave, I Shan't Bring You Again.

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.

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

"right!" "right!" "you Can Get There!" "i Can Get There!" "you're A Natural At Counting To Two!" "i'm A Nat'ral At Counting To Two!" "if You Can Count To Two, You Can Count To Anything!" "if I Can Count To Two, I Can Count To Anything!" "and Then The World Is Your Mollusc!" "my Mollusc! What's A Mollusc?

I Intend, Before The Endgame Looms, To Die Sitting In A Chair In My Own Garden With A Glass Of Brandy In My Hand And Thomas Tallis On The Ipod. Oh, And Since This Is England, I Had Better Add, "if Wet, In The Library." Who Could Say That This Is Bad?

I Meant," Said Ipslore Bitterly, "what Is There In This World That Truly Makes Living Worthwhile?" Death Thought About It. Cats, He Said Eventually. Cats Are Nice.

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

No. Men Should Die For Lies. But The Truth Is Too Precious To Die For.

I Became A Journalist At 17. A Few Hours Later, I Saw My First Dead Body, Which Was Somewhat... Colourful. That's When I Learned You Can Go On Throwing Up After You Run Out Of Things To Throw Up.

(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 Can't Be Talking To A Tree. If I Was Talking To A Tree I'd Be Mad, And I'm Not Mad, So Trees Can't Talk.

It Was Lonely On The Hill, And Cold. And All You Could Do Was Keep Going. You Could Scream, Cry, And Stamp Your Feet, But Apart From Making You Feel Warmer, It Wouldn’t Do Any Good. You Could Say It Was Unfair, And That Was True, But The Universe Didn’t Care Because It Didn’t Know What “fair” Meant. That Was The Big Problem About Being A Witch. It Was Up To You. It Was Always Up To You.

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.

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.

He's Out Of His Depth On A Wet Pavement.

Once You Have Your Character Sitting Right There In Your Head, All You Really Need To Do Is Wind Them Up, Put Them Down, And Simply Write Down What They Do, Say, Or Think.

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

Preston, I Don't Think This Creature Could Ever Find Its Way Into Your Head. Quite Apart From Anything Else, It Seems Pretty Crowded And Complicated To Me.

Oh. I See. People Don't Want To See What Can't Possibly Exist.

It's Hard To Be Famous And Alive.

Oh, There's Plenty Of Reasons. I Just Don't Know Which One.

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

Well, The Traveling Teachers Do Come Through Every Few Months," Said The Baron. "yes, Sir, I Know, Sir, And They're Useless, Sir. They Teach Facts, Not Understanding. It's Like Teaching People About Forests By Showing Them A Saw. I Want A Proper School, Sir, To Teach Reading And Writing, And Most Of All Thinking, Sir, So People Can Find What They're Good At, Because Someone Doing What They Really Like Is Always An Asset To Any Country, And Too Often People Never Find Out Until It's Too Late.

Ye Know Full Well That The Meaning Of Life Is To Find Your Gift. To Find Your Gift Is Happiness. Never Tae Find It Is Misery.

Meaning Of Life

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

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