Absurdists

"But I remember that Ernest Hemingway told Bernard Berenson that the secret of his greatest book was that there was no symbolism. The sea was the sea, the old man an old man, the boy a boy, the marlin a marlin, and the sharks the same as other sharks. People empower these things themselves, groping beneath the surface, always looking for more."

"Faith is beyond me. I will settle for hope."

"But I believe it was the Rilke who said that life is a game we must begin playing before we have learned the rules. Do we ever? Are there really rules? Perhaps I read too many poets."

"“And what is imagination?” “A thing born of feeling and reason.”"

"We revisit the mental landscape of childhood in times of trouble."

"“Statistics aren’t the same thing as destiny, Bennie. Everybody makes his own.” “Statistics or destiny?” “Both, I guess.” “I think that if something’s going to happen, it’s going to happen.” “I don’t. I happen to think that the human will, backed by a sane mind can exercise some measure of control over events. If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t be in the racket I’m in.”"

"If I had just done something decent and noble, why did I feel so stupid about it? Probably because it was out of character."

"But love can mean many things. It can be an instrument of aggression or a function of disease."

"I was, at one level, still plagiarizing my earlier self. Nothing wrong with that, if some growth has occurred in the meantime."

"Of the three basic elements of any fiction—plot, character, and setting—it is the setting that requires extra attention in science fiction and fantasy."

"The important thing for me is the development and refinement of one’s perception of the world, the experimentation with viewpoints. This lies at the heart of storytelling, and all of the mechanical techniques one learns are merely tools. It is the writer’s approach to material that makes a story unique."

"Do you know what happens to artists who fall in love with their models? They come to a bad end. The same applies to scientists."

"I have no intention of climbing Fuji and accounting for myself, to God or to anything else. Only the insecure and the uncertain require justification. I do what I must. If the deities have any questions they can come down from Fuji and ask me. Otherwise, this is the closest commerce between us. That which transcends should only be admired from afar."

"The Hellenic world did not view the passage of time as we do. History was considered in an episodic sense, as the struggles of an unchanging mankind against a relentless and unchanging fate. The slow process of organic evolution had not yet been detected, and the grandest model for a world view was the seeming changeless patterning of the stars. It took the same processes that set the stage for science fiction—eighteenth-century rationalism and nineteenth-century science—to provide for the first time in the history of the world a sense of historical direction, of time as a developmental, nonrepetitive sequence. This particular world view became a part of science fiction in a far more explicit fashion than in any other body of storytelling, as it provided the basis for its favorite exercise: extrapolation. I feel that because of this, science fiction is the form of literature least affected by Aristotle’s dicta with respect to the nature of the human condition, which he saw as immutable, and the nature of man’s fate, which he saw as inevitable."

"Anyway—as I was saying—there are for me stories of character, stories of idea and stories of image. These refer to the portals by which they enter my universe. The completed product, in the best of all possible worlds, should contain all three elements. But two is okay. And I’ll even settle for one on a bad day when I need the money."

"True epics of course are few and historically well spaced, but that slightly more mundane ingredient, the speculative impulse, be it of Classic, Christian or Renaissance shading, which ornamented Western literature with romances, fables, exotic voyages and utopias, seemed to me basically the same turn of fancy exercised today in science fiction, working then with the only objects available to it. It took the Enlightenment, it took science, it took the industrial revolution to provide new sources of idea that, pushed, poked, inverted and rotated through higher spaces, resulted in science fiction. When the biggest, the most interesting ideas began emerging from science, rather than from theology or the exploration of new lands, hindsight makes it seem logical that something like science fiction had to be delivered."

"Do not preach to me of progress. Change is not desirable for its own sake, but only if it offers improvement."

"He is the Angel of Death. Life lasts long, save for him; populations would rise up like tidal waves and inundate worlds, save for him; criminals would require trials and sentencing, save for him; and of course history might reflect unnecessary twisting and turnings, save for the Angel of Death."

"“The power to hurt,” he said, snapping on a lapel microphone and activating his recorder, “has evolved in a direct relationship to technological advancement.”"

"There is some thing vulnerable about Dorothy, times when she lapses into such a strong dependence that he feels oddly moved. Other times, it just irritates the hell out of him. Perhaps this is the closest he can come to love now, an occasional ambivalent response to being needed."

"“Yes, I can understand greed.” “I call it a desire for security.”"

"I know, too, that death is the only god who comes when you call."

"Times have changed since the Good Book was written, and you can’t hold with a purely Fundamentalist approach in complex times."

"“No,” he said. “You cannot trick me into applying my principles to a hypothetical situation which will only work out the way that you want it to. Not when I am certain that it will not arise.”"

"“Cute,” she said, smiling. “If the liberal arts do nothing else they provide engaging metaphors for the thinking they displace.”"

