Science Fiction Authors

"Religious faith often finds itself at odds with story-telling. Puritans ban acting companies. Islam is uneasy about all forms of representation. And why? Because the experience of walking out of the theater after a performance is a paradigm of disillusionment, and religious people are officially supposed to believe, first and foremost, in their own literal faith, from which there are no exits. They've taken the big leap, and live, ever after, in free fall."

"He especially liked ads for shampoos and hair coloring. The women in them seemed to regard their hair as independent, capricious entities, whom they must placate and provide with food."

"Marvin Kolodny responded with a boyish grin and offered his hand. An American flag has been tattooed on his right forearm. On a scroll circling the flagpole was the following inscription:"

"The way we work, the way we talk, the way we watch television or walk down the street, even the way we fuck, or maybe that especially—each of those is part of the problem of identity. We can’t do any of those things authentically until we find out who we really are and be that person, inside and out, instead of the person other people want us to be. Usually those other people, if they want us to be something we aren’t, are using us as a laboratory for working out their own identity problems."

"Jobs are like going to church: it’s nice once or twice a year to sing along and eat something and all that, but unless you really believe there’s something holy going on, it gets to be a drag going in every single week."

"All the things that happen and seem so important at the time, and yet you forget them, one after another."

"Boz, who had no patience with Science, always confused north and south."

"People in intolerable circumstances will pray to anything. Truly, there are no atheists in foxholes: the men there pray to the bombs that they may land somewhere else."

""Use yer heads! A barnyard goose tastes better 'an a wild one cause it don't use its muscles. The same oughta hold true for a giant's brains!"—Bruenor Battlehammer, explaining his new recipe in response to Drizzt's and Wulfgar's expressions of horror and disgust."

"I shudder at the concept of a world tamed."

"One had been dismissed — and subsequently executed — for a foiled assassination attempt on a higher ranking student, a second had been killed in the practice arena, and the third died in his bunk of natural causes — for a dagger in the heart quite naturally ends one's life."

""Artemis Entreri is dead. He died in the Protector's House in Memnon, chasing ghosts"."

""Let us say that we did battle, and I emerged the victor. By your reasoning, I would thus become the rightful King of Vaa-oh, wait. I see now. That would not serve, since I haven't the proper bloodline. What a cunning system you have there. You and all the other self-proclaimed royalty of Faerun. By your conditions, you alone are kings and queens and lords and ladies of court. You alone matter, while the peasant grovels and kneels in the mud, and since you alone are 'rightful' in the eyes of this god or that, then the peasant cannot complain. He must accept his muddy lot in life and revel in his misery, all in the knowledge that he serves the rightful king". Gareth's jaw tightened, and he ground his teeth as he continued to stare unblinking at Entreri. "You should have had Kane kill me, back at the castle. Break the mirror, King Gareth. You will fancy yourself prettier in that instance"."

""I assure you, paladin king, that if I had a sword in hand, I would willingly cut out your heart, here and now. If you expect me to beg look elsewhere. The fool monk can bring me to my knees, but if I am not there of my own choosing, then calling it begging would ring as hollow as does your crown, yes?" —Artemis Entreri"

"Or animated", Friar Dudgald added. "And you know of course that to animate the corpse of a goodly man is a crime against all that is good and right. A crime against the Broken God!" Entreri stared at Dudgald, narrowed his eyes, grinned, and spat on the floor. "Not my god", he explained. Celedon rushed over and slugged him. He staggered, just a step, but refused to fall. "Gareth is king by blood and by deed!" Dudgald shouted. "Anointed by Ilmater himself!" "As every drow matron claims to be anointed by Lolth!" the stubborn prisoner cried. "Lord Ilmater strike you dead!" Lady Christine shouted. "Fetch your sword and strike for him", Entreri shouted right back. "Or get your sword and give me my own, and we will learn whose god is the stronger!"

""If you are to be so emotionally wounded when you are bested in battle, then perhaps you would do well to hone your skills". —Artemis Entreri"

""Will you grant the audience?" "Of cour-", Jarlaxle started to answer, but Entreri grasped his shoulder and shifted in front. "Tell King Gareth we do not enjoy the spectacle of an army at our doorstep unannounced. But even so, Gareth may enter my home. We have many tall towers here, as you can see. Please tell Gareth, from me, that he is most welcomed to dive headlong off of any of them"."

""There are reasons for things that a casual observer might not understand".—Jarlaxle Baenre"

""Would that he slips with both and hits himself repeatedly in the face", Entreri muttered to Jarlaxle. "So then when he's gone, my friend Entreri can take his place", the drow quipped back. "Shut up". "He is a powerful ally". "And a mighty enemy". "Watch him closely, then". "From behind"."

""It is undeniably beautiful, do you not agree?" Jarlaxle asked, looking back at the soaring cathedral, with its tall spires, soaring buttresses, and great, colored windows. "The mask of a god", Entreri replied sourly. "The mask or the face?" asked the always-surprising Jarlaxle. Entreri stared hard at his companion, and back at the towering cathedral. "The mask", he said, "or perhaps the illusion, concocted by those who seek to elevate themselves above all others and have not the skills to do so". Jarlaxle looked at him curiously. "A man inferior with the blade or with his thoughts can still so elevate himself", Entreri explained curtly, "if he can impart the belief that some god or other speaks through him. It is the greatest deception in all the world, and one embraced by kings and lords, while minor lying thieves on the streets of Calimport and other cities lose their tongues for so attempting to coax the purses of others". That struck Jarlaxle as the most poignant and revealing insight he had yet pried from the mouth of the elusive Artemis Entreri, a great clue as to who this man truly was."

