Extraterrestrial life in media

"ONCE UPON a time there was a Martian named Valentine Michael Smith."

"ONCE UPON A TIME when the world was young there was a Martian named Smith. Valentine Michael Smith was as real as taxes but he was a race of one."

"Smith is not a man. He is an intelligent creature with the genes and ancestry of a man, but he is not a man. He's more a Martian than a man. Until we came along he had never laid eyes on a human being. He thinks like a Martian, he feels like a Martian. He's been brought up by a race which has nothing in common with us. Why, they don't even have sex. Smith has never laid eyes on a woman — still hasn't if my orders have been carried out. He's a man by ancestry, a Martian by environment."

"The abrupt change from rapport of water ritual to a situation in which a newly won water brother might possibly be considering withdrawal or discorporation would have thrown him into panic had he not been consciously suppressing such disturbance. But he decided that if it died now he must die at once also — he could not grok it in any other wise, not after the giving of water."

"There was so much to grok, so little to grok from."

"Jill looked puzzled. "I don't know how to express it. Yes, I do! — Ben, have you ever seen an angel?" "You, cherub. Otherwise not." "Well, neither have I — but that is what he looked like. He had old, wise eyes in a completely placid face, a face of unearthly innocence." She shivered."

"There comes a time in the life of every human when he or she must decide to risk "his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor" on an outcome dubious. Those who fail the challenge are merely overgrown children, can never be anything else. Jill Boardman encountered her personal challenge — and accepted it — at 3:47 that afternoon."

"Jill suddenly had the feeling that Smith would unhesitatingly jump out the window if she told him to — in which belief she was correct; he would have jumped, enjoyed every scant second of the twenty-storey drop, and accepted without surprise or resentment the discorporation on impact. Nor would he have been unaware that such a fall would kill him; fear of death was an idea utterly beyond him. If a water brother selected for him such a strange discorporation, he would cherish it and try to grok."

"This brother wanted him to place his whole body in the water of life. No such honor had ever come to him; to the best of his knowledge and belief no one had ever before been offered such a holy privilege. Yet he had begun to understand that these others did have greater acquaintance with the stuff of life… a fact not yet grokked but which he had to accept."

"Johnson did not hit Jill as hard as he used to hit his wife before she left him, not nearly as hard as he hit prisoners who were reluctant to talk. Until then Smith had shown no expression and had said nothing; he had simply let himself be forced along. He had understood none of it and had tried to do nothing at all. When he saw his water brother struck by this other, he twisted, got free — and reached toward Johnson — — and Johnson was gone. Only blades of grass, straightening up where his big feet had been, showed that he had ever been there. Jill stared at the spot and felt that she might faint."

"Johnson should not have slapped her. He had not hit her hard, not even as hard as he used to hit his wife before she went home to her parents, and not nearly as hard as he had often hit prisoners who were reluctant to talk. Up to this time Smith had shown no expression at all and had said nothing; he had simply let himself be forced into the room with the passive, futile resistance of a puppy who does not want to be walked on a leash. But he had understood nothing of what was happening and had tried to do nothing at all. When he saw his water brother struck by this other, he twisted and ducked, got free — and reached in an odd fashion for Johnson. Johnson was not there any longer. He was not anywhere. The room did not contain him. Only blades of grass, straightening up where his big feet had been, showed that he had ever been there. Jill stared through the space he had occupied and felt that she might faint."

"Smith had relapsed into his attitude of passive waiting. Not understanding what it was all about, he had done only the minimum he had to do. But guns he had seen before, in the hands of men on Mars, and the expression on Jill's face at having one aimed at her he did not like. He grokked that this was one of the critical cusps in the growth of a being wherein contemplation must bring forth right action in order to permit further growth. He acted. The Old Ones taught him well. He stepped toward Berquist; the gun swung to cover him. Nevertheless he reached out — and Berquist was no longer there."

"Jill put a hand to her mouth and screamed. Smith's face had been completely blank. Now it became tragically forlorn as he realized that he must have chosen wrong action at the cusp. He looked imploringly at Jill and began to tremble. His eyes rolled up; he slipped slowly down to the grass, pulled himself tightly into a foetal ball and was motionless."

"My dear, I used to think I was serving humanity... and I pleasured in the thought. Then I discovered that humanity does not want to be served; on the contrary it resents any attempt to serve it."

"Remind me to write a popular article on the compulsive reading of news. The theme will be that most neuroses and some psychoses can be traced to the unnecessary and unhealthy habit of daily wallowing in the troubles and sins of five billion strangers. The title is 'Gossip Unlimited' — no, make that 'Gossip Gone Wild.'"

"He has this crazy Martian idea that he can trust utterly anyone with whom he has shared a drink of water. With a 'water brother' he is completely docile and with anybody else he is stubborn as a mule."

"Here, by the grace of God and an inside straight, we have a personality untouched by the psychotic taboos of our tribe — and you want to turn him into a carbon copy of every fourth-rate conformist in this frightened land!"

"Customs, morals — is there a difference? Woman, do you realize what you are doing? Here, by the grace of God and an inside straight, we have a personality untouched by the psychotic taboos of our tribe — and you want to turn him into a carbon copy of every fourth-rate conformist in this frightened land! Why don't you go whole hog? Get him a brief case and make him carry it wherever he goes — make him feel shame if he doesn't have it."

"Sit back down — and for God's sake quit trying to be as nasty as I am; you don't have my years of practice. Now let me get something straight: you are not in my debt. You can't be. Impossible — because I never do anything I don't want to do. Nor does anyone, but in my case I am always aware of it."

"I have learned two ways to tie my shoes. One way is only good for lying down. The other way is good for walking."

"The concept of fiction was nowhere in Mike's experience; there was nothing on which it could rest, and Jubal's attempts to explain the idea were so emotionally upsetting to Mike that Jill was afraid that he was about to roll up into a ball and withdraw himself."

"Harshaw stopped long enough to remind himself that this baby innocent was neither babyish nor innocent — was in fact sophisticated in a culture which he was beginning to realize, however dimly, was far in advance of human culture in some very mysterious ways… and that these naive remarks came from a superman — or what would do in place of a "superman" for the time being."

"The Universe was a damned silly place at best… but the least likely explanation for its existence was the no-explanation of random chance, the conceit that some abstract somethings "just happened" to be some atoms that "just happened" to get together in configurations which "just happened" to look like consistent laws and then some of these configurations "just happened" to possess self-awareness and that two such "just happened" to be the Man from Mars and the other a bald-headed old coot with Jubal himself inside. No, Jubal would not buy the "just happened" theory, popular as it was with men who called themselves scientists. Random chance was not a sufficient explanation of the Universe — in fact, random chance was not sufficient to explain random chance; the pot could not hold itself."

""You told me, 'God made the World.'" "No, no!" Harshaw said hastily. "I told you that, while all these many religions said many things, most of them said, 'God made the World.' I told you that I did not grok the fullness, but that 'God' was the word that was used." "Yes, Jubal," Mike agreed. "Word is 'God'" He added. "You grok." "No, I must admit I don't grok." "You grok," Smith repeated firmly. "I am explain. I did not have the word. You grok. Anne groks. I grok. The grass under my feet groks in happy beauty. But I needed the word. The word is God." Jubal shook his head to clear it. "Go ahead." Mike pointed triumphantly at Jubal. "Thou art God!" Jubal slapped a hand to his face. "Oh, Jesus H. — What have I done? Look, Mike, take it easy! Simmer down! You didn't understand me. I'm sorry. I'm very sorry! Just forget what I've been saying and we'll start over again on another day. But — " "Thou art God," Mike repeated serenely. "That which groks. Anne is God. I am God. The happy grass are God, Jill groks in beauty always. Jill is God. All shaping and making and creating together — ." He croaked something in Martian and smiled."

"Short human words were never like a short Martian word — such as "grok" which forever meant exactly the same thing. Short human words were like trying to lift water with a knife. And this had been a very short word. Smith still felt that he had grokked rightly the human word "God" — the confusion had come from his own failure in selecting other human words. The concept was truly so simple, so basic, so necessary that any nestling could have explained it perfectly — in Martian. The problem, then, was to find human words that would let him speak rightly, make sure that he patterned them rightly to match in fullness how it would be said in his own people's language. He puzzled briefly over the curious fact that there should be any difficulty in saying it, even in English, since it was a thing everyone knew else they could not grok alive."

"It would be a waste of breath to tell a man who believes in guns that you've got something better."

"Language itself shapes a man's basic ideas."

""I prefer to read the words of the Prophet in the original." "Proper. Since the Koran cannot be translated — the 'map' changes on translation no matter how carefully one tries. You will understand, then, how difficult I found English. It was not alone that my native language has much simpler inflections and more limited tenses; the whole 'map' changed. English is the largest of the human tongues, with several times the vocabulary of the second largest language — this alone made it inevitable that English would eventually become, as it did, the lingua franca of this planet, for it is thereby the richest and the most flexible — despite its barbaric accretions ... or, I should say, because of its barbaric accretions. English swallows up anything that comes its way, makes English out of it. Nobody tried to stop this process, the way some languages are policed and have official limits ... probably because there never has been, truly, such a thing as 'the King's English' — for 'the King's English' was French. English was in truth a bastard tongue and nobody cared how it grew — and it did! ? enormously, until no one could hope to be an educated man unless he did his best to embrace this monster."

"Grok" means "to drink."

"He was not in a hurry, "hurry" being one human concept he had failed to grok at all. He was sensitively aware of the key importance of correct timing in all acts — but with the Martian approach: correct timing was accomplished by waiting. He had noticed, of course, that his human brothers lacked his own fine discrimination of time and often were forced to wait a little faster than a Martian would — but he did not hold their innocent awkwardness against them; he simply learned to wait faster himself to cover their lack."

"Religion is a solace to many and it is even conceivable that some religion, somewhere, is Ultimate Truth. But being religious is often a form of conceit. The faith in which I was brought up assured me that I was better than other people; I was 'saved,' they were 'damned' — we were in a state of grace and the rest were 'heathens.' By 'heathen' they meant such as our brother Mahmoud. Ignorant louts who seldom bathed and planted corn by the Moon claimed to know the final answers of the Universe. That entitled them to look down on outsiders. Our hymns was loaded with arrogance — self-congratulation on how cozy we were with the Almighty and what a high opinion he had of us, and what hell everybody else would catch come Judgment Day."

"Religion is a solace to many people and it is even conceivable that some religion, somewhere, really is Ultimate Truth. But in many cases, being religious is merely a form of conceit. The Bible Belt faith in which I was brought up encouraged me to think that I was better than the rest of the world; I was 'saved' and they were 'damned' — we were in a state of grace and the rest of the world were 'heathens' and by 'heathen' they meant such people as our brother Mahmoud. It meant that an ignorant, stupid lout who seldom bathed and planted his corn by the phase of the Moon could claim to know the final answers of the Universe. That entitled him to look down his nose at everybody else. Our hymn book was loaded with such arrogance — mindless, conceited, self-congratulation on how cozy we were with the Almighty and what a high opinion he had of us and us alone, and what hell everybody else was going to catch come Judgment Day."

"At this point the being sprung from human genes shaped by Martian thought, and who could never be either one, completed one stage of his growth, burst out and ceased to be a nestling. The solitary loneliness of predestined free will was then his and with it the Martian serenity to embrace it, cherish it, savour its bitterness, and accept its consequences. With tragic joy he knew that this cusp was his, not Jill's. His water brother could teach, admonish, guide — but choice at a cusp was not shared. Here was "ownership" beyond any possible sale, gift, hypothecation; owner and owned grokked fully, inseparable — He eternally was the action he had taken at cusp. Now that he knew himself to be self he was free to grok ever closer to his brothers, merge without let. Self's integrity was and is and ever had been. Mike stopped to cherish all his brother selves, the many threes-fulfilled on Mars, both corporate and discorporate, the precious few on Earth — the as-yet-unknown powers of three on Earth that would be his to merge with and cherish now that at last long waiting he grokked and cherished himself."

"The Universe has variety, something for everybody — a fact you field workers often miss."

"There are times when we human females appreciate at least a semblance of jealousy — but I don't think there is the slightest chance that you will ever grok 'jealousy.'"

"I grok people. I am people… so now I can say it in people talk. I've found out why people laugh. They laugh because it hurts so much… because it's the only thing that'll make it stop hurting."

"I had thought — I had been told — that a 'funny' thing is a thing of a goodness. It isn't. Not ever is it funny to the person it happens to. Like that sheriff without his pants. The goodness is in the laughing itself. I grok it is a bravery … and a sharing … against pain and sorrow and defeat."

"Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist — a master — and that is what Auguste Rodin was — can look at an old woman, portray her exactly as she is… and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be…. and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply prisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart…. no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn't matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired — but it does to them. Look at her!"

""A poor portrayal is about as effective as a good one for most people. They don't see the defects; they see a symbol which inspires their deepest emotions; it recalls to them the Agony and Sacrifice of God." "Jubal, I thought you weren't a Christian?" "Does that make me blind to human emotion? I was saying that the crummiest painted plaster crucifix can evoke emotions in the human heart so strong that many have died for them. The artistry with which such a symbol is wrought is irrelevant."

"Now here we have another emotional symbol — wrought with exquisite craftsmanship, but we won't go into that, yet. Ben, for almost three thousand years or longer, architects have designed buildings with columns shaped as female figures — it got to be such a habit that they did it as casually as a small boy steps on an ant. After all those centuries it took Rodin to see that this was work too heavy for a girl. But he didn't simply say, 'Look, you jerks, if you must design this way, make it a brawny male figure.' No, he showed it… and generalized the symbol. Here is this poor little caryatid who has tried — and failed, fallen under the load. She's a good girl — look at her face. Serious, unhappy at her failure, but not blaming anyone else, not even the gods… and still trying to shoulder her load, after she's crumpled under it. But she's more than good art denouncing some very bad art; she's a symbol for every woman who has ever tried to shoulder a load that was too heavy for her — over half the female population of this planet, living and dead, I would guess. But not alone women — this symbol is sexless. It means every man and every woman who ever lived who sweated out life in uncomplaining fortitude, whose courage wasn't even noticed until they crumpled under their loads. It's courage, Ben, and victory."

"Victory in defeat, there is none higher. She didn't give up, Ben; she's still trying to lift that stone after it has crushed her. She's a father going down to a dull office job while cancer is painfully eating away his insides, so as to bring home one more pay check for the kids. She's a twelve-year-old girl trying to mother her baby brothers and sisters because Mama had to go to Heaven. She's a switchboard operator sticking to her job while smoke is choking her and the fire is cutting off her escape. She's all the unsung heroes who couldn't quite cut it but never quit."

"Jubal, why isn't there stuff like this around where a person can see it?" "Because the world has gone nutty and contemporary art always paints the spirit of its times. Rodin died about the time the world started flipping its lid. His successors noted the amazing things he had done with light and shadow and mass and composition and they copied that part. What they failed to see was that the master told stories that laid bare the human heart. They became contemptuous of painting or sculpture that told a stories — they dubbed such work 'literary.' They went all out for abstractions. Jubal shrugged. "Abstract design is all right — for wall paper or linoleum. But art is the process of evoking pity and terror. What modern artists do is pseudo-intellectual masturbation. Creative art is intercourse, in which the artist renders emotional his audience. These laddies who won't deign to do that — or can't — lost the public."

"Mmm, one does have to learn to look at art. But it's up to the artist to use the language that can be understood. Most of these jokers don't want to use the language you and I can learn; they would rather sneer because we 'fail' to see what they're driving at. If anything. Obscurity is the refuge of the incompetent."

"Patricia Paiwonski gave Ben Caxton the all-out kiss of brotherhood before he knew what hit him."

