Mark Devaney > Mark's Quotes

“If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all—in which case, you fail by default.”
― J.K. Rowling

“Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one.”
― Terry Pratchett

“It's not worth doing something unless someone, somewhere, would much rather you weren't doing it.”
― Terry Pratchett

“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.”
― Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

“Getting an education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge to pass it on.”
― Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

“The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to the presence of those who think they've found it.”
― Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment

“She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful: something to be admired from a distance, not up close.”
― Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

“If there was anything that depressed him more than his own cynicism, it was that quite often it still wasn't as cynical as real life.”
― Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!

“...inside every old person is a young person wondering what happened.”
― Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

“Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder.
Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels.
Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies.
Elves are glamorous. They project glamour.
Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment.
Elves are terrific. They beget terror.
The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning.
No one ever said elves are nice.
Elves are bad.”
― Terry Pratchett, Lords and Ladies

“The enemy isn't men, or women, it's bloody stupid people and no one has the right to be stupid.”
― Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment

“Gods prefer simple, vicious games, where you Do Not Achieve Transcendence but Go Straight To Oblivion; a key to the understanding of all religion is that a god's idea of amusement is Snakes and Ladders with greased rungs.”
― Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters

“A European says: I can't understand this, what's wrong with me? An American says: I can't understand this, what's wrong with him?
I make no suggestion that one side or other is right, but observation over many years leads me to believe it is true.”
― Terry Pratchett

“Humans need fantasy to be human. To be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape.”
― Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

“But here's some advice, boy. Don't put your trust in revolutions. They always come around again. That's why they're called revolutions.”
― Terry Pratchett, Night Watch

“There was this about vampires : they could never look scruffy. Instead, they were... what was the word... deshabille. It meant untidy, but with bags and bags of style.”
― Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment

“She was also, by the standards of other people, lost. She would not see it like that. She knew where she was, it was just that everywhere else didn't.”
― Terry Pratchett, Equal Rites

“Just because someone's a member of an ethnic minority doesn't mean they're not a nasty small-minded little jerk.”
― Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay

“The truth may be out there, but the lies are inside your head.”
― Terry Pratchett

“Sometimes dead is better”
― Stephen King, Pet Sematary

“The soil of a man’s heart is stonier; a man grows what he can and tends it.”
― Stephen King, Pet Sematary

“Whenever I tell people I'm a misanthrope they react as though that's a bad thing, the idiots. I live in London, for God's sake. Have you walked down Oxford Street recently? Misanthropy's the only thing that gets you through it. It's not a personality flaw, it's a skill.

It's nothing to do with sheer numbers. Move me to a remote cottage in the Hebrides and I'd learn to despise the postman, even if he only visited once a year. I can't abide other people, with their stink and their noise and their irritating ringtones. Bill Hicks called the human race 'a virus with shoes', and if you ask me he was being unduly hard on viruses; I'd consider a career in serial killing if the pay wasn't so bad.”
― Charlie Brooker, Screen Burn

“I'm somewhat socially inept. Slide me between two strangers at any light-hearted jamboree and I'll either rock awkwardly and silently on my heels, or come out with a stone-cold conversation-killer like, "This room's quite rectangular, isn't it?" I glide through the social whirl with all the elegance of a dog in high heels”
― Charlie Brooker