The collection / 875 fragments

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Passages, proverbs, and questions carried across the ages.

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01c. 1981 AD

It was also a room full of books and made of books. There was no actual furniture; this is to say, the desk and chairs were shaped out of books. It looked as though many of them were frequently referred to, because they lay open with other books used as bookmarks.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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02c. 1981 AD

Fear is a strange soil. It grows obedience like corn, which grow in straight lines to make weeding easier. But sometimes it grows the potatoes of defiance, which flourish underground.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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03c. 1981 AD

A witch ought never to be frightened in the darkest forest, Granny Weatherwax had once told her, because she should be sure in her soul that the most terrifying thing in the forest was her.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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04c. 1981 AD

A stink. A stench. A foulness in her mind, dreadful and unforgiving. A compost of horrible ideas and rotted thoughts that made her want to take our her brain and wash it.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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05c. 1981 AD

The intelligence of that creature known as a crowd is the square root of the number of people in it.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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06c. 1981 AD

And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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07c. 1981 AD

I don't see what's so triffic about creating people as people and then gettin' upset cos' they act like people", said Adam severely. "Anyway, if you stopped tellin' people it's all sorted out after they're dead, they might try sorting it all out while they're alive.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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08c. 1981 AD

Oh. I see. People don't want to see what can't possibly exist.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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09c. 1981 AD

Polly felt questing eyes boring into her. She was embarrassed, of course. But not for the obvious reason. It was for the other one, the little lesson that life sometimes rams home with a stick: you are not the only one watching the world. Other people are people; while you watch them they watch you, and they think about you while you think about them. The world isn’t just about you.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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10c. 1981 AD

History isn't like that. History unravels gently, like an old sweater. It has been patched and darned many times, reknitted to suit different people, shoved in a box under the sink of censorship to be cut up for the dusters of propaganda, yet it always - eventually - manages to spring back into its old familar shape. History has a habit of changing the people who think they are changing it. History always has a few tricks up its frayed sleeve. It's been around a long time.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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11c. 1981 AD

Oh, he did his best to make their short lives miserable, because that was his job, but nothing he could think up was half as bad as the stuff they thought up themselves.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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12c. 1981 AD

It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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13c. 1981 AD

It is always useful to face an enemy who is prepared to die for his country," he read. "This means that both you and he have exactly the same aim in mind.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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14c. 1981 AD

Peace?' said Vetinari. 'Ah, yes, defined as period of time to allow for preparation for the next war.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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15c. 1981 AD

It is a long-cherished tradition among a certain type of military thinker that huge casualties are the main thing. If they are on the other side then this is a valuable bonus.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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16c. 1981 AD

Anyway, why would you trust anything written down? She certainly didn't trust "Mothers of Borogravia!" and that was from the government. And if you couldn't trust the government, who could you trust?Very nearly everyone, come to think of it...

Terry Pratchett / quote

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17c. 1981 AD

Men marched away, Vimes. And men marched back. How glorious the battles would have been that they never had to fight!

Terry Pratchett / quote

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18c. 1981 AD

Are we entirely ready, sir?" said Lieutenant Hornett, with the special inflection that means "We are not entirely ready, sir.""We had better be. Glory awaits, gentlemen. In the words of General Tacticus, 'let us take history by the scrotum.' Of course, he was not a very honourable fighter.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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19c. 1981 AD

And now I demand that you do what the ignorant might feel is the easier thing. You must refrain from dying in battle. Revenge is not redress. Revenge is a wheel, and it turns backwards. The dead are not your masters.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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20c. 1981 AD

Now we have travelled a hundred million steps from the Datum, we are finding life systems entirely unlike our own - and yet we still find war. Must it always be so?

Terry Pratchett / quote

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21c. 1981 AD

History was full of the bones of good men who'd followed bad orders in the hope that they could soften the blow. Oh, yes, there were worse things they could do, but most of them began right where they started following bad orders.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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22c. 1981 AD

And in a nasty war, where's the best place to be? Apart from on the moon, o' course? No one?"Slowly, Jade raised a hand."Go on, then," said the sergeant."In the army, sarge," said the troll. "'cos..." She began to count on her fingers. "One, you got weapons an' armour an' dat. Two, you are surrounded by other armed men. Er... Many, youse gettin' paid and gettin' better grub than the people in Civilian Street. Er... Lots, if'n you gives up, you getting taken pris'ner and dere's rules about that like Not Kicking Pris'ners Inna Head and stuff, 'cos if you kick their pris'ners inna head they'll kick your pris'ners inna head so dat's, like, you're kickin' your own head, but dere's no rule say you can't kick enemy civilians inna head. There's other stuff too, but I ran outa numbers.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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23c. 1981 AD

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.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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24c. 1981 AD

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.

Terry Pratchett / quote

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