"Patricia's nature was an endless wish to make other people as happy as she was."

"His idea is that whenever you encounter any other grokking thing — he didn't say 'grokking' at this stage — any other living thing, man, woman, or stray cat… you are simply encountering your 'other end'… and the universe is just a little thing we whipped up among us the other night for our entertainment and then agreed to forget the gag. He put it in a much more sugar-coated fashion, being extremely careful not to tread on competitors' toes."

"We're not trying to bring people to God; that's a contradiction in terms, you can't even say it in Martian. We're not trying to save souls, because souls can't be lost. We're not trying to get people to have faith, because what we offer is not faith but truth — truth they can check; we don't urge them to believe it. Truth for practical purposes, for here-and-now, truth as matter of fact as an ironing board and as useful as a loaf of bread… so practical that it can make war and hunger and violence and hate as unnecessary as…. as — well, as clothes here in the Nest. But they have to learn Martian first. That's the only hitch — finding people who are honest enough to believe what they see, and then are willing to do the hard work — it is hard work — of learning the language it can be taught in. A composer couldn't possibly write down a symphony in English… and this sort of symphony can't be stated in English any more than Beethoven's Fifth can be."

"A prude is a person who thinks that his own rules of propriety are natural laws. You are almost entirely free of this prevalent evil."

"Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own."

"Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy — in fact, they are almost incompatible; one emotion hardly leaves room for the other."

"This poor ersatz Martian is saying that sex is a way to be happy. Sex should be a means of happiness. Ben, the worst thing about sex is that we use it to hurt each other. It ought never to hurt; it should bring happiness, or at least pleasure. "The code says, 'Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife.' The result? Reluctant chastity, bitterness, blows and sometimes murder, broken homes and twisted children — and furtive little passes degrading to woman and man. Is this Commandment ever obeyed? If a man swore on his own Bible that he refrained from coveting his neighbor's wife because the code forbade it, I would suspect either self-deception or subnormal sexuality. Any man virile enough to sire a child has coveted many women, whether he acts or not. "Now comes Mike and says: 'There is no need to covet my wife... love her! There's no limit to her love, we have everything to gain — and nothing to lose but fear and guilt and hatred and jealousy.' The proposition is incredible. So far as I recall only pre-civilization Eskimos were this naive — and they were so isolated that they were almost 'Men from Mars' themselves. But we gave them our 'virtues' and now they have chastity and adultery just like the rest of us."

"Eskimos were invariably described as the happiest people on Earth. Any unhappiness they suffered was not through jealousy; they didn't have a word for it. They borrowed spouses for convenience and fun — it did not make them unhappy. So who's looney? Look at this glum world around you, then tell me: Did Mike's disciples seem happier, or unhappier, than other people?" "I didn't talk to them all, Jubal. But — yes, they're happy. So happy they seem slap-happy. There's a catch in it somewhere." "Maybe you were the catch."

"You claim to love Jill... yet you won't give her the fair shake you give a crooked politician. Not a tenth the effort she made to help you when you were in trouble. Where would you be if she had made so feeble a try? Rotting in Hell, most likely. You're bitching about friendly fornication — do you know what I'm worried about?" "What?" "Christ was crucified for preaching without a police permit. Sweat over that, instead!"

"Mike is like the first man to discover fire. Fire was there all along — after he showed them how, anybody could use it… anybody with sense enough not to get burned with it."

"Mike is our Prometheus — but that's all. Mike keeps emphazing this. Thou art God, I am God, he is God — all that groks. Mike is a man like the rest of us. A superior man admittedly — a lesser man taught the things the Martians know, might have set himself up as a pipsqueak god. Mike is above that temptation. Prometheus… but that is all."

"The ability to grok more of the universe than that piece you happen to be standing on at the moment. Mike has it from years of Martian discipline."

"My failures are so much more numerous than my successes that I am beginning to wonder if full grokking will show that I am on the wrong track entirely — that this race must be split up, hating each other, fighting each other, constantly unhappy and at war even with their own individual selves… simply to have that weeding out that every race must have."

"If one tenth of one percent of the population is capable of getting the news, then all you have to do is show them — and in a matter of some generations all the stupid ones will die out and those with your discipline will inherit the Earth. Whenever that is — a thousand years from now, or ten thousand — will be plenty soon enough to worry about whether some new hurdle is necessary to make them jump higher. But don't go getting faint-hearted because only a handful have turned into angels overnight. Personally, I never expected any of them to manage it."

"Man, as a social animal, can no more escape government than the individual can escape bondage to his bowels."

"Each sunrise is a precious jewel…for it may never be followed by its sunset."

"Is there more than one Berquist?" "Maybe not; he is something of a bastard."

"I do know that the slickest way to lie is to tell the right amount of truth at the right time — and then shut up."

"A desire not to butt into other people's business is at least eighty percent of all human 'wisdom'...and the other twenty percent isn't very important."

"Who said I was wise? I'm a professional bad example. You can learn a lot by watching me. Or listening to me. Either one."

"Kiss girls all you want to — it beats the hell out of card games."

""Audacity, always audacity" — soundest principle of strategy. In practicing medicine I learned that when you are most at loss is the time when you must appear confident. In law I had learned that, when your case seems hopeless, you must impress the jury with your relaxed certainty."

"I mean it. A confidence man knows he's lying; that limits his scope. But a successful shaman believes what he says — and belief is contagious; there is no limit to his scope. But I lacked the necessary confidence in my own infallibility; I could never become a prophet ... just a critic — a sort of fourth-rate prophet with delusions of gender."

"Thou art God. May you always drink deep May you never be thirsty."

"With water of life we grow closer."

"Our nest is yours."

"I give you the water of life."

"May you always drink deep."

"We grow ever closer."

"Share water. Never thirst."

"Grok in fullness."

"Nest. Water. Life."

"Waiting always fills."

"Secrecy begets tyranny."

"Aquafraternally yours,"

"The essence of the discipline is, first, self-awareness, then, self control."

"He had long ago made a pact with himself to postulate a Created Universe on even-numbered days, a tail-swallowing eternal-and-uncreated Universe on odd-numbered days — since each hypothesis, while equally paradoxical, neatly avoided the paradoxes of the other — with, of course, a day off each leap year for sheer solipsist debauchery. (UC)"

"Self awareness is not just a bunch of amino acids bumping together."

"There is no safety this side of the grave."

"God forgives necessity."

"The size of mammary glands is only a concern for infants. (and, I could add, for men or women who are temporarily or inappropriately thinking or acting like infants.)"

"The golden sunshine of Italy congealed into tears. Here's to the alcoholic brotherhood... much more suited to the frail human soul, if any, than any other sort."

"Most moral philosophers consciously or unconsciously assume the essential correctness of our cultural sexual code — family, monogamy, continence, the postulate of privacy, ... restriction of intercourse to the marriage bed, etcetera. Having stipulated our cultural code as a whole, they fiddle with details - even such piffle as solemnly discussing whether or not the female breast is an "obscene" sight! But mostly they debate how the human animal can be induced or forced to obey this code, blandly ignoring the high probability that the heartaches and tragedies they see all around them originate in the code itself rather than the failure to abide by the code."

"...You know how Fair Witnesses behave." "Well . . . no, I don't. I've never had any dealings with Fair Witnesses." "So? Perhaps you weren't aware of it. Anne!" Anne was seated on the springboard; she turned her head. Jubal called out, "That new house on the far hilltop - can you see what color they've painted it?" Anne looked in the direction in which Jubal was pointing and answered, "It's white on this side." She did not inquire why Jubal had asked, nor make any comment. Jubal went on to Jill in normal tones. "You see? Anne is so thoroughly indoctrinated that it doesn't even occur to her to infer that the other side is probably white too. All the King's horses and all the King's men couldn't force her to commit herself as to the far side . . . unless she herself went around to the other side and looked - and even then she wouldn't assume that it stayed whatever color it might be after she left . . . because they might repaint it as soon as she turned her back. "Anne is a Fair Witness?" "Graduate, unlimited license, and admitted to testify before the High Court. ..."

"Live each golden moment as if it were eternity — without fear, without hope, but with a sybaritic gusto."

"A Cabellesque satire on religion and sex."

"SISL was never censored by anyone in any fashion. The first draft was nearly twice as long as the published version. I cut it myself to bring it down to a commercial length. But I did not leave out anything of any importance; I simply trimmed all possible excess verbiage. Perhaps you have noticed that it reads 'fast' despite its length; that is why. … The original, longest version of SISL … is really not worth your trouble, as it is the same story throughout — simply not as well told. With it is the brushpenned version which shows exactly what was cut out — nothing worth reading, that is. I learned to write for pulp magazines, in which one was paid by the yard rather than by the package; it was not until I started writing for the Saturday Evening Post that I learned the virtue of brevity."

"Jubal... is a devout and fierce individualist in a world filled with cults and bureaucracies, and by novel’s end it is he, not Jill nor Mike, that is still a stranger, still tilting against the windmills. He honestly believes in his own free will, which Mike, Jill, and the Fosterites misinterpret as a pandeistic urge, ‘Thou art God!’ Mike, by contrast, readily abandons his Martian beliefs for human ones, even as he claims to merely find a congress between them."

"The opinions expressed in this book are not those of the author."

"He had lost his race. And he knew that he had lost it, not by the few weeks or months that he had feared, but by millennia. The huge and silent shadows driving across the stars, more miles above his head than he dared to guess, were as far beyond his little "Columbus" as it surpassed the log canoes of paleolithic man. [...] All that the past ages had achieved was as nothing now: only one thought echoed and re-echoed through Reinhold's brain: The human race was no longer alone."

"When this book was written in the early 1950s, I was still quite impressed by the evidence for what is generally called the paranormal, and used it as a main theme of the story. Four decades later, after spending some millions of dollars of Yorkshire Television’s money researching my Mysterious World and Strange Powers programmes, I am an almost total skeptic. I have seen far too many claims dissolve into thin air, far too many demonstrations exposed as fakes."

"Science can destroy religion by ignoring it as well as by disproving its tenets."

"If you want a single proof of the essential—how shall I put it—benevolence of the Overlords, think of that cruelty-to-animals order which they made within a month of their arrival. If I had had any doubts about Karellen before, that banished them!"

"Evil men could be destroyed, but nothing could be done with good men who were deluded."

"It was a tribute to the Overlords' psychology, and to their careful years of preparation, that only a few people fainted. Yet there could have been fewer still, anywhere in the world, who did not feel the ancient terror brush for one awful instant against their minds before reason banished it forever. There was no mistake. The leathery wings, the little horns, the barbed tail—all were there. The most terrible of all legends had come to life, out of the unknown past. Yet now it stood smiling, in ebon majesty, with the sunlight gleaming upon its tremendous body, and with a human child resting trustfully on either arm."

"Fifty years is ample time to change the world and it's people almost beyond recognition. All that I'd required for the task are a sound knowledge of social engineering, a clear sight of the intended goal- and power"

"All political problems," Karellen had once told Stormgren, "can be solved by the correct application of power"

"Crime had practically vanished. It had become unnecessary and impossible. When no one lacks anything there is no point in stealing."

"Western man had relearned-what the rest of the world had never forgotten-that there was nothing sinful in leisure as long as it did not degenerate into mere sloth."

"The instrument he handed over on permanent loan to the World History Foundation was nothing more than a television receiver with an elaborate set of controls for determining co-ordinates in time and space. [...] One had merely to adjust the controls, and a window into the past was opened up. Almost the whole of human history for the past five thousand years became accessible in an instant. [...] Within a few days, all mankind's multitudinous messiahs had lost their divinity. Beneath the fierce passionless light of truth, faiths that had sustained millions for twice a thousand years vanished like morning dew. All the good and all the evil they had wrought were swept suddenly into the past, and could touch the minds of men no more. Humanity had lost its ancient gods: now it was old enough to have no need for new ones."

"The evidence is confused with mysticism—perhaps the prime aberration of the human mind."

"A well-stocked mind is safe from boredom."

"What finally decided him was the thought that, if he neglected this incredible opportunity, he would never forgive himself. All the rest of his life would be spent in vain regrets—and nothing could be worse than that."

"It had been the Golden Age. But gold was also the color of sunset, of autumn."

"The group of artists and scientists that had so far done least was the one that had attracted the greatest interest --and the greatest alarm. There was the team working on "total identification." The history of the cinema gave the clue to their actions. First sound, then color, then stereoscopy, then cinerama, had made the old "moving pictures" more and more like reality itself. Where was the end of the story? Surely, the final stage would be reached when the audience forgot it was an audience and became part of the action. to achieve this would involve stimulation of all the senses, and perhaps hypnosis as well but many believed it to be practical. When the goal was attained, there would be an enormous enrichment of human experience. A man could become --for a while, at least-- any other person, and could take part in any conceivable adventure, real or imaginary. He could even be a plant or an animal, if it proved possible to capture and record the sense impressions of other living creatures. And when the "program" was over, he would have acquired a memory as vivid as any experience in his actual life --indeed, indistinguishable from reality itself."

"“I've invented a new definition for TV,” he muttered gloomily. “I've decided it’s a device for hindering communication between artist and audience.”"

"Few artists thrive in solitude, and nothing is more stimulating than the conflict of minds with similar interests."

"Far, far away on the horizon was something that was not of Earth—a line of misty columns, tapering slightly as they soared out of the sea and lost themselves among the clouds. They were spaced with perfect precision along the rim of the planet—too huge to be artificial, yet too regular to be natural. ("Sideneus 4 and the Pillars of the Dawn," said Rashaverak, and there was awe in his voice. "He has reached the center of the Universe." "And he has barely begun his journey," answered Karellen.)"

"A century ago we came to your world and saved you from self-destruction. I do not believe that anyone would deny that fact—but what that self-destruction was, you never guessed."

"Across that abyss, there is only one bridge. Few races, unaided, have ever found it. Some have turned back while there was still time, avoiding both the danger and the achievement. Their worlds have become Elysian islands of effortless content, playing no further part in the story of the universe. That would never have been your fate—or your fortune. Your race was too vital for that. It would have plunged into ruin and taken others with it, for you would never have found the bridge."

"Your mystics, though they were lost in their own delusions, had seen part of the truth. There are powers of the mind, and powers beyond the mind, which your science could never have brought within its framework without shattering it entirely. [...] During the first half of the twentieth century, a few of your scientists began to investigate these matters. They did not know it, but they were tampering with the lock of Pandora's box. The forces they might have unleashed transcended any perils that the atom could have brought. For the physicists could only have ruined the Earth: the paraphysicists could have spread havoc to the stars."

"All these potentialities, all these latent powers—we do not possess them, nor do we understand them. Our intellects are far more powerful than yours, but there is something in your minds that has always eluded us."

"We believe—it is only a theory—that the Overmind is trying to grow, to extend its powers and its awareness of the universe. By now it must be the sum of many races, and long ago it left the tyranny of matter behind. It is conscious of intelligence, everywhere. When it knew that you were almost ready, it sent us here to do its bidding, to prepare you for the transformation that is now at hand."

"It starts with a single individual—always a child—and then spreads explosively, like the formation of crystals round the first nucleus in a saturated solution. Adults will not be affected, for their minds are already set in an unalterable mould."

"What you have brought into the world may be utterly alien, it may share none of your desires or hopes, it may look upon your greatest achievements as childish toys—yet it is something wonderful, and you will have created it. When our race is forgotten, part of yours will still exist. Do not, therefore, condemn us for what we were compelled to do. And remember this—we shall always envy you."

"...no one of intelligence resents the inevitable."