""Power is always a relative concept".—the illithid Yharaskrik"

"'Never ask for anything! Never for anything, and especially from those who are stronger than you. They'll make the offer themselves, and give everything themselves.'"

"'Unfortunately I cannot show it to you,' replied the master, 'because I burned it in my stove.I'm sorry but I don't believe you,' said Woland. 'You can't have done. Manuscripts don't burn.'"

"No documents, no person."

"Manuscripts don't burn."

"'Don't be afraid, Queen … don't be afraid, Queen, the blood has long since gone into the earth. And where it was spilled, grapevines are already growing.'"

"The hope that she might regain her happiness made her fearless."

"'Once upon a time there was a lady. She had no children, and no happiness either. And at first she cried for a long time, but then she became wicked . . .'"

"Follow me reader! Who told you that there is no true, faithful, eternal love in this world! May the liar's vile tongue be cut out!"

"We have no idea whether there were any other strange occurences in Moscow that night, and we have no intention of trying to find out, since the time has come for us to proceed to Part Two of this true narrative. Follow me, reader!"

"`Second freshness - that's what is nonsense! There is only one freshness - the first - and it is also the last. And if sturgeon is of the second freshness, that means it is simply rotten.'"

"'What's the use of dying in a ward surrounded by a lot of groaning and croaking incurables? Wouldn't it be much better to throw a party with that twenty-seven thousand and take poison and depart for the other world to the sound of violins, surrounded by lovely drunken girls and happy friends?'"

"'What is all this? Damn me if I don't have you thrown out of here!' The beast just smiled and said: 'Damn you, I think you said? Very well!'"

"The tongue can conceal the truth, but the eyes never! You're asked an unexpected question, you don't even flinch, it takes just a second to get yourself under control, you know just what you have to say to hide the truth, and you speak very convincingly, and nothing in your face twitches to give you away. But the truth, alas, has been disturbed by the question, and it rises up from the depths of your soul to flicker in your eyes and all is lost."

"There was something uncommonly fake and uncertain in every line of these articles, depite their threatening and self-assured tone. I kept thinking . . . that the authors of these articles weren't saying what they wanted to say, and that that was why they were so furious."

"[S]aid the not entirely suppressed old Ivan, rearing his head from inside the new one, although without much confidence."

"‘He's clever,' thought Ivan,' I must admit there are some smart people even among the intelligentsia'"

"Foreign visitors . . . how impressed you all are with foreign visitors! But they come in many different varieties."

"Ryukhin showed himself no mercy-'I don't believe in anything I've ever written!'"

"Да, человек смертен, но это было бы ещё полбеды. Плохо то, что он иногда внезапно смертен, вот в чём фокус!"

"Well, as everyone knows, once witchcraft gets started, there's no stopping it."

"It's all over, so let's not burden the telegraph system."

"'I do not know these good men,' replied the prisoner."

"'Oh, no, you don't look like a halfwit,' the procurator replied quietly and smiled some strange smile."

"'Kant ought to be arrested and given three years in Solovki asylum for that "proof" of his!' Ivan Nikolayich burst out completely unexpectedly. 'Ivan!' whispered Berlioz, embarrassed. But the suggestion to pack Kant off to an asylum not only did not surprise the stranger but actually delighted him. 'Exactly, exactly!' he cried and his green left eye, turned on Berlioz glittered. 'That's exactly the place for him! I said to him myself that morning at breakfast: "If you'll forgive me, professor, your theory is no good. It may be clever but it's horribly incomprehensible. People will think you're mad."' Berlioz's eyes bulged. At breakfast...to Kant?"

"In fact, I'm beginning to fear that this confusion will go on for a long time. And all because he writes down what I said incorrectly."

"In Mikhail Bulgakov's novel The Master and Margarita, the Devil comes to Moscow. What follows is a fearful spiral of denunciation, disappearance and death, at once arbitrary and spiteful, calculated and yet deranged. No work better captures the loathsome quality of the Terror; no scene gets closer to illuminating the surreal atmosphere of the show trials than Nikanor Bosoy's nightmare of being exposed as a foreign currency dealer while sitting in the audience of a variety show in a Moscow theatre. For not every act in the drama required Stalin's instigation; his role was to create an environment in which ordinary men and women - even members of the same family - would denounce one another; in which today's torturer could be tomorrow's victim; in which today's camp commandant could spend the night in the punishment cells."

"How sad, ye gods, how sad the world is at evening, how mysterious the mists over the swamps. You will know it when you have suffered greatly before dying, when you have walked through the world carrying an unbearable burden. You know it too when you are weary and ready to leave this earth without regret; it's mists, it's swamps and it's rivers; ready to give yourself into the arms of death with a light heart, knowing that death alone can comfort you."

"Gods, my gods! How sad the earth is at eventide! How mysterious are the mists over the swamps. Anyone who has wandered in these mists, who has suffered a great deal before death, or flown above the earth, bearing a burden beyond his strength knows this. Someone who is exhausted knows this. And without regret he forsakes the mists of the earth, its swamps and rivers, and sinks into the arms of death with a light heart knowing that death alone . . ."

"They have read your novel . . . and they said only one thing, that, unfortunately, it is not finished. So I wanted to show you your hero. He has been sitting here for about two thousand years, sleeping, but, when the moon is full, he is tormented, as you see, by insomnia. And it torments not only him, but his faithful guardian, the dog. If it is true that cowardice is the most grave vice, then the dog, at least, is not guilty of it. The only thing that brave creature ever feared was thunderstorms. But what can be done, the one who loves must share the fate of the one who is loved."