Eleanor Arnason > Quotes

“The man is an asshole."
"You might say that, but you'd be maligning a part of the body that is of unquestioned utility. I prefer to think of Lugala as a tumor.”
― Eleanor Arnason, Ring of Swords

“Do not mislead Perez Anna or malign the people who have sheltered you for over twenty years. We are not - what is the word for eaters of one another?"
"Capitalists," said Anna.”
― Eleanor Arnason, Ring of Swords

“I am the Little Bug Spirit. I come to people when they begin to take themselves too seriously. They think they are big. I cut them down to size." This angered me. I tried to speak, but I couldn't get my thoughts together. The person went on, “I am the stone under your foot. I am the bug that bites you in the ass. I am the fart that comes when you are introduced to the important visiting professor. I am menstrual cramps and diarrhea." I kept getting angrier. “My tools are lies and tricks, misunderstandings and accidents. Everything stupid and undignified happens because of me. Hola! I am something!”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“Isn't that petty?"
"Anna, you have not yet seen pettiness. When a couple of tough guys like the general and Lugala Tsu decide to confront each other, vistas of pettiness open up that you and I can barely comprehend.”
― Eleanor Arnason, Ring of Swords

“Who of those born in future generations will believe this? I myself who saw it can hardly believe that such was possible.”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“How was she able to imagine a world like this one, when all she had experienced was ice and sunlight and blood? There is no good answer to this question. Maybe the world was somehow implicit in the monster’s body and her parents’ organs. Maybe the Goddess could see into the future. Her abilities are many and not well understood. If so, she was able to use the world-that-came-into-existence as a model for the world-not-yet-made; and we, living and acting now, may be shaping the world at its moment of origin. In”
― Eleanor Arnason, Hwarhath Stories: Transgressive Tales by Aliens

“You acted, as far as I can tell, out of honor and compassion, but your action was unnecessary and inappropriate. Does the fact that your action was unnecessary make it meaningless? “What you did was contrary to the will of the Goddess and to all good sense. But you didn’t know that. How can I judge the behavior of an alien, a person from a culture that does not seem to have the first idea of what is decent?” He paused and drew in a breath, hissing softly. “Does intent matter or only the action? Does action matter or only the result?”
― Eleanor Arnason, Ring of Swords

“Knowledge—by itself—is an intervention. Our presence changes the way the natives see the world. According to her, there is no way to study these people without causing change." “The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle,”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“I am the Little Bug Spirit. I come to people when they begin to take themselves too seriously. They think they are big. I cut them down to size.”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“I, me, my, mine— Each one a danger sign. “That’s what the witches used to tell us. Listen for those words, they said. If a person uses them too often or with too much emphasis, then he or she is sinking down into the well of self. And that is a dangerous situation. You may be face-to-face with a greedhead or a power freak.”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“What had they been thinking of, those people then? They had left their descendants almost no water and great mountains of uranium. What kind of inheritance was that? How did they think we were going to survive?”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“Imagine guilt as an iron band fastened around something that is growing: the trunk of a tree, the neck of a child. Sooner or later, one of two things must happen. If the band does not break, the growing thing will be deformed. “Commit yourself to change, Lixia, to living in the present, to making and remaking who you are. Do the best you can. Understand what you do. And do not feel guilty.”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People

“[Homosexualidad.] La palabra me desagrada. No me gusta el hecho de que su formación sea irregular, y siempre he considerado que apesta a ciencia y a intelecto. Preferiría una palabra que oliera a vida corriente. (...) Sus raíces pertenecen a dos lenguas distintas: "Homo", que en griego significa "igual" y "sexual" que procesde de la palabra latiana para "sexo". Alguien la acuñó en el esiglo XIX y no logro imaginar en qué estaba pensando.”
― Eleanor Arnason

“It's a typical Western bias. You think a tool is more important than a dream because a tool can be measured and a dream cannot.”
― Eleanor Arnason, A Woman of the Iron People