"The buildings round me, the ground, the mountains—everything’s like a glass—I can see through it. [...] The light! From beneath me—inside the Earth—shining upward, through the rocks, the ground, everything—growing brighter, brighter, blinding—"

"There was nothing left of Earth: They had leeched away the last atoms of its substance. It had nourished them, through the fierce moments of their inconceivable metamorphosis, as the food stored in a grain of wheat feeds the infant plant while it climbs towards the Sun. Six thousand million kilometers beyond the orbit of Pluto, Karellen sat before a suddenly darkened screen. [...] The weight of centuries was upon him, and a sadness that no logic could dispel."

"Come on, you apes! You wanta live forever?"

"I always get the shakes before a drop. I've had the injections, of course, and hypnotic preparation, and it stands to reason that I can't really be afraid. The ship's psychiatrist has checked my brain waves and asked me silly questions while I was asleep and he tells me that it isn't fear, it isn't anything important — it's just like the trembling of an eager race horse in the starting gate. I couldn't say about that; I've never been a race horse. But the fact is: I'm scared silly, every time."

"Rasczak's Roughnecks have got a reputation to uphold. The Lieutenant told me before he bought it to tell you that he will always have his eye on you every minute... and that he expects your names to shine!"

"My mother said violence never solves anything." "So?" Mr. Dubois looked at her bleakly. "I'm sure the city fathers of Carthage would be glad to know that."

"… I was not making fun of you personally; I was heaping scorn on an inexcusably silly idea — a practice I shall always follow. Anyone who clings to the historically untrue and thoroughly immoral doctrine that violence never settles anything I would advise to conjure up the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk, and the Passenger Pigeon. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and their freedoms." He sighed. "Another year, another class — and for me another failure. One can lead a child to knowledge but one cannot make him think." Suddenly he pointed his stump at me. "You. What is the moral difference, if any, between the citizen and the civilian?" "The difference, I said carefully, "lies in the field of civic virtue. A citizen accepts personal responsibility for the safety of the body politic of which he is a member, defending it, if need be, with his life. The civilian does not." "The exact words of the book," he said scornfully. "But do you understand it? Do you believe it?"

"But if you want to serve and I can't talk you out of it, then we have to take you, because that's your constitutional right. It says that everybody, male or female, should have his born right to pay his service and assume full citizenship — but the facts are that we are getting hard pushed to find things for all the volunteers to do that aren't just glorified KP. You can't all be real military men; we don't need that many and most of the volunteers aren't number-one soldier material anyhow...[W]e've had to think up a whole list of dirty, nasty, dangerous jobs that will ... at the very least make them remember for the rest of their lives that their citizenship is valuable to them because they've paid a high price for it ... A term of service is ... either real military service, rough and dangerous even in peacetime ... or a most unreasonable facsimile thereof."

"Don't you know about SGT's? ... They don't have mothers. Just ask any trained private." He blew smoke towards us. "They reproduce by fission ... like all bacteria."

"I made a very important discovery at Camp Currie. Happiness consists in getting enough sleep. Just that, nothing more. All the wealthy, unhappy people you've ever met take sleeping pills; Mobile Infantrymen don't need them. Give a cap trooper a bunk and time to sack out in it, and he's as happy as a worm in an apple—asleep."

"There are no dangerous weapons; there are only dangerous men."

"If you wanted to teach a baby a lesson, would you cut its head off? Of course not. You'd paddle it. There can be circumstances when it's just as foolish to hit an enemy city with an H-bomb as it would be to spank a baby with an axe. War is not violence and killing, pure and simple; war is controlled violence, for a purpose. The purpose of war is to support your government's decisions by force. The purpose is never to kill the enemy just to be killing him...but to make him do what you want him to do. Not killing...but controlled and purposeful violence. But it's not your business or mine to decide the purpose of the control. It's never a soldier's business to decide when or where or how—or why—he fights; that belongs to the statesmen and the generals. The statesmen decide why and how much; the generals take it from there and tell us where and when and how. We supply the violence; other people—'older and wiser heads,' as they say—supply the control. Which is as it should be."

"The most noble fate a man can endure is to place his own mortal body between his loved home and the war's desolation."

"Value" has no meaning other than in relationship to living beings. The value of a thing is always relative to a particular person, is completely personal and different in quantity for each living human — "market value" is a fiction, merely a rough guess at the average of personal values, all of which must be quantitatively different or trade would be impossible. … This very personal relationship, "value", has two factors for a human being: first, what he can do with a thing, its use to him… and second, what he must do to get it, its cost to him. There is an old song which asserts that "the best things in life are free". Not true! Utterly false! This was the tragic fallacy which brought on the decadence and collapse of the democracies of the twentieth century; those noble experiments failed because the people had been led to believe that they could simply vote for whatever they wanted… and get it, without toil, without sweat, without tears. … I fancy that the poet who wrote that song meant to imply that the best things in life must be purchased other than with money — which is true — just as the literal meaning of his words is false. The best things in life are beyond money; their price is agony and sweat and devotion . . . and the price demanded for the most precious of all things in life is life itself — ultimate cost for perfect value."

"You! I've just awarded you the prize for the hundred-meter dash. Does it make you happy? […] No dodging, please. You have the prize — here, I'll write it out: 'Grand prize for the championship, one hundred-meter sprint.'" He had actually come back to my seat and pinned it on my chest. "There! Are you happy? You value it — or don't you?" Mr. Dubois had looked surprised. "It doesn't make you happy?" "You know darn well I placed fourth!" "Exactly! The prize for first place is worthless to you . . . because you haven't earned it. But you enjoy a modest satisfaction in placing fourth; you earned it."

"That old saw about "to understand all is to forgive all" is a lot of tripe. Some things, the more you understand the more you loathe them."

"Ah yes, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness]... Life? What 'right' to life has a man who is drowning in the Pacific? The ocean will not hearken to his cries. What 'right' to life has a man who must die to save his children? If he chooses to save his own life, does he do so as a matter of 'right'? If two men are starving and cannibalism is the only alternative to death, which man's right is 'unalienable'? And is it 'right'? As to liberty, the heroes who signed the great document pledged themselves to buy liberty with their lives. Liberty is never unalienable; it must be redeemed regularly with the blood of patriots or it always vanishes. Of all the so-called natural human rights that have ever been invented, liberty is least likely to be cheap and is never free of cost. The third 'right'?—the 'pursuit of happiness'? It is indeed unalienable but it is not a right; it is simply a universal condition which tyrants cannot take away nor patriots restore. Cast me into a dungeon, burn me at the stake, crown me king of kings, I can 'pursue happiness' as long as my brain lives—but neither gods nor saints, wise men nor subtle drugs, can ensure that I will catch it."

"I told you that 'juvenile delinquent' is a contradiction in terms. 'Delinquent' means 'failing in duty.' But duty is an adult virtue—indeed a juvenile becomes an adult when, and only when, he acquires a knowledge of duty and embraces it as dearer than the self-love he was born with. There never was, there cannot be a 'juvenile delinquent.' But for every juvenile criminal there are always one or more adult delinquents—people of mature years who either do not know their duty, or who, knowing it, fail."

"I do not understand objections to 'cruel and unusual' punishment. While a judge should be benevolent in purpose; his awards should cause the criminal to suffer, else there is no punishment - and pain is the basic mechanism built into us by millions of years of evolution which safeguards us by warning when something threatens our survival. Why should society refuse to use such a highly perfected survival mechanism?""

"There are a dozen different ways of delivering destruction in impersonal wholesale, via ships or missiles of one sort or another, catastrophes so widespread, so unselective that the war is over because that nation or planet has ceased to exist. What we do is entirely different. We make war as personal as a punch in the nose. We can be selective, applying precisely the required amount of pressure at the specified point at a designated time. We've never been told to go down and kill or capture all left-handed redheads in a particular area, but if they tell us to, we can. We will. We are the boys who will go to a particular place, at H-hour, occupy a designated terrain, stand on it, dig the enemy out of their holes, force them then and there to surrender or die. We're the bloody infantry, the doughboy, the duckfoot, the foot soldier who goes where the enemy is and takes them on in person. We've been doing it, with changes in weapons but very little change in our trade, at least since the time five thousand years ago when the foot sloggers of Sargon the Great forced the Sumerians to cry "Uncle!""

"The historians can't seem to settle whether to call this one "The Third Space War" (or the "Fourth"), or whether "The First Interstellar War" fits it better. We just call it "The Bug War" if we call it anything, which we usually don't and in any case the historians date the beginning of "war" after the time I joined my first outfit and ship. Everything up to then and still later were "incidents," "patrols," or "police actions." However, you are just as dead if you buy the farm in an "incident" as you are if you buy it in a declared war.""

"Operation Bughouse should have been called "Operation Madhouse." Everything went wrong. It had been planned as an all-out move to bring the enemy to their knees, occupy their capital and the key points of their home planet, and end the war. Instead it damn near lost the war. I am not criticizing General Diennes. I don't know whether it's true that he demanded more troops and more support and allowed himself to be overruled by the Sky Marshal-in-Chief—or not. Nor was it any of my business. Furthermore I doubt if some of the smart second-guessers know all the facts. What I do know is that the General dropped with us and commanded us on the ground and, when the situation became impossible, he personally led the diversionary attack that allowed quite a few of us (including me) to be retrieved—and, in so doing, bought his farm. He's radioactive debris on Klendathu and it's much too late to court-martial him, so why talk about it?"

"There was no god but the Lieutenant and SGT Jelal was his prophet."

""Peace" is a condition in which no civilian pays any attention to military casualties which do not achieve page-one, lead-story prominence-unless that civilian is a close relative of one of the casualties. But, if there ever was a time in history when "peace" meant that there was no fighting going on, I have been unable to find out about it."

"Service men are not brighter than civilians. In many cases civilians are much more intelligent. That was the sliver of justification underlying the attempted coup d' etat just before the Treaty of New Delhi, the so-called 'Revolt of the Scientists': let the intelligent elite run things and you'll have utopia. It fell flat on its foolish face of course. Because the pursuit of science, despite its social benefits, is itself not a social virtue; its practitioners can be men so self-centered as to be lacking in social responsibility."

"I have never been able to see how a thirty-year-old moron can vote more wisely than a fifteen-year-old genius . . . but that was the age of the "divine right of the common man." Never mind, they paid for their folly."

"To vote is to wield authority; it is the supreme authority from which all other authority derives—such as mine to make your lives miserable once a day. Force if you will!—the franchise is force, naked and raw, the Power of the Rods and the Ax. Whether it is exerted by ten men or by ten billion, political authority is force."

"To permit irresponsible authority is to sow disaster; to hold a man responsible for anything he does not control is to behave with blind idiocy. The unlimited democracies were unstable because their citizens were not responsible for the fashion in which they exerted their sovereign authority . . . other than through the tragic logic of history. The unique 'poll tax' that we must pay was unheard of. No attempt was made to determine whether a voter was socially responsible to the extent of his literally unlimited authority. If he voted the impossible, the disastrous possible happened instead—and responsibility was then forced on him willy-nilly and destroyed both him and his foundationless temple."

"Without debating the usefulness or morality of planned parenthood, it may be verified by observation that any breed which stops its own increase gets crowded out by breeds which expand."

"Man is what he is, a wild animal with the will to survive, and (so far) the ability, against all competition. Unless one accepts that, anything one says about morals, war, politics—you name it—is nonsense. Correct morals arise from knowing what man is—not what do-gooders and well-meaning old Aunt Nellies would like him to be. The universe will let us know—later—whether or not Man has any "right" to expand through it. In the meantime the M.I. will be in there, on the bounce and swinging, on the side of our own race."

"Bugs, Mr. Rico. Zillions of em!"

"One last thing. I had a letter from Captain Jelal just before we left. He says that his new legs work fine. But he also told me to tell you that he's got you in mind... And that he expects your names to shine!"

"To the everlasting glory of the Infantry—"

"With national governments in collapse at the end of the XXth century, something had to fill the vacuum, and in many cases it was the returned veterans. They had lost a war, most of them had no jobs, many were sore as could be over the terms of the Treaty of New Delhi, especially the P.O.W. foul-up — and they knew how to fight. But it wasn't revolution; it was more like what happened in Russia in 1917 — the system collapsed; somebody else moved in. The first known case, in Aberdeen, Scotland, was typical. Some veterans got together as vigilantes to stop rioting and looting, hanged a few people (including two veterans) and decided not to let anyone but veterans on their committee. Just arbitrary at first — they trusted each other a bit, they didn't trust anyone else. What started as an emergency measure became constitutional practice in a generation or two. (Pg. 179)"

"In a mixed ship, the last thing a trooper hears before a drop (maybe the last word he ever hears) is a woman's voice, wishing him luck. If you don't think this is important, you've probably resigned from the human race."

"If it has to be done, a man — a real man — shoots his own dog himself; he doesn't hire a proxy who may bungle it."

"Morals — all correct moral laws — derive from the instinct to survive. Moral behavior is survival behavior above the individual level."

"The basis of all morality is duty."

"When you come right to it, it is easier to die than it is to use your head."

"Basic truths cannot change and once a man of insight expresses one of them it is never necessary, no matter how much the world changes, to reformulate them. This is immutable, true everywhere, throughout all time, for all men and all nations."

"On the cover of the file was stenciled WILDFIRE, and underneath, an ominous note: THIS FILE IS CLASSIFIED TOP SECRET. Examination by unauthorized access is a criminal offense punishable by fines and imprisonment up to 20 years and $20,000. When Leavitt gave him the file, Hall had read the note and whistled. "Don't you believe it," Leavitt said. "Just a scare?" "Scare, hell," Leavitt said. "If the wrong man reads this file, he just disappears.""

"For years it was stated that men had forty-eight chromosomes in their cells; there were pictures to prove it, and any number of careful studies. In 1953, a group of American researchers announced to the world that the human chromosome number was forty-six. Once more, there were pictures to prove it, and studies to confirm it. But these researchers also went back to reexamine the old pictures, and the old studies — and found only forty-six chromosomes, not forty-eight. Leavitt's Rule of 48 said simply, "All Scientists Are Blind.""

"Houston: Scoop, Houston Projection Group has confirmed orbital instability and decay ratios are now being passed by the data trunk to your station. Scoop: How do they look, Houston? Houston: Bad. Scoop: Not understood. Please repeat. Houston: Bad: B as in broken, A as in awful, D as in dropping."

"As Stone was fond of saying, scientific research was much like prospecting: you went out and you hunted, armed with your maps and your instruments, but in the end your preparations did not matter, or even your intuition. You needed your luck, and whatever benefits accrued to the diligent, through sheer, grinding hard work."

"He [Stone] often argued that human intelligence was more trouble than it was worth. It was more destructive than creative, more confusing than revealing, more discouraging than satisfying, more spiteful than charitable."

"The biologist R. A. Janek has said that "increasing vision is increasingly expensive." He meant by this that any machine to enable men to see finer or fainter details increased in cost faster than it increased in resolving power."

"What ARE you two doing? I thought you said something about a nice little slideshow?"

"Machines aren't capable of evil. Humans make them that way."

"All of our history... our art and science... All to meet the needs of that... beast."

"Nothing can beat science!"

"Even a door of this caliber can't keep science at bay!"

"Where have they been keeping her!?"

"Lower thine guard and thou'rt allowing the enemy in."

"Mine name is Glenn! Cyrus' hopes and dreams…and now the Masamune, these will now become my burden! Forthwith I will slay Magus and restore honor!"

"Thou hast lost thy friend before thine eyes; there art no words to comfort thee."

"We have'th our own will!"

"Ma'am, thou'rt mistaken, I'm not a pet, I'm a Knight and master swordsman."

"Thou'rt here to save the Queen?"

"The lair is deep within. Will thee accompany me?"

"My guise doth not incur thy trust..."

"Mayhap a hidden door lurks nigh? Let us search the environs."

