Authors From The United States

"Women speak because they wish to speak, whereas a man speaks only when driven to speech by something outside himself—like, for instance, he can't find any clean socks."

"If you have formed the habit of checking on every new diet that comes along, you will find that, mercifully, they all blur together, leaving you with only one definite piece of information: french-fried potatoes are out."

"The real menace in dealing with a five-year-old is that in no time at all you begin to sound like a five-year-old."

"The average, healthy, well-adjusted adult gets up at seven-thirty in the morning feeling just plain terrible."

"Children are different—mentally, physically, spiritually, quantitatively, qualitatively; and furthermore, they're all a little bit nuts."

"I will read anything rather than work."

"If you can keep your head when all about are losing theirs, it's just possible that you haven't grasped the situation."

"You can't sleep until noon with the proper élan unless you have some legitimate reason for staying up until three (parties don't count)."

"The most important thing about me is that I am a Catholic. It's a superstructure within which you can work, like a sonnet."

"Movie actors are just ordinary mixed-up people—with agents."

"Jewish success is due to a culture that promotes excellence, blessed with self discipline, education, dedication and a quest for leaving this world a better place."

"I am familiar with what goes on in the Arab countries, and I'm sad to say that most of us want to annihilate Israel. We want to kill all the Israelis... Do you know what they used to say in the mosques in Egypt? "We want to go to the White House and turn it into the Islamic House..." We call upon the Arab countries to stop teaching hatred to the Arab children."

"Farmer's greatest achievement, accomplished with brilliant understatement, is to make us gradually realize that our own situation here on Earth is just as mysterious as anything on Riverworld, or that the answer to the enigmas of Riverworld might also be the explanation of the paradoxes of our own peculiar existence here and now. Once again, in a brilliant climax, Farmer demonstrates my pet theory that sf is the only serious literature around these days, because it is the only literature that grapples with the ultimate questions of who or what we are and how we got here."

"One of the most original, one of the most talented, and certainly one of the most fearless writers around."

"Excellent science fiction writer; in fact, a far more skillful writer than I am."

"The truth is that you can be immortal, relatively so, anyway. You won't last beyond the death of the universe and probably not nearly as long as the universe does. But you have the potentiality for living a million years, two, perhaps three or more. As long as you can find a Terrestrial-type planet with a hot core and have resurrection machinery available. Unfortunately, not all can be permitted to possess immortality. Too many would make immortality miserable or hellish for the rest, and they would try to control others through their control of the resurrection machinery. Even so, everybody, without exception, is given a hundred years after his Earthly death to prove that he or she can live peacefully and in harmony with himself and the others, within the tolerable limits of human imperfections. Those who can do this will be immortal after the two projects are completed."

"How strange and unforeseeable! The world had been saved, not by great rulers and statesmen, not by mystics and saints and prophets and messiahs, not by any of the holy scriptures, but by an introverted eccentric writer of mathematical texts and children's books and by the child who'd inspired him. The little girl become a woman, dream-ridden Alice, had inspired the nonsense not really nonsense, and this in circuitous and spiraling fashion had inspired her to do what all others had failed to do, to save eighteen billion souls and the world."

"If the Creator has a plan for us, why doesn’t He tell us what it is? Are we so stupid that we can’t understand it? He should tell it to us directly! The books that the prophets, the revelators, and the revisionists wrote, claiming to have authority from God Himself, to have taken His dictations, these so-called revelations are false! They make no sense! Besides, they contradict each other! Does God make contradictory statements?"

"“Perhaps God—if there is one—doesn’t care,” Burton said. “There is no evidence whatsoever that He does.”"

"Burton sighed. She was, on the whole, sane. But she was also a religious fanatic who managed to ignore the facts of life and also the contradictory elements in her faith."

"“Okay,” she said, “I’ll listen to the wise. Are you wise?” “Wise enough,” he said, “and mighty experienced, which is the same thing if you’re not too stupid.”"

"You should have waited to find out the true situation, madame. But then…scarcely anyone ever does."

"By the Providence that did not exist, events had worked out perfectly."

