quote · Words worth keeping
Small animals are a great problem. I wish God had never created small animals, or else that He had made them so they could talk, or else that He'd given them better faces. Space. Take moths. They fly at the lamp and burn themsleves, and then they fly right back again. It can't be instinct, because it isn't the way it works. They just don't understand, so they go right on doing it. Then they lie on their backs and all their legs quiver, and then they're dead. Did you get all that? Does it sound good?""Very good," Grandmother said.Sophia stood up and shouted, "Say this: say I hate everything that dies slow! Say I hate everything that won't let you help! Did you write that?
Small animals are a great problem. I wish God had never created small animals, or else that He had made them so they could talk, or else that He'd given them better faces. Space. Take moths. They fly at the lamp and burn themsleves, and then they fly right back again. It can't be instinct, because it isn't the way it works. They just don't understand, so they go right on doing it. Then they lie on their backs and all their legs quiver, and then they're dead. Did you get all that? Does it sound good?""Very good," Grandmother said.Sophia stood up and shouted, "Say this: say I hate everything that dies slow! Say I hate everything that won't let you help! Did you write that?
Approximate author period: c. 1957 AD · modern
Meaning not yet available
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- Author or tradition
- Tove Jansson
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
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- Approximate author period: c. 1957 AD · modern
Approximate author-period anchor from life dates 1914 to 2001; Wikidata Q102071, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q102071 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 51975; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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