"'Tis a feisty crowd! But they are thine kin, and 'tis of consequence."

"Queen Leene awaits. Your Majesty, we too shall take our leave."

"...Long farewells ne'er were nessecary."

"Ayla fight while alive! Win and live. Lose and die. Rule of life. No change rule."

"Old man breathe, but dead on inside!"

"Ayla's word! "La" mean fire. "Vos" mean big."

"No rubbish for Ayla, or head go boom!"

"Yummy frog! For Ayla eat?"

"I... it's that stupid frog! Kissed any princesses lately?!"

"Ah...! The Masamune!!! I bet you're just dying to use it! The black wind begins to blow... Okay... give me your best shot... If you're prepared for the void!"

"The black wind howls... One among you will shortly perish..."

"Don't waste your time. Alfador only likes me."

"... go away!"

"What a filthy hovel!"

"I survived the Darkness to defeat you!"

"Idiots... Nothing can live forever."

"Do you wish to fight me?"

"Unimaginable is the power of Lavos. Anyone who dares to oppose... it... meets certain doom."

"I never imagined that we would settle our score in this dusty old era. Come, let us finish this charade!"

"There's a letter here. Shall we burn it?"

"The weak always strive to be weaker..."

"You got whacked 'cuz you're weak."

"Oh, how dreadful. Say, do you hear that? It's the sound of the Reaper..."

"The past is dead. It was all just a dream..."

"We were created only to be harvested. All people... and all living things... It's over for you... Your life ends here!"

"If history is to change, let it change! If the world is to be destroyed, so be it! If my fate is to be destroyed... I must simply laugh!!"

"Crono!! We can't keep sponging off my dad! Go and get a job!!"

"Enough with the false modesty! You have a real gift! I would trade my royal ancestry for your genius in a heartbeat!"

"I didn't "pick up" anything from outside! It's called "common sense!""

"It was awful. I can't recall it all... I was somewhere cold, dark, and lonely. Is that what it's like to... die?"

"Like we're in another world."

"You cocky boxes of bolts!"

"Good morning, mistress. What is your command?"

"Name? Ah, my serial number. It is R66-Y."

"Something is written in archaic script. I will translate... R...o...i...h...c...l...e...m? Roihclem? System error! I reversed it! It says "Melchior!"."

"The Time Gyro says... What!? 12,000 years in the past?! That was some trip!"

"Systems reactivated. Wh, where am I? Ahh... Chrono, how nice to see you. For you, it was a quick hop, but for me 400 long years have passed. The effort was worth it! The forest has grown back! Now, let us celebrate our 400th year reunion."

"After 400 years of experience, I have come to think that Lavos may not be responsible for the Gates... It is unknown, whose memories these are. It may be something beyond our comprehension. Our journey may come to an end when we finally discover the identity of the Entity. ... shall we turn in for the night?"

"I'll give you my legs! They're lightweight and well balanced. You could mount some treads on me instead."

"I'm sorry but... I cannot afford to lose anything else... Not my precious memories, or my irreplaceable friends... Humans have taught me much. Crono, Marle, Lucca, Frog, and Ayla... I will not betray my friends."

"A.D. 1999! At 1:24! Data confirmed!"

"Lucca, YOU have taught me these emotions. Thank you."

"Caution! Oil has washed over my sight sensors. Sight diminished..."

"You're a marshmallow, Glenn."

"All life begins with Nu and ends with Nu... This is the truth! This is my belief! ...At least for now."

"It all began aeons ago, when man's ancestors picked up a shard of strange red rock. Its power, which was beyond human comprehension, cultivated dreams... in turn, love and hate were born... Only time will see how it all ends."

"This is the eternal kingdom of Zeal, where dreams can come true. But at what price?"

"I'm Doreen. Seek the hidden path, and open the doors of knowledge, each in turn."

"Am I butterfly dreaming I'm a man? Or a bowling ball dreaming I'm a plate of sashimi? Never assume what you see and feel is real!"

"Water summons Wind, Wind makes Fire dance!"

"In our world, every storm has an end. Every night has a new morning. What's important is to trust those you love, and never give up. We must all keep hope alive..."

"Just as you touch the energy of every life form you meet, so, too, will their energy strengthen you. Fail to live up to your potential, and you will never win."

"Male...female.....what's the difference? Power is beautiful, and I've got the power!"

"Dear me...! Crono! how many times have I told you to keep your pets outside!!"

"Congrats on finishing the game. Now get a life!!"

"Stop degrading yourselves! We Enlightened Ones were once the same as you. The only difference is that we are under Lavos' control."

"Behold, my pretties! Destiny, in its most brutal form. All the dreams that might have been. All the happiness and sorrow you might have experienced. Gone forever!!! For you there will be no tomorrow! The Black Omen transcends time and space, waiting for Lavos to awaken! Destiny has led you here. And here you shall rest forever, unless you defeat me, and smash the Omen! Perhaps I can persuade Lavos to share his dreams to you! Did I say dreams? I meant his eternal nightmare!"

"This weapon represents considerable power... Your actions may either save or destroy life. Wield your sword with full knowledge of the consequences!"

"To bring back lost loved ones... It's what everyone wants... Crono must be proud... to have friends like you..."

"🎶They call me Gato/I have metal joints/Beat me up/And earn fifteen silver points!🎶"

"(When exiting a portal that came up in a closet in a imp's house) Did you guys just come out of the closet? Get out of here!"

"HP/MP restored! But you're still hungry."

"Sickness and healing are in every heart. Death and deliverance are in every hand."

"The truth is a beautiful and terrible thing, and therefore should be treated with great caution."

"This is how humans are: We question all our beliefs, except for the ones that we really believe in, and those we never think to question."

"No human being, when you understand his desires, is worthless. No one's life is nothing. Even the most evil of men and women, if you understand their hearts, had some generous act that redeems them, at least a little, from their sins."

"Only one rabbi dared to expect of us such a perfect balance that we could preserve the law and still forgive the deviation. So, of course, we killed him."

"The best parts of my intellectual life are tangential, in areas outside my expertise. I supposed because within my area of expertise, the regulations they have placed upon me make it impossible to know or understand anything."

"I understood that she didn’t want to be liked. As if she were a visitor who expected to go back home any day."

"You are the one human being who is capable of understanding the alien mind, because you are the alien mind; you know what it is to be unhuman because there’s never been any human group that gave you credentials as a bona fide homo sapien."

"Anthropology is never an exact science; the observer never experiences the same culture as the participant."

"His eyes were seductive with understanding."

"Marriage is not a covenant between a man and a woman; even the beasts cleave together and produce their young. Marriage is a covenant between a man and a woman on one side and their community on the other."

"Don’t ever try to teach me about good and evil. I've been there; you’ve seen nothing but the map."

"My, but I miss the days when we never talked to each other for weeks at a time."

"Ignorance and deception can’t save anybody. Knowing saves them."

"It wasn’t a matter of confession, penance, and absolution, like the priests offered. It was something else entirely. Telling the story of who she was, and then realizing that she was no longer the same person. That she had made a mistake, and the mistake had changed her, now she had become someone else, someone less afraid, someone more compassionate."

"I speak to everyone in the language they understand. That isn’t being slick. It’s being clear."

"There’s so much that we don’t understand. And so much more that you don’t understand. We should tell each other more."

"If people only react to the way that others treat them, then nobody is responsible for anything. If your sins are not your own to choose, then how can you repent?"

"It’s the dream of every living creature. The desire that is the very root of life itself: to grow until all the space you can see is part of you, under your control. It’s the desire for greatness. There are two ways, though, to fulfill it. One way is to kill anything that is not yourself, to swallow it up or destroy it, until nothing is left to oppose you. But that way is evil. You say to all the universe, Only I will be great, and to make room for me the rest of you must give up even what you already have, and become nothing."

"I’m not one to despise other people for their sins. I haven’t found one yet, that I didn’t say to myself, I’ve done worse than this."

"Once you know what people really want, you can't hate them anymore. You can fear them, but you can't hate them, because you can always find the same desires in your own heart."

"As long as you keep getting born, it’s okay to die sometimes."

"There are worse reasons to die, than to die because you cannot bear to kill." "What about someone who can’t kill, and can’t die, and can’t live, either?" "Don’t deceive yourself. You’ll do all three someday."

"A question isn't an argument, unless you think you know my answer."

"He loved her, as you can only love someone who is an echo of yourself at your time of deepest sorrow."

"You don’t know how much pain it will cause if all the secrets come out." "Take a look at my family. How can the truth cause any more pain than the secrets have already caused?"

"He was telling the truth, the story you wouldn't think to doubt because it’s taken for granted."

"I think you can’t possibly know the truth about somebody unless you love them."

"I knew her so well that I loved her, or maybe I loved her so well that I knew her."

"He is dangerous, the infidel, the anti-Christ, he walks brazenly into places in my heart that I had kept as holy ground, where no one else was ever permitted to stand."

"These people came for entertainment, but they're your targets; you will pierce them to the hearts."

"If you really believed that someone was perfect in heart... So righteous that to live another day could only cause them to be less perfect, then wouldn't it be a good thing for them if they were killed and taken directly into heaven?"

"Are you ready to reveal yourself to the rest of humanity?" "I’ve always been ready. The question is, are they ready to know me?"

"I carry the seeds of death with me and plant them wherever I linger long enough to love. My parents died so others could live; now I live, so others must die."

"[They] knew each other so well that there was often nothing to say. But without her there, [he] grew impatient with his own thoughts; they never came to a point, because there was no one to tell them to."

"I want to understand everything," said Miro. "I want to know everything and put it all together to see what it means." "Excellent project," she said. "It will look very good on your resume."

"We become one tribe because we say we're one tribe."

"Twisted and perverse are the ways of the human mind," Jane intoned. "Pinocchio was such a dolt to try to become a real boy. He was much better off with a wooden head."

"But they knew from that day forward who the piggies were, just as the readers of the Hive Queen had understood the buggers, and the readers of the Hegemon had understood humankind in its endless quest for greatness in a wilderness of separation and suspicion."

"You killed more people than anybody in history." said Olhado, "Be the best at whatever you do, that's what my mother always told me.” said Ender"

"All the stories are fictions. What matters is which fiction you believe."

"Your trust in rationality makes you irrational."

"Religion is tied to the deepest feelings people have. The love that arises from that stewing pot is the sweetest and strongest, but the hate is the hottest, and the anger is the most violent."

"Knowledge is just opinion that you trust enough to act upon."

"Please don't disillusion me. I haven't had breakfast yet."

"I'm all the more in need of good advice, since I can’t actually conceive of needing any."

"If only we were wiser or better people perhaps the gods would explain the mad, unbearable things they do."

"I have been a slave. But at least in all that time I knew my own heart. I knew what I truly thought even as I did what they wanted, whatever it took to get what I wanted from them."

"What does it matter, to tell yourself that the thing controlling you comes from outside, if in fact you only experience it inside your own heart? Where can you run from it? How can you hide?"

"You'd think she'd learn something from that. But she still does the same thing. Making decisions that deform other people’s lives, without consulting them, without ever conceiving that perhaps they don't want her to save them from whatever supposed misery she's saving them from."

"The only people who ever prize purity of ignorance are those who profit from a monopoly on knowledge."

"But he did love her, with all his heart he loved her. All his heart? All of it he knew about."

"All our rationalities are invented to justify what we were going to do anyway before we thought of any reasons."

"Even gentle people recognize that sometimes the decision not to kill is a decision to die."

"Love was the genes of all creatures demanding that they be replicated, replicated, replicated."

"Life is a suicide mission."

"Is the brain a map that leads down twisted paths and into hidden corners? Then when we die, the map is lost but perhaps some explorer could wander through that strange landscape and find out the hiding places of our misplaced memories."

"You couldn't bear to let another man leave you, so you left him first."

"What had been lost was found again. And those who had been hungry without knowing the name of their hunger, were fed."

"I have a sense of comfortableness in love; it isn't grand sweeping passions that I expected to feel."

"The price of having these emotions, these passions, is that you have to control them, you have to bear them when they're too strong to bear."

"She wants what everybody wants — to be loved and cared for, to be part of something beautiful and fine, to have the respect of those she admires."

"I once heard a tale of a man who split himself in two. The one part never changed at all; the other grew and grew. The changeless part was always true, the growing part was always new, and I wondered, when the tale was through, which part was me, and which was you."

"He chose this world as his home, not just because there was a family that needed him, but also because in this place he did not have to be entirely a member of the human race... He could be part of something larger than mere humanity."

"Changing the world is good for those who want their names in books. But being happy, that is for those who write their names in the lives of others, and hold the hearts of others as the treasure most dear."

"That's life. It hurts, it's dirty, and it feels very very good."

"Would I tame this great being and make her so much my slave that every moment of her time belongs to me? Would I focus her eyes so they can see nothing but my face? I should rejoice that I am part of her, instead of resenting I'm not more of her."

"Up, up, and away!"

"If I go crazy then will you still Call me Superman If I’m alive and well, will you be There a-holding my hand I’ll keep you by my side With my superhuman might Kryptonite."

"Well I know what I've been told You've to break free to break the mold But I can't do this all on my own No, I can't do this all on my own I know, that I'm no Superman."

"I didn't bother getting into it with Tarantino about the Superman thing, because it's not really true," chuckles Carradine. "It's not unique. The idea that Superman's analysis, whatever you want to call it, his image of the human race is Clark Kent, weak, a coward, fumbling, wearing glasses, uncertain of himself, not able to get a girl, all those kinds of things. That's his idea about us and that's the point that Tarantino was trying to make. But the idea of Superman being unique in that he was born Superman, which is another point that Tarantino's trying to make, that that's what these people [Bill, etc.] are, these people are born warriors and they can't help it, but there's also the Silver Surfer, right? And there's Sub-Mariner..."

"None of us really have a choice. The warrior does not have a choice. It's pre-destined, you can't help it. Superman didn't... well, he did have a choice. You know, he could have been a bad guy. And the other thing about Superman that I don't think Quentin pointed out and that isn't part of this movie and maybe isn't part of Quentin, is that even though Superman sees us as weak jellyfish, he loves us. And he wants to take care of us. That's really the big essence of Superman. I prefer Batman. I like the meanness of him, the darkness of him."

"I think Superman's a loner. Without a doubt. I think he recognizes that he has this responsibility, because of the power that he has, and that he has to bear it by himself. And to make sure that he is using it for good and not for evil. He has to keep in check his human emotions, though he's not really a human – because those are the things about living on Earth that can get us in trouble. Greed, power, love -- all those things that take us off the tracks."

"I think Superman likes Batman. In his own private way, he gets a kick out of the fact that he can count on Batman being cynical and pessimistic, and that he sort of relies on that probably in the way you rely on certain friends or family members to do certain things that you shake your head and go, “Oh, jeez.”"

"Villains are really what give comic stories their flavor. Honestly, I think Superman would be quite dull without a really great villain. Batman, maybe not so much, because he's such a twisted character himself. He's struggling with a lot of inner demons. But Superman is the kind of guy who's impossible to hate, because he's a guy's guy, and he's straightforward. He can be a little sarcastic and he has a wryness about him. But he doesn't have a lot of dark corners. So I think that contrasting him with someone like Darkseid, who's a real badass villain, absolutely makes the script more interesting."

"You know, I feel badly that I did not realize how important Superman was to a lot of people. I had a really good time doing it. I didn’t take it as seriously as I perhaps should have because—I mean, I thought I was doing something for kids, right? I didn’t realize that there was this whole Comic-Con thing going on, that people really took that seriously."

"Superman has a lot of power and he doesn’t have to be showy, rather he carries that confidence quietly. He knows what he can do. I certainly am not capable of pulling that off in my own life. But knowing that, I can fake that attitude to help me out now and then."