"And how in God’s name did Santiago find out about the laser? Even Queen Victoria’s sex life wasn’t a better secret."

"Clemens was afraid that he’d lose his temper and cuss out King John as no one else in the universe had ever been cussed out before."

"Let's give this entity which you call soul another name. Soul has too many incorrect meanings for humans, too many verbal reverberations, too many contrary definitions."

"Now, this is what the visitor said the Ethicals had learned from the Ancients. The Creator, God, the One Spirit, call it what you will, forms all. It is the universe; the universe is it. But its body is formed of two essences. One is matter, the other, for lack of a better word, is nonmatter."

"By now you must have accepted the fact that your religion, in fact, none of the Earthly religions, truly knew what the afterlife would be. All made guesses, and then established these as articles of faith. Though, in a sense, some were near the mark, if you accept their revelations as symbolic."

"Sometimes I regret we are forbidden any violence whatsoever. Right now, I would like to kick you in the ass."

"Monasticism, retreat from the world, reclusivism, that’s a lot of crap."

"Sometimes you are arrogant, thinking you are better than others. More often you are humble. Too humble. I might even say, sickeningly humble. That is another form of arrogance. True humility is knowing your true place in the cosmic scale."

"If you live very long time or are immortal, perhaps you learn everything about everything in order to pass the time."

"I concluded that extreme mysticism was closely allied to madness."

"I have been forced into this situation and may like it. To survive you must lie better than the liars, deceive more than the deceivers, and kill the killers first! To me it’s sheer necessity, though justified!"

"Malory clung to his faith with fierce obliviousness to “facts”—in itself an indication that he had gone mad, if his critics were to be believed."

"Everybody should fear only one person, and that person should be himself."

"Beauty is beautiful because it is doomed to perish!"

"Suddenly, he was weeping. The tears were for the good things that had been or might have been, for the bad things that had been but should not have been."

"Imagination was the great cozener of the past."

"“We’re not that stupid!” “No, but you’re that impulsive. Which is a form of stupidity.”"

"He seemed to get along with just about everybody. Which, in my book, makes him suspect."

"Anyway, women are about as mysterious as a tin mine. All you have to do is carry a lantern into the dark places, and you see everything. But men like to think women are the eternally mysterious. That saves men the trouble of asking questions, taking a little time and effort."

"“I don’t believe in women’s intuition,” Sam said. “They’re just culturally conditioned to observe different patterns of action and speech, different gestures and inflections from those men observe. They’re more sensitive to certain subtleties because of this conditioning.”"

"“At least, they tried,” Johnston said. “So did the eunuch in the sheik’s harem.”"

"If you’ve read your history…then you’ll know that the medieval noblemen were notorious for treachery. Their god was Opportunity, no matter how many churches they built for the glory of Church and God. They had all the morals of a hyena."

"“I thought that was just one of the wild tales those visionaries had invented,” Jill said. “I didn’t put any more credence in it than I did in the ravings of Earth prophets. Moses, Jesus, Zoroaster, Mohammed, Buddha, Smith, Eddy, the whole sick crew.”"

"I had the honor to serve at the siege of Arras. Where I received a thrust through the throat, the second of the serious wounds that convinced me, along with all else I had seen of wars miseries and horrors, that Mars was the stupidest of the gods."

"Was destiny anything but chance? Probably. But the odds against this happening on Earth were infinity to one."

"“The trouble with you, Peter—one of the troubles—is you worry too much about other people’s behavior. And you have too high ideals for them, ideals which you yourself don’t try to live up to.” “I know I can’t live up to them, so I make a no pretense,” Frigate said. “But it bothers me that others claim to have these ideals and to be living up to them. If I point out that they aren’t, they get angry.” The little Moor chuckled. “Naturally. Your criticism threatens their self-image. If that were to be destroyed, they, too, would be destroyed. At least, they think so.”"

"The religions of Jesus, Paul, and Buddha had started to degenerate before their founders were cold in their graves. Just as St. Francis’ order had begun corrupting before its founder’s body was rotten."