"Why won't anyone ever answer my questions?" "Because you never stop asking them and especially because you keep asking them even when it's clear that nobody knows the answers." "Well, how do I know that they don't know the answer unless I ask?"

"I think that I say those things that make people so angry, not because I really mean them, but because I simply thought of a clever way to say them. It's a kind of art, to think of the perfect way to say an idea, and when you think of it then you have to say it, because words don't exist until you say them." "A pretty feeble kind of art, Nyef, and I say you should give it up before it gets you killed."

"Nafai knew the rule: when a man acts like a child, he's boyish, and everyone's delighted; when a boy acts the same way, he's childish, and everyone tells him to be a man."

"I've seen Australia and I've lived on an asteroid and I'd take the asteroid."

"'Waterloo was won,'" quoted Rackham, "'on the playing fields of Eton.'" "What the hell does that mean?" asked Carn Carby. "You never even went to Eton." "It was an analogy," said Rackham. "If you hadn't spent your entire childhood playing war games, you'd actually know something. You're all so uneducated."

"I don't care how loyal you think you're going to be, Dink. It's not in you. You're a brat and you always will be. So admit what a lousy follower you are, and go ahead and LEAD."

""And you actually were cuddly," said Carn. "No offense, but you were spunky." "If that's your word for 'bratty little asshole,' said Dink mildly."

"Such fools they were in Battle School, to let so few girls in. It left the boys completely helpless against a woman when they returned to Earth."

"If I have to choose between an omnipotent God who leaves the world in this condition, and a God who has only a little bit of power but really cares and tries to make things better, I'll take you every time. Go on playing God, Hyrum. You're not bad at it. Sometimes you kind of get it right."

"My hands are clean, but not because I wasn't prepared to bloody them."

"“Did they program brattiness into you?” “That’s a trait I developed for myself,” she said. “Do you like it?”"

"Here's the bottom line. I promise you it's entirely legal, and he can't touch you for it. This is how the laws are written. They're designed to protect the fortunes of people as rich as you, while throwing the main tax burden on people in much lower brackets."

"“You can afford me,” said Jane. “I’m cheap and you’re rich.”"

"“Am I hired?” “There is no legal way you can get me out of paying that much of my taxes.” “On the contrary, Mr. Wiggin. The tax laws are designed to trick people into paying more than they have to. That way the rich who are in the know get to take advantage of drastic tax breaks, while those who don’t have such good connections and haven’t yet found an accountant who does are tricked into paying ludicrously higher amounts.”"

"It (i. e., advertising) was like horoscopes—enough blind stabs and some of them are bound to strike a target."

"Even in cultures where marriages are arranged by parents, you're never actually forbidden to fall in love with your mate."

"What does it matter if, by following my heart, I also fulfill someone else's plan?"

"“Are all Polish men as arrogant and intrusive and rude as you?” “Few measure up to my standards, but most try.”"

"Only stupid men trying to seem smart need to be with dumb women. Only weak men trying to look strong are attracted to compliant women."

"“My religion,” said Ms. Brown, “is to try to falsify all hypotheses.”"

"There are many steps on the continuum between controlling something and doing nothing at all."

"Why did people get so upset when somebody mentioned dying? Did they think that if they didn't mention it, it would skip a few people and leave them alive forever?"

"That reminded John Paul of what Andrew had said when he was teaching him to play chess. “You have to think ahead, the next move, the next move, the next move, to see where it’s all going to lead.” John Paul understood the principle as soon as Andrew explained it. But he stopped playing chess anyway, because he didn't care what happened to little plastic figures on a board of sixty-four squares."

"He was only six, but he already knew that he hated it when he had to do what other people wanted, even when he knew that they were wrong. He didn't want to be a soldier. He didn't want to kill. He didn't want to die. He didn't want to obey stupid people."

"“Part of the test,” said Sillain, “is seeing how well you obey orders.” “Then I fail,” said John Paul."

"She knew that her feelings toward Bean were completely different. No such dreams and fantasies. Just a sense of complete acceptance. She belonged with Bean, not the way that a wife belonged with a husband or, God forbid, a girlfriend with a boyfriend, but rather way the left hand belonged to the right. They simply fit. Nothing exciting about it, nothing to write home about. But it could be counted on."

"I don't know a soul who doesn't maintain two separate lists of doctrines — the ones that they believe that they believe; and the ones that they actually try to live by."

"You are so intent that you believe only what you believe that you believe, that you remain utterly blind to what you really believe without believing that you believe it."

"To say what's in their hearts, regardless of shame. It doesn't change what they feel, what they want. It just helps... loosen them up."

"Like running hurdles. Work so hard, jump over every one, fast, high enough but no higher, because you can't afford to hang in the air. And then, when the race is over, you're dripping with sweat, either they beat you or you beat them... and then a couple of guys come out and move the hurdles out of the way. Turns out they were nothing. All that work to jump over them, but now they're gone."

"Love can't conquer anything. Love can't make a scholar into a warrior. Loving her can't make her love me."

"If he was a good man, how could he leave me? So he must not be a good man. But if he isn't good, then why does it hurt so much to lose him? Is it just my pride that's wounded?"

"I took the leap, yes, but I didn't like the ledge where I landed — I fought the bear, I kissed the princess, but now I don't want to be king. Well, where in the fairy tales did it ever say Cinderella had to like being queen?"

""Women's intuition" wasn't intuition at all, it was heightened observation, unconscious registration of subtle clues."

"In the absence of understanding, that was a good a reason as any for living together and making babies and raising them up and throwing them out of the house and then going through the long slow decline together until one of them died and left the other alone again, understanding as little as ever about what their spouses really wanted, who they really were. Was that tragedy? Or was that comedy? Was there really any difference?"

"Having never been in control of his own life, his idea of freedom was simply to break free."

"How could you lose me, when you've never had me, never wanted me?"

"It was his father who had shrunk, who no longer had the power of the giant, of the god, to enfold him and keep him safe."

"How could I hurt her? She'd have to love me before I could do that."

"Living with a god is not what it's cracked up to be. They think their women should be grateful just to have them around."

"Was his very boyishness the reason he was chosen? In that case, was it not a virtue to be admired, and not a failing to be despised?"

"I don't know you, ma'am, and apparently I'm expected to die for you."

"Marriage is about banality. Its purpose is banality, to create an environment of surpassing safety and predictability for young children to grow up in, the foundation of life, the root of inner peace."

"How strange it was that this other woman, this girl-child, should speak of her son so possessively, should speak of his future as if it were her own future."

"More than likely, mother would simply go enigmatic on him, give him one of her inscrutable smiles, and tell him that if he didn't already understand, he never would."

"I never had you, not since you escaped from the womb."

"Before the story he refused to even think about it; after the story, it became conceivable to him, and, once he could conceive of it, it soon became inevitable."

"In Vanya's family, silence had never meant surrender, only tactical retreat."

"We're both damaged property, I guess. Plenty of time for renovation."