"Superman has always defended vulnerable communities and he’s always been political, says Joseph Darowski, a professor at Brigham Young University. Darowski is also a comic historian and the editor of “The Ages of Superman: Essays on the Man of Steel in Changing Times.” “It’s an inevitable part of the comic book industry that politics is going to seep in,” Darowski says. “There’s always some reflection of what’s going on on the world stage.” In the 1940s, Superman tried to stop World War II. He’s taken on corrupt politicians and got political during the Cold War, too. “As America gets engaged in the space race, suddenly Superman’s enemies are coming from the stars more frequently,” Darowski says. “Kryptonite and other forms of radiation creeps into the stories after the dropping of the atomic bomb. During the Cold War and the nuclear arms race, Kryptonite becomes much more commonly used in Super-man stories, and villains who get their power through radiation also become much more common. These geopolitical events end up being adapted in fantastic ways into the Superman comics.”"

"If I had to differentiate between [Batman and Superman], I'd say Superman is sort of about hope. You've got this guy who's an alien and not truly human, but he personifies all the best qualities of humanity. He's sort of an example of what it would be nice to be like. We would all like to be like Superman. We would all like to have power, compassion, the ability to settle problems in a good way, and maybe [be able to] wink to ourselves about how nobody else besides us knows we really have this secret power and we keep it ourselves. There's not a lot of angst with Superman. If there is, it's more like, "I wish I could tell Lois who I really was." Batman is how you'd like to be if you [could] break someone's neck: "I'm pissed off, and I want to go out and do something about it." Superman waits for trouble to happen, and then he goes off and stops the problem. Batman's looking for trouble; he doesn't really start it, but he's out there looking. And if he sees something going on, he just jumps into the middle of it."

"He (Reeve) was put on this Earth for... a lot of reasons. He wasn't just here to be an actor. He was Superman."

"[Jews needed] a hero who could protect us against an almost invincible force. So [Siegel and Shuster] created an invincible hero."

"You see all these super hero movies, and super heroes have a moral code that they live by and it seemed like in Kick-Ass, that wasn’t the case. It was survival on the streets and still try to fight crime. I think that’s a more realistic version of what vigilantes would be. I don’t think we’ll see a Superman ever flying in the sky or anything like that, and if that does happen, I don’t think the outcome that we watch in the movies is gonna be the outcome in real life. I think we’d send the army after this person, and the navy, and the air force, and the marines, after this person."

"Christopher Reeve is Superman, right here, right now... Reeve shows us the power, the possibilities and the results of a fierce and persistent commitment to growth and development. With God's help, Reeve is Superman because: 1. He survived the horse riding accident and challenged himself physically during countless months of painful physical therapy. 2. Because he remained committed to his role as a loving husband and doting father 3. Because he kept hope alive in the face of injury and paralysis that can destroy all hope-in the face of having to depend on his wife and many others to feed, wash, change, move and carry him to the doctor. 4. Because he came to the conclusion that God still had something for him to do... Christopher Reeve turned his focus away from his paralysis and began figuring out how he could live afresh. Reeve decided that a lot of people might like to hear his story. Instead of limiting the communication of his story to letters, books and videos subject to edit, Reeve chose the lecture circuit. That meant showing up in public, allowing the public to gawk at his incapacity, talking about his condition and sharing lessons learned. Thus, Christopher Reeve has become Superman for real."

"Jerry Siegel, an intellectually and physically circumcised chap who has his headquarters in New York. . . The inventive Israelite named this pleasant guy with an overdeveloped body and underdeveloped mind “Superman..”"

"I was enamored with Superman because I thought, being Canadian and from Toronto, that the original series was based around Toronto. I remember as a kid being told that. That the Daily Planet was the Star Newspaper and the whole idea was based around that kind of small cosmopolitan city so that caught my attention."

"Everyone’s like, ‘He’s so powerful, I can’t relate to him.’ Are you kidding me? He’s the most relatable character ever. He grew up on a farm, he doesn’t have a lot of friends, feels isolated, he can’t tell everybody what his secrets are. He’s a great character. He feels overlooked — who hasn’t felt overlooked, or wanted to connect with people? All social media is, is people wanting to connect with other people. That’s all it is. Because people long to connect with other people. And Superman is the embodiment of that. He’s more relevant now than ever."

"When Superman came out it galvanized the entire industry. It’s just part of the American scene. Superman is going to live forever. They’ll be reading Superman in the next century when you and I are gone. I felt in that respect I was doing the same thing. I wanted to be known. I wasn’t going to sell a comic that was going to die quickly."

"A very young person can come up with an idea— well, Superman is the classic example, see? All these businessmen are at the top of the pyramid, but the entire pyramid is resting on two little stones, and the pyramid denies the existence of these stones because it’s so big. It’s loaded with officials, but the little stones are the ones that are holding it up because that’s where the support is coming from, and I was in the same position."

"Superman has, despite the fact that he is a super-being, emotions just like everyone else. He's not a robot. If I were a super-being, I'd just be a human being with super-powers, which is the way I see Superman. He's a human being with super-powers and he can be lonely; he has emotions, he can be in love, he can hate people. He hates evil."

"Superman is invincible, and Superman is the first super-being to come into literary life. There he is alone. That's the way I see him. If I were a Superman among two billion people, despite the fact that I was a super-being, I'd feel pretty insecure. For instance, say I was a white hunter in Africa and I were to walk into a cannibal village. Despite the fact that I had a gun and they didn't, despite the fact that I had ammunition and they didn't, I'd feel pretty insecure, despite the fact that I could probably shoot my way out. Superman is alone in our world."

"Superman obeys the Talmudic injunction to do good for its own sake and heal the world where he can."

"Superman is arguably the most powerful person on the planet, but how long can he sit at his desk with someone breathing down his neck and treating him like the least important person in the world?"

"Rather than Clark be this clownish suit that Superman puts on, we're going to really see Clark come into his own in the next few years as far as being a guy who takes to the Internet and to the airwaves and starts speaking an unvarnished truth."

"[S]cholarship frequently appears to pay little attention to the tendency and credibility of sec-ondary sources that confirm their hypothesis. This is nowhere clearer or more troubling than in the instances where Nazi propaganda is cited by popular and academic writers as “recognition” of Superman’s “Jewish roots” and as “highlighting” his creators’ Jewish heritage (Weinstein 25–26; Tye 66; “Surnames”). Less dramatically, popular “Judeocentric” (Fingeroth 25) books are problematic only to the extent that they are uncritically used in academic work. The works of writers like Rabbi Simcha Weinstein, Danny Fingeroth, and Arie Kaplan are not tested for schol-arly rigor or quality and, most importantly, do not aspire to academic rigor. When these generic differences are ignored and they are cited as authoritative sources (e. g. Malcolm 159n18; Royal 1n2), parochial cultural myths can be disseminated into comics scholarship. With repetition, they can become naturalized, possibly muddling the historical record and making new insights into historical connections between comics and identity increasingly inaccessible."

"I am a fan of anybody who can make a living in his underwear."

"The 2 wishes behind Superman are certainly the soundest of all; they are, in fact, our national aspirations at the moment--to develop unbeatable national might, and to use this great power, when we get it, to protect innocent, peace-loving people from destructive, ruthless evil. You don’t think for a minute that it is wrong to imagine the fulfillment of those two aspirations for the United States of America do you? Then why do should it be wrong or harmful for children to imagine the same things for themselves, personally when they read ‘Superman’?"

"A man who can see across the planet and wring diamonds from its anthracite."

"Mark Waid had him as a vegetarian, he sort of ratified it and then people were really angry because they used to say in the 70s his favourite food was beef bourguignon. But I kind of think of course he would be a vegetarian, I mean he would find it hard not to be. He's a super kid who grew up with animals and I'm sure he'd empathise with them pretty early on and just not be. ` Mark Waid had him as a vegetarian, he sort of ratified it and then people were really angry because they used to say in the 70s his favourite food was beef bourguignon. But I kind of think of course he would be a vegetarian, I mean he would find it hard not to be. He's a super kid who grew up with animals and I'm sure he'd empathise with them pretty early on and just not be."

"When Superman was created during the Great Depression, he was the champion of the oppressed and fought on the side of the working man. He was lawless. If you were a wife beater, he’d throw you out the window. If you were a corrupt congressman, he’d swing you from the rooftops until you confessed. I think it appealed to people who were losing their jobs to machines: Suddenly you had Superman wrecking machines and punching robots. But his popularity has declined—nobody wants to be the son of a farmer now. American writers often say they find it difficult to write Superman. They say he’s too powerful; you can’t give him problems. But Superman is a metaphor. For me, Superman has the same problems we do, but on a Paul Bunyan scale. If Superman walks the dog, he walks it around the asteroid belt because it can fly in space. When Superman’s relatives visit, they come from the 31st century and bring some hellish monster conqueror from the future. But it’s still a story about your relatives visiting."

"As an outsider, Superman had a unique view of the forces of good and evil shaping his new world. Although he gained a new identity and built a successful career in America, he isn't cele-brated for being an assimilated refugee; he’s beloved because he used his abilities to improve and protect the society that gave him refuge."

"Superman is more than just an American, but he is no longer Kryptonian either. His identity is shaped both by where he came from and the strong morals and American values instilled in him by his adoptive parents. He inherited his abilities from Krypton ... but it was the Kents who in-spired him to become a hero. Superman was something new and special ... and not just be-cause he had superpowers. Apart from his normal crime-fighting activity, he spoke out against issues including social injustice, corruption, domestic violence and racial inequality. During World War II, he went to Europe to fight the Nazis and fascists. Then he returned the U.S. to take on white supremacists. Superman’s story is the ultimate example of an immigrant who makes his new home better. America's favorite superhero is an immigrant, and that's only fitting because America is a nation made up of people from all over the world—people blending their contributions and creating something new in the process."

"Contrary to the rumours that you've heard, I was not born in a manger. I was actually born on Krypton and sent here by my father, Jor-El, to save the planet Earth."

"When Superman and Batman came to Japan, it was right after the war, right? Together with the G.I.s. In other words, our height and theirs was completely different. We were totally overwhelmed physically, and got this complex about being unable to compete with White people. It was just then that Superman arrived, the White man’s representative, and I thought who the hell does he think he is? And then Lois Lane, the classic American beauty. Even her outfit and her makeup were like a foreign woman’s. Of course today Japanese make themselves up more like foreigners than foreigners do. Ha ha ha."

"Ha ha ha. But at the time, everyone in Superman looked like an alien from another planet. Compared with that, Mickey Mouse was just an animal, and so was easier to use. That’s the side I got consumed with. So just maybe, had I felt more in common with Superman, my drawing style would have been different."

"When I was little, I think that I wanted Superman to be my boyfriend. So this is the next best thing. I get to pretend to be Superman’s girlfriend. Although the older I’ve become, I’ve sort of decided that I would rather be Superman myself. So I’m trying (she snickers). But even my first memory of a super hero was of Superman, because I had a crush on him. Well, it was on Clark Kent, Superman and Christopher Reeve, all rolled into one."

"Superman, a native of the fictional planet of “Krypton,” landed on Earth as an infant and some suggest that he would therefore be eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, DACA. President Trump recently announced that he would end the program, though he called on Congress to provide a new path for DACA holders."

"The key word for me on him is "inspiration." He is a leader by inspiration. He sets an example. It's quite important that people realize that I don't see him as a glad-handing show-off, a one-man vigilante force who rights every wrong. Basically, he's a pacifist, a man who comes along and says, 'What can I do to help?' He stands on the sidelines until there is real trouble. He does not want to get involved unless it's absolutely necessary because he thinks people should learn to make their own decisions."

"Superman is nothing more than a popular retelling of the Christ story, or Greek mythology. It's an archetype, watered down and made in vivid colors for twelve-year-old's mentality. It's pop mythology, which extends to the actor, then seeps over to a demand that that actor reflect the needs of the worshipers. The worship doesn't only go on in the temples — it goes on in the streets, and restaurants, in magazines. But, you know, I'm from New Jersey, I'm not from Olympus or Krypton, so back off 'cause I can't take the responsibility."

"What makes Superman a hero is not that he has power, but that he has the wisdom and the maturity to use the power wisely."

"He's a fairy, I do suppose, flying through the air in pantyhose. He may be sexy, or even cute, but he looks like a sucka in a blue and red suit."

"To me, now and forever, Superman is the guy. If there's only one guy, this is the guy. There's no other guys, there's no better guys, there's nobody competing with this guy. I don't care if he's dead, alive, quadrupled, under a red sun, yellow sun, he's Superman and that's it, case closed."

"If only I could fly..."

"The story would begin with you as a child on far-off planet Krypton. Like the others of that world, you had super-powers. The child’s scientist-father was mocked and denounced by the Science Council. They did not believe his claim that Krypton would soon explode from internal stresses. Convinced that his prediction was valid, the boy’s father had been constructing a model rocket ship. As the planet began to perish, the baby’s parents knew its end was close. There was not space enough for three people in the small model craft. They put the baby into it. The mother chose to remain on the doomed planet with the man she loved, and die with him. Tearfully, hoping that their baby boy would survive, they launched the craft toward the planet Earth. Shortly, Krypton exploded and its millions of inhabitants were destroyed."

"What led me into creating Superman in the early thirties? … Hearing and reading of the oppression and slaughter of helpless, oppressed Jews in Nazi Germany … seeing movies depicting the horrors of privation suffered by the downtrodden … I had the great urge to help… help the downtrodden masses, somehow. How could I help them when I could barely help myself? Superman was the answer. ~ Jerry Siegel"

"The interesting thing about the Man of Steel was that regardless of how extraordinary the mortals of Earth thought him to be, the Kryptonians didn’t think of themselves as super at all when they were together on their home planet. Why? Because on Krypton, everyone was strong. Gilbert and Sullivan said it best in their operetta, The Gondoliers, when the Grand Inquisitor proclaimed, “If everybody’s somebody, then no-one’s anybody.” But when a Kryptonian left the home planet and came to live with the mortals of Earth, the difference was striking."

"Superman stands alone. Superman did not become Superman, Superman was born Superman. When Superman wakes up in the morning, he is Superman. His alter ego Clark Kent is how Superman views us. And what are the characteristics of Clark Kent? He's weak. He's unsure of himself. He's a coward. Clark Kent is Superman's critique on the whole human race."

"The police officer who puts their life on the line with no superpowers, no X-Ray vision, no super-strength, no ability to fly, and above all no invulnerability to bullets, reveals far greater virtue than Superman — who is only a mere superhero."

"Superman represents an instinctive problem that we are all born and grown up with, that we can fly ─ after all, we can fly now; we couldn't before ─ and that we can carry on all kinds of scientific investigations, that we can stop crime, which Superman does, and that we can have a good influence on the world, and that we can be protected by the powerful influences in the world which may be our own parents, or may be the authorities, or what not."

"So I advised them that in my experience children throughout the ages, long before Superman existed, tried, to fly, and also it has been my specific experience, since I have been at Bellevue Hospital, that certain children with certain emotional problems are particularly preoccupied with the problem of flying, both fascinated by it, and fearful of it. And we frequently have on our ward at Bellevue the problem of making Superman capes in occupational therapy and then the children wearing them and fighting over them and one thing or another ─ and only about 3 months ago we had such, what we call epidemic, and a number of children were hurt because they tried to fly off the top of radiators or off the top of bookcases or what not and got bumps."