"On the water, aboard the Proteus, the crowding, the activities, the tempo, of life in the cities, on the land, are muted, slowed—fictionalized—by the metaphysical distancing a few meters of water can provide. We alter the landscape with great facility, but the ocean has always seemed unchanged, and I suppose by extension we are infected with some feelings of timelessness whenever we set out upon her."

"I decided that the devil finds work for idle hands and thanked him for his suggestion."

"Robots are nice to work with. They mind their own business, and they never have anything to say."

"I had troubles of my own—and even the most heartening of philosophical vistas is no match for, say, a toothache, if it happens to be your own."

"All of these things considered, it is not surprising that one can detect echoes, correspondences and even an eternal return or two within the work of a single author. The passage of time does bring changes, yea and alas; but still, I would recognize myself anywhere."

"A bizarrerie of fires, cunabulum of light, it moved with a deft, almost dainty deliberation, phasing into and out of existence like a storm-shot piece of evening; or perhaps the darkness between the flares was more akin to its truest nature — swirl of black ashes assembled in prancing cadence to the lowing note of desert wind down the arroyo behind buildings as empty yet filled as the pages of unread books or stillnesses between the notes of a song."

"Freedom of expression must also bow to the necessity for clear communication, as many of science fiction’s failed experiments of the sixties demonstrate."

"People haven’t changed. They are as rational—and irrational—as they were in the old days. They are as moral and law-abiding—and not—as ever. Many new things have been learned, many new situations evolved, but I do not believe that the nature of man has altered significantly in the time you’ve slept. Nothing you do is going to change that. You may be able to alter a few features of the times, but would it really be proper to meddle? Everything is so interdependent today that even you would not be able to predict all the consequences of any actions you take. You might do more harm than good; and whatever you do, man’s nature will remain the same."

"“And your oath? To right wrongs, to punish the wicked…?” “The longer I lived the more difficult it became to determine what was a wrong and who was wicked. Make it clear to me again and I may go back into business.”"

"“It is no shame to lose to me, mortal. Even among mythical creatures there are very few who can give a unicorn a good game.” “I am pleased that you were not wholly bored,” Martin said. “Now will you tell me what you were talking about concerning the destruction of my species?” “Oh, that,” Tlingel replied."

"The burden of proof is on the moralist. Your judgment is no longer sufficient for me."

"The garden of life never seems to confine itself to the plot philosophers have laid out for its convenience. Maybe a few more tractors would do the trick."

"Occasionally, there arises a writing situation where you see an alternative to what you are doing, a mad, wild gamble of a way for handling something, which may leave you looking stupid, ridiculous or brilliant — you just don't know which. You can play it safe there, too, and proceed along the route you'd mapped out for yourself. Or you can trust your personal demon who delivered that crazy idea in the first place. Trust your demon."

"At the end of the season of sorrows comes the time of rejoicing. Spring, like a well-oiled clock, noiselessly indicates this time."

"Some are born to obscurity and others only achieve it through diligent effort."

"I didn’t say anything because I didn’t have anything to say."

"Such is the essence of valor: an unthinking moment, a spark along the spinal nerves, predetermined by the sum total of everything you have ever done, wished to do or not to do, and wish you had done, or hadn’t, and then comes the pain."

"People never pay attention to weather reports; this, I believe, is a constant factor in man’s psychological makeup, stemming probably from an ancient tribal distrust of the shaman. You want them to be wrong. If they’re right, then they’re somehow superior, and this is even more uncomfortable than getting wet."

"“It was an assassination attempt, wasn’t it?” “Who knows? Yesterday’s politics are not worth the paper wasted on its promises, its threats.”"

"Two days, like icebergs—bleak, blank, half-melting, all frigid, mainly out of sight, and definitely a threat to peace of mind—drifted by and were good to put behind."

"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us."

"They’re here and we’re here, and they think we’re gods—maybe because we do nothing for them but make them miserable."

"I thought back over my life. How does a man come to climb mountains? Is he drawn by the heights because he is afraid of the level land? Is he such a misfit in the society of men that he must flee and try to place himself above it? The way up is long and difficult, but if he succeeds they must grant him a garland of sorts. And if he falls, this too is a kind of glory. To end, hurled from the heights to the depths in hideous ruin and combustion down, is a fitting climax for the loser—for it, too, shakes mountains and minds, stirs things like thoughts below both, is a kind of blasted garland of victory in defeat, and cold, so cold that final action, that the movement is somewhere frozen forever into a statuelike rigidity of ultimate intent and purpose thwarted only by the universal malevolence we all fear exists. An aspirant saint or hero who lacks some necessary virtue may still qualify as a martyr, for the only thing that people will really remember in the end is the end."

"The days that followed were a game I enjoyed playing. Fake indecision is delicious when people want you to do something."

"Between the black of yesterday and the white of tomorrow is the great gray of today, filled with nostalgia and fear of the future."