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Quotes by Writer
"None were left now to unname, and yet how close I felt to them when I saw one of them swim or fly or trot or crawl across my way or over my skin, or stalk me in the night, or go along beside me for a while in the day. They seemed far closer than when their names had stood between myself and them like a clear barrier: so close that my fear of them and their fear of me became one same fear. And the attraction that many of us felt, the desire to feel or rub or caress one another's scales or skin or feathers or fur, taste one another's blood or flesh, keep one another warm, that attraction was now all one with the fear, and the hunter could not be told from the hunted, nor the eater from the food."
56
"Imagine being sentient but not alive. Seeing and even knowing, but not alive. Just looking out. Recognizing but not being alive. A person can die and still go on. Sometimes what looks out at you from a person's eyes maybe died back in childhood."
56
"Once you are married, there is nothing left for you, not even suicide."
56
"Ever since Newton, we've done science by taking things apart to see how they work. What the computer enables us to do is to put things together to see how they work: we're now synthesized rather than analysed. I find one of the most enthralling aspects of computers is limitless communication."
56
"I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move."
56
"Do not assume that order and stability are always good, in a society or in a universe. The old, the ossified, must always give way to new life and the birth of new things. Before the new things can be born the old must perish. This is a dangerous realization, because it tells us that we must eventually part with much of what is familiar to us. And that hurts. But that is part of the script of life. Unless we can psychologically accommodate change, we ourselves begin to die, inwardly. What I am saying is that objects, customs, habits, and ways of life must perish so that the authentic human being can live. And it is the authentic human being who matters most, the viable, elastic organism which can bounce back, absorb, and deal with the new."
56
"One of the great disadvantages of hurry is that it takes such a long time."
56
".. when all this started, I asked myself, 'Am I going to withdraw from the world, like most people do, or am I going to live?' I decided I'm going to live - or at least try to live - the way I want, with dignity, with courage, with humour, with composure."
56
"Hope is a slighter, tougher thing even than trust, he thought, pacing his room as the soundless, vague lightning flashed overhead. In a good season one trusts life; in a bad season one only hopes, But they are of the same essence: they are the mind's indispensable relationship with other minds, with the world, and with time. Without trust, a man lives, but not a human life; without hope, he dies. When there is no relationship, where hands do not touch, emotion atrophies in void and intelligence goes sterile and obsessed. Between men the only link left is that of owner to slave, or murderer to victim."
56
"I like them all - I don't always approve. I see myself as a sort of benevolent uncle to these characters, and I can see why they do what they do; sometimes they make some mistakes, but at heart I think they're decent."
55
"An autobiography is an obituary in serial form with the last installment missing."
55
"Don't stare into a mirror when you are trying to solve a problem."
55
"I compromised my ability to tell my story, at the most basic level."
55
"The law is simply expediency wearing a long white dress."
55
"The Christian notion of the possibility of redemption is incomprehensible to the computer."
55
"Smile, for everyone lacks self-confidence and more than any other one thing a smile reassures them."
55
"The knack of flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss."
55
"One should be willing to throw away a dozen ideas to come up with a good one, just as one should throw away a dozen words to come up with the right one."
55
"I honestly believe that TV generally is obsessed with the ratings battle to the point of cutting its own throat."
55
"There are certain times when public opinion is the worst of all opinions."
55
"Happiness doesn't depend on any external conditions, it is governed by our mental attitude."
55
"Every writer knows he is spurious; every fiction writer would rather be credible than authentic."
55
"Every sin is the result of collaboration."
55
"But I don't read or listen for pleasure. I have too much else to do."
55
"As you get older, you sometimes feel that it's harder and harder to get something new and wonderful to come into your life."
Life,
55
"Lose yourself in generous service and every day can be a most unusual day, a triumphant day, an abundantly rewarding day!"
55
"Music was invented to confirm human loneliness."
55
"Documents create a paper reality we call proof."
55
"I can see now that a concept or even a feeling makes no sense unless out of our substance we spin around it a web of references, of relationships, of values."
55
"Civilization is merely an advance in taste: accepting, all the time, nicer things, and rejecting nasty ones."
55
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