"There is another reason why Superman has had good influence. That is the years of continuity of the Superman character. The children know that Superman will always come out on the right side. On that, I can give you another story about what they wanted to do. At the end of the Second World War we bad the problem of a certain number of soldiers coming home as amputees. One of the script writers got the bright idea that we ought to prepare children for their fathers coming home as amputees by having one of the characters─ I don’t think it was Superman ─ one of the others ─ have an accident and lose his leg. They wanted to know what I thought about that idea. I said I thought it was absolutely terrible because I felt that the children loved this character and, after all, how many children were going to have to face the question of an amputee father? Certainly there are far better ways of preparing such children for such a father than to have to shock the whole comic reading children public. So I disapproved of it."

"Jerry and Joe’s story of the Super-Man-that diabolical scientist who conducted gruesome experiments on unsuspecting homeless men-was still incubating in their minds. Then, according to Superman lore, late one night in the summer of 1934, the answer hit Jerry like a lightning bolt. They had it backward. The world had no need for an evil superman. The world needed a good superman-a trustworthy and powerful ally who would come to the rescue of regular people by protecting them from ruthless criminals, cheating businessmen, and corrupt politicians. With millions of people out of work, the streets full of crime, the stock market in ruins, and a war brewing in Europe, readers were starved for hope, inspiration, and a sense of power. A good superman could provide all of that. ACCORDING TO THE LORE, the essence of the character-the one the world would come to know-flashed into Jerry’s mind that restless night with the force of one of those sci-fi meteors crashing to Earth. In point of fact, the epiphany of the good superman sparked a long collaboration that would lead to the iteration of the character known today."

"The few publishers who considered the proposal rejected it. Frustrated with the failure, Joe went into a rage and began destroying the manuscript, Jerry intervened but managed to save only the cover. The cover, showing the Superman leaping at a gun-wielding thug, was eerily reminiscent of Mitchell Siegel’s death. Still not quite right. The work continued. As the writer, Jerry took the lead in developing the now-classic story line that finally emerged. Superman is born on the planet Krypton. His scientist father places him in a small rocket ship and launches him toward Earth just moments before Krypton erupts in devastating earthquakes and explosions that kill all the inhabitants. The spacecraft lands on earth, where people discover the baby and take him to an orphanage in a small Midwestern town. A family named Kent adopts him, gives him the name of Clark, and raises him on a farm. After realizing the possibilities of his superhuman powers, Clark moves to the big city of Metropolis and becomes a reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper. In times of trouble Clark sheds his street clothes and peels off his glasses to become Superman. He uses his powers to leap great heights, to hoist huge weights, to deflect bullets, to soar into the sky, and to subdue criminals. His only motives are to protect the innocent, to bring the guilty to justice, ad to crusade for a better world. After saving the day, Superman returns to his guise as the mild-mannered Clark, who works at the newspaper with a gutsy “girl reporter” named Lois Lane. But Lois has little time for bespectacled, nerdy Clark. She only has eyes for Superman. Sensing that the character was special, the two creators worked feverishly to fill in the details of his persona. Before long the full picture was on the page. Superman had his rugged good looks, his shock of blue-black hair, his muscular physique, his flowing red cape, and the bold S insignia on his chest. Joe designed his uniform as a cross between a spaceman suit and a classic circus performer outfit-down to the blue tights, red shorts, and cape. He skillfully captured each of Superman’s actions in single comic panels: the caped crusader raising his arms toward the heavens, leaping off the ground with incredible strength, soaring upward at supersonic speed, and landing with both feet firmly planted on the ground. The Man of Steel-also called the Man of Tomorrow in those early days-stands tall, hands on his hips, bullets bouncing off his chest, as befuddled, gun-packing gangsters fire shot after harmless shot. In time the classic image would evolve: The handsome, smiling superhero would save Lois Lane from all kinds of danger, hoist her in his arms, soar over the flickering lights o Metropolis, and deliver her safely home."

"To breathe life into the Superman character, Jerry and Joe drew upon their love of science fiction, their passion for movies, their fascination for books, and their experienced growing up Jewish during the Great Depression. The Greek and Roman myths they learned at school featured heroes with superhuman strength. Strange visitors from distant planets were common in the science fiction stories they devoured night and day. Daredevil heroes clad in masks and capes were all the rage in the movies they watched at the Crown and the Uptown. Even heroes with dual identities were commonplace on the screen and in print. The silent screen character Zorro was the alter ego of Don Diego de la Vega, a sissified aristocrat who ate, drank and dressed the dandy to throw off suspicion of his role as the night-riding avenger. The Shadow, a pulp magazine character, was the alter ego off Kent Allard, a famed pilot who fought for the French during World War I. Just as the name Clark Kent was a cross between actors Clark Gable and Kent Taylor, the name of the mythical city of Metropolis came from the 1927 silent film of the same name. For Superman, the magic was in the mix. Jerry and Joe’s Jewish heritage deeply influenced the makeup of Superman too. The all-American superhero reflected many of the beliefs and values of Jewish immigrants of the day. Like them, Superman had come to America from a foreign world. Like them, he longed to fit in to his strange new surroundings. Superman also seemed to embody the Jewish principle of tzedakah-a command to serve the less fortunate and to stand up for the weak and exploited-and the concept of “tikkun olam”, the mandate to do good works (literally, to “repair a broken world”). Before Superman is blasted off the dying planet of Krypton, Superman’s father, Joe-El, names his son Kal-El In ancient Hebrew, the suffix ”El” means “all that is God.” Then there is the Moses connection. Just before Krypton explodes Superman’s parents place him in a crib-size rocket and launch him toward Earth to be raised by loving strangers. In the Old Testament, after Pharoh decrees that all newborn Jewish males must be killed, Moses’s mother places him in a crib-size basket and launches him down the Nile River to be raised by others. Just as Pharaoh’s daughter rescues the infant Moses from the bulrushes and nurtures him as her own, the Kents find and raise Superman on Earth. The Superman story also resembles the tale of Rabbi Maharal of Prague, who created his own superman, called the Golem, to protect the people of the Jewish ghetto from hostile Christians."

"While Superman was a complex conglomeration of influences, Jerry and Joe left plenty to reader’s imaginations. What Superman “wasn’t” was just as important as what he was. The character had no clear ethnic background, no hint of an accent or dialect, no stated religious preference, and no political affiliation. The Superman character offered a little bit to everyone. Coming from a distant planet, he was the ultimate foreigner. Raised in the Midwestern heartland, he was the quintessential American. Growing up in a small town, he was rural at heart. Moving to a big city, he became more sophisticated and worldly. He was both weak and strong. Hi meek, mild alter ego, Clark Kent, was a sheepish bumbler, but he was always ready to transform himself into the all-powerful superhero. So Superman was relevant to the prairie farmer, the urban factory worker, the white-collar insurance salesman, the hardworking waitress, and the struggling immigrant. Millions or ordinary people struggling through the Depression could imagine themselves shedding their plain, run-of-the mill exteriors to reveal their real power within. True, Superman had descended from the heavens with the power of a god. His intention was godly too-to protect humanity from its own worst instincts. But Superman had characteristics the masses could relate to. He could beam with a smile, burst into anger, and form lasting friendships. Beneath it all Superman seemed like a regular guy. Superman was also a creation of his times. To keep up with those times, Jerry and Joe often spent Saturdays flipping through out-of-town newspapers and national newsmagazines for ideas at the Cleveland Public Library. The headlines described crisis after crisis. The New York Stock Exchange had lost 90 percent of its value Millions of Americans were out of work, a Midwestern drought had engulfed prairie farms in the Dust Bowl, and desperate farmers had to pack up their starving families and head to California to start anew. The international news was no more comforting. Headlines warned of economic collapse in global markets, the rise of fascist regimes in Europe, and the new communist experiment in the Soviet Union. The whole world seemed to be heading toward an explosion."

"In his popular fireside chats, broadcast on all the major radio networks in an era before the invention of television, Roosevelt spoke in plain language that resonated with common men and women. As children of the Depression, Jerry and Joe saw hope in FDR’s pledge to help the average person cope with the “hazards and vicissitudes of life,” to provide some measure of protection “to the average citizen and to his family against the loss of a job and against poverty-ridden old age.” Superman could get behind goals like that."

"So Jerry and Joe plucked elements from the world around them to stir into their Superman stew. For the most part however, Superman’s millions of fans would ignore his origins. For them the Man of Steel would simply be the defender of the little man and woman-and a big problem for the forces of evil in the world."

"SUPERMAN was introduced to the world in 1938 as the Champion of the Oppressed. In time his moniker morphed into the defender of Truth, Justice, and the American Way. In his journey through comic books, comic strips, radio and TV programs, movies, and more, the character has kept a careful watch over the less fortunate and the downtrodden. From defending coal miners against unsafe working conditions (1938) to supporting protestors opposing the oppressive regime in Iran (2011), Superman has maintained a social conscience that is as strong as steel."

"Despite their success, Jerry and Joe had a beef with the world. Back in 1938 they had signed away the Superman copyright to Harry Donenfeld for $130-$10 for each of the 13 pages of “Action Comics” No. 1. True, they were not making well above the standard industry rate and had a ten-year contract that assured them steady work and a good income. But they knew that millions were flowing in from the merchandise sales and media ventures, and most of it was ending up in the pockets of other people. And why should Harry Donenfeld get rich off Superman? He hadn’t envisioned the character and spent years perfecting it. As the Cleveland collaborators churned out page after page, week after week, month after month, Donenfeld continued to build the Superman empire, even as he added new superheroes and comic books to his stable. Before long, friends would greet the party-loving publisher in fancy restaurants with the line “Hiya, Superman,” at which point he would tear open his shirt and throw out his chest to expose his blue T-shirt with the big red S on the front."

"As a former pulp writer himself, Maxwell knew he had to make sure that the writers wove liberal doses of good old-fashioned “blood and thunder” into each story arc. At the same time he walked a delicate line as he balanced Superman’s thirst for action with his good intentions. Maxwell knew that the show’s young listeners-and their parents-prized the wholesome qualities of honesty and fair play. So Superman-by now referred to as the Big Blue Boy Scout by other, edgier comic book superheroes-remained squeaky-clean on the radio."

"The radio show was no more immune to criticism than the comic books were. Some critics claimed that Superman reflected the concept of “der Ubermensch”, a German term that could be translated into “the Superman.” The term was coined by 19th century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, who argued that certain people could transcend the influences of religion, culture, and conformity to become enlightened supermen. According to Nietzsche, the person could reach this pinnacle by rising above the pestering of the masses, who buzz like “flies in the marketplace.” After Nietzsches death, the German Nazis twisted his words to mean that their ideal of the blond, blue-eyed German (what they called Aryan) could rise above all “inferiors” to create a dominant race of supermen. The criticism that Superman manifested a Nazi concept showed a complete lack of understanding of the character. While striving to create a popular superhero who would attract a mass audience Jerry and Joe had forged Superman to embody the best parts of the American way of life and to raise awareness of un-American” attitudes. The notion of un-American behavior applied not only to gangsters who broke the law, crooked politicians who violated the public trust, and wealthy industrialists who exploited workers, but also to foreign powers that threatened democracy. So Superman’s creators-too busy to be sidetracked by the critics-aimed their superhero at the looming Nazi threat in Europe."

"THE CREATORS of the superman character had been firing their initial salvos at the then undeclared enemy even before the United States entered the war. At first the creators kept their attacks subtle-by comic book standards. Superman writers never mentioned German chancellor Adolf Hitler, Japanese emperor Hirohito, and Italian dictator Benito Mussolini by name, even though it was clear that the jabs and barbs were aimed at these Axis leaders, as well as their ruthless lieutenants, devious spies, and formidable combat troops. Furthermore, Superman’s team sought to hammer home to their readers that the foreign dictators followed a philosophy of racial and religious superiority and that their quest for world domination included plans to conquer America. At about that time, nationally circulated “Look” magazine commissioned Siegal and Shuster to create a strip entitled “How Superman Would End the War.” For that special assignment, the collaborators took off their gloves and actually named Hitler as the target. So in the pages of “Look” the caped crusader grabbed the Fuhrer by the scruff of the neck and growled, “I’d like to land a strictly non-Aryan sock on your jaw.” Instead of taking justice into his own hands, however, Superman delivers Hitler to a tribunal of world leaders to face justice. In another direct challenge in a Superman strip the caped crusader demolishes part of the German Westwall with France. That’s when Superman’s fictionalized triumphs over the Nazis came to the attention of the German ministerial bureau that tracked foreign press commentary. The German propagandists did not respond well to the Superman stories, and the U.S. press covered their response. U.S. news paper reports that infamous minister Joseph Goebbels exploded ina meeting over the Superman anti-Nazi crusades were almost certainly exaggerated if not outright false. But it is true that “Das Shwarze Korps”, the weekly newspaper of the infamous Nazi Secret Service, denounced Superman. In April 1940 the paper ran the proclamation, “Superman “ist ein Jude”! (“Superman is a Jew!”) The sarcastic, mocking piece referred to Superman’s primary creator as Jerry “Israel” Siegel and accused him of sowing “hate, suspicion, evil, laziness, and criminality in young hearts”: Jerry Siegel, an intellectually and physically circumcised chap who has hid headquarters in New York, is the inventor of a colorful figure with an impressive appearance, a powerful body, and a red swim suit who enjoys the ability to fly through the ether. The inventive Israelite named this pleasant guy with an overdeveloped body and underdeveloped mind “Superman.” He advertised widely Superman’s sense of justice, well-suited for imitation by the American youth. As you can see, there is nothing the Sadduccees [an ancient Jewish sect] won’t do for money! Jerry Siegellack stinks. Woe to the American youth who must live in such a poisonous environment and don’t even notice the poison they are swallowing daily. Superman “did” reflect the culture of his Jewish creators. The Jewish American story was baked into the personality of his character and his exploits. Superman also seemed to reflect the more modern-and frightening-Jewish realities of the time. The story of baby Superman’s journey from Krypton seemed to foreshadow the saga of the Kindertransports-the emergency evacuations of hundreds of Jewish children, without their parents, from Nazi Germany to safety in Great Britain prior to the war."

"Like most Americans, the Superman creative team foresaw the long road ahead and knew that victory hinged on the effectiveness of the nation’s leadership and the bravery and blood of its fighting men. The creators wanted to use Superman to support the war effort, but there was a problem, which “Time” dubbed “Superman’s Dilemma.” Given the character’s power to soar to the sky, to change the course of mighty rivers, to turn back tidal waves, and to survive massive explosions without a scratch, it only stood to reason that he could single-handedly defeat the enemy in short order. More specifically, Superman ought to be able to drop thousand-pound bombs from the sky on German troops, flick Japanese Zeros out of the air, and drag battleships to the bottom of the ocean. In the end the editors decided against publishing what would certainly be several years of highly implausible Superman combat adventures. Instead Superman would be stationed at home in Metropolis and would make only periodic visits to the front lines to support the troops or to handle delicate, secret missions for the top brass. In Metropolis he would serve as a model for life on the home front, and his encounters with villains like Lex Luthor, the Prankster, the Toyman, and the Insect Master would provide readers with an escape from the weighty issues of the war. Once the home-front strategy was set, the writers needed a plot device to explain why the Man of Steel was not joining the Army, Navy, or Marines and going off to war with the rest of the troops. The solution appeared in the “Superman” newspaper strips that ran from February 15 to February 19, 1942. The story begins with Clark Kent arriving at his recruitment center to sign up for duty. The bumbling reporter is so excited about joining the armed forces that he inadvertently botches his eye exam. The reason: His x-ray vision kicks in, and he accidenatly reads the eye chart in an adjacent room. The doctors declare him 4-F (undraftable) and send him packing. As a result, in the pages of “Superman” comics, Kent does not don a military uniform for the duration, and Superman is free to influence the war as an outsider."

