All Quotes

"My grandfather for example only died twice, once during the war and once in the 1980s."

"Nothin'g sa'ys q'uality fantas'y l'ike misuse'd apos'tro'phes."

"All gone. Zelazny was one of the first times I looked at something I had had familiarity with to find the spot where the memory should have been empty, replaced by a scrawled "Moved South for the Fishing" sign. Calculus was another loss. It was quite upsetting to reach for a skill and find nothing."

"I find this varies considerably from near-death experience to near-death experience. For example, having a wandering loonie break down the door of my game store to look for women was so funny the entire concussion and pools of blood thing was a minor footnote. Being sucked out into the Atlantic by an undertow was deeply irritating. Having a snowba[n]k collapse on me was alarming because of the claustrophobia issue. The car wreck was over almost before I had time to realise what was happening."

"I think once you start eating people you should stop claiming to be a vegetarian, even if you only eat bad people."

"The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary."

"Look, I tried the cat experiment. On the third trial, the cat was dead. On each of the subsequent 413 trials, it remained dead. Am I doing something wrong?"

"Romeo and Juliet *died*. I always liked that in a teen romance story."

"[F]olks would better off dipping their heads in a bucket of liquid [nitrogen] and battering them against a tree very very hard than reading Baxter's Titan. It would not surprise me if reading that book causes birth defects."

"This is the sort of book that justifies fatwahs. If WWIII occurred right now, we could die happy knowing Baxter would never write again. If a dinosaur killing asteroid was headed for Earth and I knew Baxter had another book coming up, I would campaign for letting the rock hit, since it is obviously the work of a benevolent deity trying to save us from another Titan."

"I can't help but notice that everytime I fly somewhere, other people's planes fall out of the sky."

"A lot of my stories end with "And when I regained consciousness, there was a crowd standing around looking at me.""

"You may have trouble getting permission to aero or lithobrake asteroids on Earth."

"Before it exploded one night, I went to a four grade, two room schoolhouse and we had textbooks from the 1940s."

"John Barnes is incredibly variable. Pete's Rule (Never buy a Barnes with sodomy in it) is a good one but unfortunately the publisher does not put that kind of stuff on the cover."

"Someday I'd like to read a story about competent people on Mars."

"I'm the king of the world!"

"I got everything I need right here with me. I got air in my lungs, a few blank sheets of paper. I mean, I love waking up in the morning not knowing what's gonna happen, or who I'm gonna meet, where I'm gonna wind up. Just the other night, I was sleeping under a bridge, and now, here I am on the grandest ship in the world having champagne with you fine people. I figured life's a gift and I don't intend on wasting it. You never know what hand you're gonna get dealt next. You learn to take life as it comes at you... To make each day count."

"ROSE!!! ROSE, OVER HERE!"

"[looks at back of salvaged mirror] This was mine. How extraordinary! And it looks the same as it did the last time I saw it. [turns mirror over] The reflection has changed a bit."

"It was the ship of dreams to everyone else. To me, it was a slave ship taking me back to America in chains. Outwardly, I was everything a well-brought up girl should be. Inside, I was screaming."

"[narrating] I saw my whole life as if I already lived it. An endless parade of parties and cotillions, yachts and polo matches. Always the same narrow people, the same mindless chatter. I felt like I was standing at a great precipice, with no one to pull me back, no one who cared or even noticed."

"1,500 people went into the sea when Titanic sank from under us. There were 20 boats floating nearby and only one came back. One. 6 were saved from the water, myself included. 6... out of 1,500. Afterward, the 700 people in the boats had nothing to do but wait. Wait to die, wait to live, wait for an absolution that would never come."

"[About Cal] That's the last time I ever saw him. He married, of course, and inherited his millions, but The Crash of '29 hit his interests hard, and he put a pistol in his mouth that year...or so I read."

"Benjamin Guggenheim: [after being offered a lifebelt] No, thank you. We are dressed in our best, and are prepared to go down as gentlemen. But we would like a brandy!!!"

"Colonel Astor: I am looking for my damned dog. Madeleine asked me to look for the dog..."

"Cosmo Gordon: [after being asked to go back to pick up more people] It's out of the question!!!"

"Quartermaster Hichens: It's our lives now, not theirs."

"Hichens: And there'll be one less on this boat, if you don't SHUT THAT HOLE IN YOUR FACE!!!"

"Frederick Fleet: [to Reginald Lee] If that's what it takes for us two to get warm, I'd rather not, if it's all the same to you, alright?"

"Fleet: Bugger me!"

"Fleet: Pick up, you bastards!"

"Fleet: ICEBERG, RIGHT AHEAD!!!"

"Fleet: Why ain't they turning?!"

"Fleet: Oy, that was a close shave weren't it?"

"Reginald Lee: [to Frederick Fleet] Smell ice, can ya? Bleedin' Christ."

"Hartley: Right, boys, like the Captain said. Nice and cheery; so there's no panic. Wedding dance!"

"Hartley: Well, they don't listen to us at dinner, either. Come on, let's play. It will keep us warm. Orpheus!"

"Hartley: Gentlemen, it has been a privilege playing with you tonight."

"Andrews: About half, actually. I installed these new welin type davits which can take an extra row of boats here...but it was thought, by some, that the deck would look too cluttered, so, I was over-ruled. But you can sleep soundly, young Rose. I have built a ship strong, safe and true. She is as unsinkable as it is possible to make a ship, and she can handle a collision impressively. If the ship ever is sinking, just remember what I told you about these lifeboats. You must decide to get in."

"Andrews: The ship will sink. In an hour, or so...all of this will be at the bottom of the Atlantic."

"Andrews: I'm sorry I couldn't build you a better ship, young Rose."

"E Deck Steward: What do you think you're doing? You'll have to pay for that y'know. That's White Star Line property!!!!"

"Gate Steward 2: Go back down the main stairwell like I told you!!!"

"Steward: Miss, you shouldn’t be here right now!"

"Lewis Bodine: [narrating an animation of the Titanic sinking] Okay here we go; she hits the ‘berg on the starboard side, right? She kinda bumps along punching holes like Morse code ‘deet-deet-deet’, along the side, below the water line. Then the forward compartments start to flood. Now as the water level rises it spills over the watertight bulk heads which unfortunately don’t go any higher than E Deck, so now as the bow goes down, the stern rises up. Slow at first then faster and faster until finally she’s got her whole ass is sticking up in the air, and that’s a big ass, we’re talking 20-30,000 TONS. And the hull’s not designed to deal with that pressure so what happens? “KEEG” she splits. Right down to the keel and the stern falls back level. Then as the bow sinks it pulls the stern vertical then finally detaches. Now the stern section kinda bobs there like a cork for a couple of minutes, floods, then finally goes under about 2:20 A.M., 2 hours and 40 minutes after the collision. The bow section planes away landing about half a mile away going 20-30 knots when it hits the ocean floor, “BOOM”. Pretty cool, huh?"

"Collide with Destiny."

"Nothing on Earth could come between them."

"[from trailer] Take a journey back in time, in search of a mystery locked beneath the sea. This December, you will be given the key."

"[from TV spot] On December 19th, the most incredible event that ever happened will happen to you."