"The homebound Superman encourages Americans to buy war bonds, to ration scarce supplies, and to donate to organizations like the Red Cross and the United States Services Organization (USO). In his adventures, Superman travels outside Metropolis to military training centers to lift the spirits of the troops and to prepare them for the action ahead. In one comic book adventure he travels to a fictional U.S. military training center, where he takes part in a mock war game by taking the side of the blue army in a simulated battle with the red army. Superman ferries blue troops across rivers, bombs red airfields with sandbags, locates red snipers with his x-ray vision, and finally tunnels through a mountain to lead blue troops into the red camp. Facing defeat, the red general implores his men to fight on. “What if they were Japs or Nazis?” he asks, “Would you let down the folks who are counting on your to save your country and the world?” At this point the red army summons the strength to repel the blues and win the game. Superman, happily experiencing a rare defeat, concludes that American soldiers are the real superheroes and congratulates the men for being “Super-Soldiers.” Still, from 1941 to 1945 there were stories of Superman’s periodic trips to the front lines, Siegel clearly designed one newspaper strip to draw the attention of American children to the evil of the enemy. In this strip, Hitler Mussolini, and Tojo (Japan’s prime minister) kidnap Santa Claus as part of their plan for world domination. Superman is forced to rescue Old Saint Nick and save Christmas. In addition to these occasional war stories, a number of powerful “Superman” magazine covers trumpeted the war effort, even though there were usually no corresponding stories inside to back up the symbolic cover art; Superman, seen through the periscope of a German U-boat, swimming furiously toward the submarine in the wake of the Allied ship that the sub just sank; Superman holding an eagle on his arm, standing proudly in front of the Stars and Stripes; Superman delivering supplies to an American machine-gun squad fighting in the jungles; Lois Lane, with an Army soldier, a Navy sailor, and a Marine, telling them with a wink, “You’re my Supermen.”"

"[P]erhaps Superman’s most important war contribution was his direct connection to the troops. The scene of a soldier or sailor passing time with a comic book in hand was common overseas, and Superman was the superhero of choice for most of the servicemen and women. In fact, one of four magazines shipped to troops overseas was a comic book, and 35,000 copies of “Superman” alone went abroad each month. The U.S. War Department and USO made sure that copies of “Superman” magazine were distributed to soldiers, sailors, and marines throughout the war. Military leaders hoped to provide a little entertainment and escape until the troops could come back home for good. As “Time” reported, “Superman got a high priority rating last week: the Navy Department ruled that the Superman comic books should be included among essential supplies destined for the marine garrison at Midway Islands. For the tough Marines, as for all U.S. Armed Forces, the Man of Steel is still super-favorite reading.”"

"What if they used Superman to teach children the values of tolerance and fair play and the importance of accepting other kids regardless of race, religion, or national origin? What if Superman could teach a generation of children to reject those who preached prejudice and hate? After all, the entire country had banded together to win the war. Now most everyone was banding together to build a peaceful and prosperous future. Those grim photographs and films of mass graves and starving concentration camp prisoners had made an indelible mark on the public mind. Could Superman lead the way?"

"QUESTION: As different as they are, what is it that you think creates the dynamic for Batman and Superman to essentially be each other’s best friend?"

"QUESTION: Where do you start as an actor when trying to create a voice for Superman?"

"QUESTION: Are there any specific characteristics you believe are essential to the voice?"

"Q: What do you think has made Superman so popular for over 40 years?"

"Shuster: I was mild-mannered, wore glasses, was very shy with women."

"Siegel: You see, Clark Kent grew not only out of my private life, but also out of Joe's. As a high school student, I thought that some day I might become a reporter, and I had crushes on several attractive girls who either didn't know I existed or didn't care I existed. As a matter of fact, some of them looked like they hoped I didn't exist. It occurred to me: What if I was real terrific? What if I had something special going for me, like jumping over buildings or throwing cars around or something like that? Then maybe they would notice me. That night when all the thoughts were coming to me, the concept came to me that Superman could have a dual identity, and that in one of his identities he could be meek and mild, as I was, and wear glasses, the way I do. The heroine, who I figured would be a girl reporter, would think he was some sort of a worm; yet she would be crazy about this Superman character who could do all sorts of fabulous things. In fact, she was real wild about him, and a big inside joke was that the fellow she was crazy about was also the fellow whom she loathed. By coincidence, Joe was a carbon copy (of me)."

"Siegel: I figured that the character would be so advanced that he would be invulnerable in other ways than physically. Secretly, I kind of enjoyed the thought that women, who just didn't care at all about somebody like Clark Kent, would go ape over somebody like Superman. I enjoyed the fact that he wasn't that affected by all their admiration. When you come down to it, some of the greatest lovers of all time simply aren't that crazy about women: It's the women who are crazy about them. Clark Gable was hard to get, and so were some of the other romantic heroes."

"Q: Were you influenced by the Edgar Rice Burroughs John Carter of Mars stories?"

"A life, some would argue, is a series of problems. There’s no denying the truth in that – but why get lost in it? Why not rise above the truth… and lead a good life? Shouldn’t we all look at problems as a chance for us to find… solutions?"

"I believe there’s something inherently dangerous when something real becomes mythic. Because when faced with a myth? We can’t win. So the mythic must be exposed for what it is. So we can believe in ourselves. Because it’s only what’s in us…the drive to be mythic…that matters."

"But one thing’s clear, beyond the mask he wears… is his passion. A palpable thing, that’s almost greater then the man himself. And if there’s passion… there’s desire. And desire means there’s a hole in the man. (About Bruce Wayne/Batman)"

"What gives measure to a man's choices is what he has to give up to make them."

"The English localization of Contra III featured these infamous quotes:"

"The Japanese version featured these equally intimidating quotes:"

"February 14, 2636. You are about to learn what it takes to a descendent of commando legends Scorpion and Mad Dog. That is, now that Red Falcon would like to use your family tree as a toothpick. You're Jimbo and Sully, special forces comrades just like your fearsome forefathers were. Nowadays, your weapons and maneuvers are more advanced than they were when your ancestors saved the world from being skewered on Red Falcon's fangs. That brutal beast is still in his prime and has had plenty of time to plot his revenge."

"DARLING NO BAKA!!! ("Darling, you idiot!")"

"One, two, three! DIVINE RETRIBUTION!!!"

"We're going to make a baby on Saturday night!"

"visiting Ataru in his classroom: Teacher, husbands and wives should always be together, whether it's raining or windy, in the house, or even at school!"

"Darling! Shinobu can go to hell!"

"Nope! 'Cause in my tummy is DARLING'S BABY!"

"Where I come from, marriage is a sacred institution, so if you cheat on me... [shocks Ataru] (Episode 1)"

"[referring to Rei] Oooh! I will never marry such a tacky man! Tacky tacky tacky!!"

"Thank you, Ran. I will think hard about this..."

"Umeboshi? GIVE ME UMEBOSHI!"

"I don't care if it's a lie. I just want you to say it. (Movie 5)"

"Darling, you IDIOT! Do ya wanna really forget about me!? (Movie 5)"

"Even if it takes a "lifetime", I'll make ya say it! (Movie 5)"

"I refuse! I'd sooner go to Iscandar than fight and be killed by an Oni! (Episode 1)"

"on his game of tag with Lum: But to grab those horns, naturally I've gotta grab the body first... (Episode 1)"

"speaking English while flirting with a girl in Hawaii: Hi! I'm Ataru Moroboshi, Number One Japanese Boy! Please date with me!"

"I'm gonna run away from home! Will that make you happy?! WAAAAAAAAA!!!! [runs out the front door in his sock feet, then comes back for a second to put his shoes on] Damn it! [runs back out the door] WAAAAAAAA!!!! (Episode 2)"

"When will you learn that I always do things without thinking of the consequences? (Movie 2)"

"I HATE YOUR GUTS! (Movie 5)"

"You idiot, if I say "I love you" under these circumstances, How do you know if I was telling the truth? (Movie 5)"

"I'll never forget, I'll... never... forget..., I'LL NEVER FORGET! ...you, Lum... [collapses] (Movie 5)"

"I'll say it on my "deathbed"! (Movie 5)"

"Ne, ne, ne...Juusho to denwa bangou wa?! (Hey, hey, hey...What's your address and phone number?!)"

"repeated line: WAAA! KURAI YO! SEMAI YO! KOWAI YO!!! ("Waaa! It's cramped! It's dark! I'm scared!!!")"

"repeated line: OTOKO NAN TE! ("Men be damned!")"

"You flirtatious scum!"

"from the BBC dub "Lum the Invader Girl": I must go to my sweet Ataru! He needs me! He loves me! Even though I know Lum will be with him, I can't keep away from my beloved, my precious. Although, if he's shagged her... I'LL KILL HIM!"

"also from "Lum the Invader Girl"; Shinobu's reaction to Lum's claim that she is pregnant with Ataru's child: You've got... a bun in your oven???"

"Lum, you'd be better off if you dumped that idiot!"

"It's obvious that Lum is too good for you! (Episode 2)"

"What's that look on yer face? Is that how you look at folks coming all the way from beyond the galaxy?! (Episode 2)"

"You disgusting slimeball!"

"repeated line: Boku ii ko! ("I'm a good boy!")"

"oft-repeated line: Oh, I never should have had him!"

"to Ataru: You are the personification of the word "stupid"!"

"Y... your face, my friend... it's hopelessly horrible!!!"

"Praise Buddha, praise Buddha. In the name of Jesus Christ, praise Buddha."

"Haratama! Kiyotama! (Excorsize! Purify!)"

"ORE WA ONNA DA!!!! ("I AM A WOMAN!!!!")"

"Oh, that's terrible..."

"If you do not apologize...I shall be angry."

"Would you like some sherbert while you bathe?"

"So am I sarcastic, the stingiest person you know, or a cold-blooded businesswoman which is it...I am none of those, but that's quite alright with me."

"Move it! Outta my way!"

"Hey Ran. It's a call from your '"treacherous snake"."

"Ran-chan shiawase! (Lil' Ran's so happy!)"

"We're the Guardians of the Galaxy and we're here to — #%@&$!! We're too late, aren't we?"

"Reports of my death were greatly exaggerated."

"I don't know if this team will work or not. All I know is it MUST. Time is critical. I see clearly now why I've been reborn. We haven't got long. Years if we're lucky, months if we're not."

"I am Groot."

"It Will Steal Your Body And Damn Your Soul!"

"Science-Fiction's most astounding story!"

"The incredible space-brain invades a human body with its destructive evil power!"

"Fantastic! Fearsome!"

"John Agar — Steve March"

"Joyce Meadows — Sally Fallon"

"Robert Fuller — Dan Murphy"

"Thomas Browne Henry — John Fallon"

"Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time, roughly a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet Earth. Now this is an interesting number, for by a curious coincidence there are approximately a hundred billion stars in our local universe, the Milky Way. So for every man who has ever lived, in this Universe there shines a star."

"...there was already something in his gaze beyond the capability of any ape. In those dark, deep-set eyes was a dawning awareness- the first imitations of an intelligence that could not possibly fulfill itself for ages yet, and might soon be extinguished forever."

"But please remember this is only a work of fiction. The truth, as always, will be far stranger."

"The drought had lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended. Here on the Equator, in the continent which would one day be known as Africa, the battle for existence had reached a new climax of ferocity, and the victor was not yet in sight. In this barren and desiccated land, only the small or the swift or the fierce could flourish, or even hope to survive."

"Moon-Watcher saw that his father had died in the night. He did not know that the Old One was his father, for such a relationship was utterly beyond his understanding, but as he looked at the emaciated body he felt dim disquiet that was the ancestor of sadness…He never thought of his father again."

"In the caves, between spells of fitful dozing and fearful waiting, were being born the nightmares of generations yet to be."

"And then there came a sound which Moon-Watcher could not possibly have identified, for it had never been heard before in the history of the world. It was the clank of metal upon stone."

"Moon-Watcher had no idea of its cause, still less of its cure; but discontent had come into his soul, and he had taken one small step toward humanity."

"The very atoms of his simple brain were being twisted into new patterns. If he survived, those patterns would become eternal, for his genes would pass them on to future generations. It was a slow, tedious business, but the crystal monolith was patient. Neither it, nor its replicas scattered across half the globe, expected to succeed with all the scores of groups involved in the experiment."

"Moon-Watcher started to move toward the nearest pig. It was a young and foolish animal, even by the undemanding standards of warthog intelligence."

"Others stood hesitantly around the corpse — the future of a world waiting upon their decision. It was a surprisingly long time before one of the nursing females began to lick the gory stone she was holding in her paws…and before Moon-Watcher really understood that he need never be hungry again."

"The man-apes had been given their first chance. There would be no second one; the future was, very literally, in their own hands. Moons waxed and waned; babies were born and sometimes lived; feeble, toothless thirty-year-olds died; the leopard took its toll in the night; the Others threatened daily across the river - and the tribe prospered. In the course of a single year, Moon-Watcher and his companions had changed almost beyond recognition."

"The leopard knew that something was wrong when it felt a stunning blow on its head."

"Moon-Watcher was holding a stout branch, and impaled upon it was the bloody head of the leopard. When he reached the far side of the stream, One-Ear was still standing his ground. Perhaps he was too brave or too stupid to run. Coward or hero, it made no difference in the end, as the frozen snarl of death came crashing down upon his uncomprehending head."

"For a few seconds Moon-Watcher stood uncertainly above his new victim…he was master of the world, and he was not quite sure what to do next. But he would think of something."

"A new animal was abroad on the planet, spreading slowly out from the African heartland. It was still so rare that a hasty census might have overlooked it. In the hundred thousand years since the crystals had descended upon Africa, the man-apes had invented nothing. But they had started to change, and had developed skills which no other animal possessed."

"Outside the tropics, the glaciers slew those who had prematurely left their ancestral home. But, unlike so many others, the man-apes had not merely become extinct - they had been transformed. The toolmakers had been remade by their own tools."

"They had learned to speak, and so had won their first great victory over Time. Now the knowledge of one generation could be handed on to the next. Unlike the animals, who knew only the present, Man had acquired a past; and he was beginning to grope toward a future."

"Presently he invented philosophy, and religion. And he peopled the sky, not altogether inaccurately, with gods."

"The spear, the bow, the gun, and finally the guided missile had given him weapons of infinite range and all but infinite power. Without those weapons, often though he had used them against himself, Man would never have conquered his world. Into them he had put his heart and soul, and for ages they had served him well. But now, as long as they existed, he was living on borrowed time."

"No matter how many times you left Earth, Dr. Heywood Floyd told himself, the excitement never really palled. He had been to Mars once, to the Moon three times, and to the various space stations more often than he could remember. Yet as the moment of takeoff approached, he was conscious of a rising tension, a feeling of wonder and awe - yes; and of nervousness - which put him on the same level as any Earth lubber about to receive his first baptism of space."

"The jet that had rushed him here from Washington, after that midnight briefing with the President, was now dropping down toward one of the most familiar, yet most exciting, landscapes in all the world. There lay the first two generations of the Space Age. Spanning twenty miles of the Florida coast to the south were the giant gantries of the Saturns and Neptunes, that had set men on the path to the planets, and had now passed into history."

"In a million years, the human race had lost few of its aggressive instincts; along symbolic lines visible only to politicians, the thirty-eight nuclear powers watched one another with belligerent anxiety."

"Perhaps the Chinese were only trying to shore up their sagging economy, by turning obsolete weapons systems into hard cash, as some observers had suggested. Or perhaps they had discovered methods of warfare so advanced that they no longer had need of such toys; there had been talk of radio hypnosis from satellite transmitters, compulsion viruses, and blackmail by synthetic diseases for which they alone possessed the antidote. These charming ideas were almost certainly propaganda or pure fantasy, but it was not safe to discount any of them."

""Hmm," said Moisevitch, obviously quite unconvinced. "Seems odd to me that you, an astronomer, should be sent up to the Moon to look into an epidemic…Then do you know what TMA-1 means?” Miller seemed about to choke on his drink, but Floyd was made of sterner stuff. He looked his old friend straight in the eye, and said calmly: "TMA-1? What an odd expression. Where did you hear it?” "Never mind," retorted the Russian. "You can't fool me. But if you've run into something you can't handle, I hope you don't leave it until too late before you yell for help.”"

"When he tired of official reports, Floyd would plug his foolscap-sized News pad into the ship's information circuit. One by one he would conjure up the world's major electronic papers…He sometimes wondered if the News pad, and the fantastic technology behind it, was the last word in man's quest for perfect communications. Here he was, far out in space, speeding away from Earth at thousands of miles an hour, yet in a few milliseconds he could see the headlines of any newspaper he pleased. (That very word "newspaper," of course, was an anachronistic hangover into the age of electronics.) It was hard to imagine how the system could be improved or made more convenient. But sooner or later, Floyd guessed, it would pass away, to be replaced by something as unimaginable as the News pad itself would have been to Caxton or Gutenberg."

"So here, Floyd told himself, is the first generation of the Spaceborne; there would be more of them in the years to come. Though there was sadness in this thought, there was also a great hope. When Earth was tamed and tranquil, and perhaps a little tired, there would still be scope for those who loved freedom, for the tough pioneers, the restless adventurers…The time was fast approaching when Earth, like all mothers, must say farewell to her children."

""I met Moisevitch at the Space Station…he'd heard of TMA-1; rumors are beginning to leak out. But we just can't issue any statement, until we know what the damn thing is and whether our Chinese friends are behind it.”"

"Floyd was particularly struck by a collection of signs, obviously assembled with loving care, which carried such messages as PLEASE KEEP OFF THE GRASS…NO PARKING ON EVEN DAYS…DEFENSE DE FUMER…TO THE BEACH…CATTLE CROSSING…SOFT SHOULDERS and DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS. If these were genuine - as they certainly appeared to be - their transportation from Earth had cost a small fortune. There was a touching defiance about them; on this hostile world, men could still joke about the things they had been forced to leave behind - and which their children would never miss."

"At first we thought it might be an outcrop of magnetic rock," Dr. Michaels said, "but all the geological evidence was against it. And not even a big nickel-iron meteorite could produce a field as intense as this; so we decided to have a look."

""My colleagues and I will stake our reputations on this. TMA-l has nothing to do with the Chinese. Indeed, it has nothing to do with the human race - for when it was buried, there were no humans.”"

"Here, at the very portals of Earth, man was already face to face with a mystery that might never be solved. Three million years ago, something had passed this way, had left this unknown and perhaps unknowable symbol of its purpose, and had returned to the planets — or to the stars."

"After three million years of darkness, TMA-1 had greeted the lunar dawn."

"Deep Space Monitor 19 had noted something strange — a faint yet unmistakable disturbance rippling across the Solar System…As would Orbiter M 15, circling Mars; and High Inclination Probe 21, climbing slowly above the plane of the ecliptic; and even Artificial Comet 5, heading out into the cold wastes beyond Pluto. As soon as he glanced at his morning report, the Radiation Forecaster at Goddard knew that something strange had passed through during the last twenty-four hours. Some immaterial pattern of energy, throwing off a spray of radiation like the wake of a racing speedboat, had leaped from the face of the Moon, and was heading out toward the stars."

"The ship was still only thirty days from Earth, yet David Bowman sometimes found it hard to believe that he had ever known any other existence than the closed little world of Discovery. All his years of training, all his earlier missions to the Moon and Mars, seemed to belong to another man, in another life. Frank Poole admitted to the same feelings, and had sometimes jokingly regretted that the nearest psychiatrist was the better part of a hundred million miles away."

"Soft light flooded into the chamber; Bowman saw moving shapes silhouetted against the widening entrance. And in that moment, all his memories came back to him, and be knew exactly where he was. Though he had come back safely from the furthest borders of sleep, and the nearest borders of death, he had been gone only a week. When he left the Hibernaculum, he would not see the cold Saturnian sky; that was more than a year in the future and a billion miles away. He was still in the trainer at the Houston Space Flight Center under the hot Texas sun."

"Hal (for Heuristically programmed Algorithmic computer, no less) was a masterwork of the third computer breakthrough. These seemed to occur at intervals of twenty years, and the thought that another one was now imminent already worried a great many people. The first had been in the 1940s, when the long-obsolete vacuum tube had made possible such clumsy, high-speed morons as ENIAC and its successors. Then, in the 1960s, solid-state microelectronics had been perfected. With its advent, it was clear that artificial intelligences at least as powerful as Man's need be no larger than office desks…In the 1980s, Minsky and Good had shown how neural networks could be generated automatically — self replicated — in accordance with any arbitrary learning program. Artificial brains could be grown by a process strikingly analogous to the development of a human brain."

"Whether Hal could actually think was a question which had been settled by the British mathematician Alan Turing back in the 1940s. Turing had pointed out that, if one could carry out a prolonged conversation with a machine — whether by typewriter or microphone was immaterial — without being able to distinguish between its replies and those that a man might give, then the machine was thinking, by any sensible definition of the word. Hal could pass the Turing test with ease."

"The time might even come when Hal would take command of the ship. In an emergency…if there was no reply from Earth, he would take what measures he deemed necessary to safeguard the ship and to continue the mission — whose real purpose he alone knew."

"Although Bowman was nominal Captain on this phase of the mission, no outside observer could have deduced the fact. He and Poole switched roles, rank, and responsibilities completely every twelve hours. This kept them both at peak training, minimized the chances of friction, and helped toward the goal of 100 percent redundancy."

"Fifty years ago, Bowman would have been considered a specialist in applied astronomy, cybernetics, and space propulsion systems — yet he was prone to deny, with genuine indignation, that he was a specialist at all. Bowman had never found it possible to focus his interest exclusively on any subject; despite the dark warnings of his instructors, he had insisted on taking his Master's degree in General Astronautics — a course with a vague and woolly syllabus, designed for those whose IQs were in the low 130s and who would never reach the top ranks of their profession. His decision had been right; that very refusal to specialize had made him uniquely qualified for his present task."

"Bowman had become fascinated by the great explorations of the past — understandably enough, in the circumstances. Sometimes he would cruise with Pytheas out through the Pillars of Hercules, along the coast of a Europe barely emerging from the Stone Age, and venture almost to the chill mists of the Arctic. Or, two thousand years later, he would pursue the Manila galleons with Anson, sail with Cook along the unknown hazards of the Great Barrier Reef, achieve with Magellan the first circumnavigation of the world. And he began to read the Odyssey, which of all books spoke to him most vividly across the gulfs of time."

""Mission Control, this is X-ray-Delta-One. At two-zero-four-five, on-board fault prediction center in our niner-triple-zero computer showed Alpha Echo three five unit as probable failure within seventy-two hours. Request check your telemetry monitoring and suggest you review unit in your ship systems simulator. Also, confirm your approval our plan to go EVA and replace Alpha Echo three five unit prior to failure. Mission Control, this is X-ray-Delta-One, two-one-zero-three transmission concluded.”"

"Discovery was no longer a happy ship."

""Hello, X-ray-Delta-One — this is Mission Control. We have completed the analysis of your AE-35 difficulty, and both our Hal Nine Thousands are in agreement…The trouble lies in the prediction circuits, and we believe that it indicates a programming conflict which we can only resolve if you disconnect your Nine Thousand and switch to Earth Control Mode. You will therefore take the following steps, beginning at 2200 Ship Time—” The voice of Mission Control faded out. At the same moment, the Alert sounded, forming a wailing background to Hal's "Condition Yellow! Condition Yellow!”"

"Bowman's movement in the field of view must have triggered something in the unfathomable mind that was now ruling over the ship; for suddenly, Hal spoke. "Too bad about Frank, isn't it?” "Yes," Bowman answered, after a long pause. "It is.” "I suppose you're pretty broken up about it?”"

"Deliberate error was unthinkable. Even the concealment of truth filled him with a sense of imperfection, of wrongness — of what, in a human being, would have been called guilt. For like his makers, Hal had been created innocent; but, all too soon, a snake had entered his electronic Eden. For the last hundred million miles, he had been brooding over the secret he could not share with Poole and Bowman…who would not learn the mission's full purpose, until there was need to know. So ran the logic of the planners; but their twin gods of Security and National Interest meant nothing to Hal. He was only aware of the conflict that was slowly destroying his integrity."

"The link with Earth, over which his performance was continually monitored, had become the voice of a conscience he could no longer fully obey… He had been threatened with disconnection… So he would protect himself, with all the weapons at his command… And then, following the orders that had been given to him in case of the ultimate emergency, he would continue the mission — unhindered, and alone."

""Something seems to have happened to the life-support system, Dave.” Bowman took no notice. He was carefully studying the little labels on the logic units. "I think there's been a failure in the pod-bay doors," Hal remarked conversationally. "Lucky you weren't killed.” Bowman released the locking bar on the section labeled COGNITIVE FEEDBACK… "Hey, Dave," said Hal. "What are you doing?” He began to pull out the panel marked EGO-REINFORCEMENT. "Look here, Dave," said Hal, "an irreplaceable amount of effort has gone into making me what I am.” He started on the AUTO-INTELLECTION panel. "Dave," said Hal, "I don't understand…"

"Heywood Floyd looked as if he had had very little sleep, and his face was lined with worry. But whatever his feelings, his voice sounded firm and reassuring; he was doing his utmost to project confidence to the lonely man on the other side of the Solar System. "First of all, Dr. Bowman," be began, "we must congratulate you on the way you handled this extremely difficult situation. You did exactly the right thing in dealing with an unprecedented and unforeseen emergency.""

""Two years ago, we discovered the first evidence for intelligent life outside the Earth. A slab or monolith of hard, black material, ten feet high, was found buried in the crater Tycho. Here it is.” At his first glimpse of TMA-1, with the space-suited figures clustering around it, Bowman leaned toward the screen in open-mouthed astonishment. In the excitement of this revelation he almost forgot his own desperate predicament."

""But why bury a Sun-powered device thirty feet underground? The favorite theory is the simplest, and the most logical. It is also the most disturbing. You hide a Sun-powered device in darkness - only if you want to know when it is brought out into the light. In other words, the monolith may be some kind of alarm. And we have triggered it."

""At the moment, we do not know whether to hope or fear. We do not know if, out on the moons of Saturn, you will meet with good or with evil — or only with ruins a thousand times older than Troy.”"

"Bowman sometimes wondered if the cultural-shock danger was the only explanation for the mission's extreme secrecy. Some hints that had been dropped during his briefings suggested that the U.S.-U.S.S.R. bloc hoped to derive advantage by being the first to contact intelligent extraterrestrials. From his present viewpoint, looking back on Earth as a dim star almost lost in the Sun, such considerations now seemed ludicrously parochial."

"Could any technology, no matter how advanced, bridge the awful gulf what lay between the Solar System and the nearest alien sun? Many scientists flatly denied the possibility. A vocal minority refused to agree. Even if it took centuries to travel from star to star, they contended, this might be no obstacle to sufficiently determined explorers…In any event, why should one assume that all intelligent species were as short-lived as Man? There might be creatures in the universe to whom a thousand-year voyage would present nothing worse than slight boredom."

"If TMA-1 had indeed sent a signal to the stars…humanity would have a breathing space which could certainly be measured in decades — more probably in centuries. To many people, this was a reassuring thought. But not to all. A few scientists — most of them beachcombers on the wilder shores of theoretical physics — asked the disturbing question: "Are we certain that the speed of light is an unbreakable barrier?" They talked hopefully about shortcuts through higher dimensions, lines that were straighter than straight, and hyper-spatial connectivity. They were fond of using an expressive phrase coined by a Princeton mathematician of the last century: "Wormholes in space.""

"A few mystically inclined biologists speculated, taking their cues from the beliefs of many religions, that mind would eventually free itself from matter. The robot body, like the flesh-and-blood one, would be no more than a steppingstone to something which, long ago, men had called "spirit.” And if there was anything beyond that, its name could only be God."

"Bowman could no longer tolerate silence; except when he was sleeping, or talking over the circuit to Earth, he kept the ship's sound system running at almost painful loudness…He finally found peace, as so many others had done, in the abstract architecture of Bach, occasionally ornamented with Mozart. And so Discovery drove on toward Saturn, as often as not pulsating with the cool music of the harpsichord, the frozen thoughts of a brain that had been dust for twice a hundred years."

"Whatever the origin of the rings of Saturn, the human race was fortunate to have seen such a wonder; it could exist for only a brief moment of time in the history of the Solar System…created a mere two or three million years ago. But no one had ever given the slightest thought to the curious coincidence that the rings of Saturn had been born at the same time as the human race."

"Japetus alone possessed a distinctive geography, and a very strange one indeed. One hemisphere of the satellite was extremely dark, and showed very little surface detail. In complete contrast, the other was dominated by a brilliant white oval, about four hundred miles long and two hundred wide. At the moment, only part of this striking formation was in daylight, but the reason for Japetus's extraordinary variations in brilliance was now quite obvious."

"For three million years, it had circled Saturn, waiting for a moment of destiny that might never come. In its making, a moon had been shattered, and the debris of its creation orbited still. Now the long wait was ending."

"Those who had begun that experiment, so long ago, had not been men — or even remotely human. But they were flesh and blood, and when they looked out across the deeps of space, they had felt awe, and wonder, and loneliness. As soon as they possessed the power, they set forth for the stars. In their explorations, they encountered life in many forms, and watched the workings of evolution on a thousand worlds. They saw how often the first faint sparks of intelligence flickered and died in the cosmic night. And because, in all the galaxy, they had found nothing more precious than Mind, they encouraged its dawning everywhere. They became farmers in the fields of stars."

"The great dinosaurs had long since perished when the survey ship entered the Solar System after a voyage that had already lasted a thousand years. It swept past the frozen outer planets, paused briefly above the deserts of dying Mars, and presently looked down on Earth. Spread out beneath them, the explorers saw a world swarming with life. For years they studied, collected, catalogued. When they had learned all that they could, they began to modify. They tinkered with the destiny of many species, on land and in the ocean. But which of their experiments would succeed they could not know for at least a million years."

"And now, out among the stars, evolution was driving toward new goals. The first explorers of Earth had long since come to the limits of flesh and blood; as soon as their machines were better than their bodies, it was time to move. First their brains, and then their thoughts alone, they transferred into shining new homes of metal and of plastic. In these, they roamed among the stars. They no longer built spaceships. They were spaceships."

"In their ceaseless experimenting, they had learned to store knowledge in the structure of space itself, and to preserve their thoughts for eternity in frozen lattices of light. They could become creatures of radiation, free at last from the tyranny of matter."

"Now they were lords of the galaxy, and beyond the reach of time. They could rove at will among the stars, and sink like a subtle mist through the very interstices of space. But despite their godlike powers, they had not wholly forgotten their origin, in the warm slime of a vanished sea. And they still watched over the experiments their ancestors had started, so long ago."

"He was back, precisely where he wished to be, in the space that men called real."

"There before him, a glittering toy no Star-Child could resist, floated the planet Earth with all its peoples…A thousand miles below, he became aware that a slumbering cargo of death had awoken, and was stirring sluggishly in its orbit…He put forth his will, and the circling megatons flowered in a silent detonation that brought a brief, false dawn to half the sleeping globe. Then he waited, marshaling his thoughts and brooding over his still untested powers. For though he was master of the world, he was not quite sure what to do next. But he would think of something."