Quotes from Terry Pratchett

The Egregious Professor of Grammar and Usage would have corrected this to 'she was not she', which would have caused the Professor of Logic to spit out his drink.

Mrs Cake? What is a Mrs Cake? You have ... ghastly Things from the Dungeon Dimensions and things, yes? Terrible hazards of your ungodly profession? said the Chief Priest. Yes. We have someone called Mrs Cake. Ridcully gave him an inquiring look. Don't ask, said the priest, shuddering. Just be grateful you'll never have to find out.

El C. I. de una muchedumbre es el C. I. de su miembro más estúpido dividido por el número de sus integrantes.

Why is it all Mr. Dibbler's films are set against the background of a world gone mad?" said the dwarf. Soll's eyes narrowed. "Because Mr. Dibbler," he growled, "is a very observant man.

Yes. So what? Lots of people in history have only done their jobs and look at the trouble they caused.

Witches preferred to cut enemies dead with a look. There was no sense in killing your enemy. How would she know you'd won?

You had to stop discussing politics or you would run right into it, causing no damage to anything but yourself.

That's how it goes. Meetings in rooms. A little diplomacy, a little give and take, a promise here, an understanding there. That's how real revolutions happen.

Nanny Ogg was sitting in a chair by the fire with a quart mug in one hand, and was conducting the reprise with a cigar. She grinned when she saw Granny's face. "What ho, my old boiler," she screeched above the din. "See you turned up, then. Have a drink. Have two. Wotcher, Magrat. Pull up a chair and call the cat a bastard.

People were good at imagining hells, and some they occupied while they were alive.

call it empathy. That means putting yourself in the place of the other person and seeing their point of view. I suppose it's because in the very olden days, when humans had to fight fir themselves every day, they needed to find people who would fight with them too, and together we lived—yes, and prospered. Humans need other humans—it's as simple as that.

Anathema didn't only believe in ley-lines, but in seals, whales, bicycles, rainforests, whole grain in loaves, recycled paper, white South Africans out of South Africa, and Americans out of practically everywhere down to and including Long Island. She didn't compartmentalize her beliefs. They were welded into one enormous, seamless belief, compared with which that held by Joan of Arc seemed a mere idle notion.

And yet somehow that lodged in the mind as a crime beyond mercy. There will be no mercy for a song now silenced. No redemption for killing hope in the darkness. I know you. You

And, with alarming suddenness, nothing happened.

Pigbog wished he'd paid more attention to the Book of Revelation. If he'd known he was going to be in it, he'd have read it more carefully.

For example, it is said that someone at a party once asked the famous philosopher Ly Tin Weedle "Why are you here?" and the reply took three years.

Normally he came up the stairs as if he hated every one of them.

At least nothing particularly dreadful was happening to him right now. Probably it was only a matter of time.

Ave! Duci novo, similis duci seneci",' murmured Mr Slant, drily as only a zombie can manage. 'Or, as we used to say at school, "Ave! Bossa nova, similis bossa seneca!"' He gave a little schoolmasterly laugh. He felt at home with dead languages. 'Of course, grammatically that is completely—' 'And that means . . . ?' said Madam. 'Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss,' muttered Dr Follett.

Talent just defines what you do...It doesn't define what you are. Deep down, I mean. When you know what you are, you can do anything

Oh, you mean like Orpheo rescuing Euniphon from the Underworld?" said Roland. Rob Anybody just stared. "It's a myth from Ephebe," Roland went on. "It's supposed to be a love story, but it's really a metaphor for the annual return of summer. There's a lot of versions of that story." (...) "A metaphor is a kind o' lie to help people understand what's true," said Billy Bigchin, but this didn't help much.

At the end of the world is a great big mountain of granite rock a mile high,' she said. 'And every year, a tiny bird flies all the way to the rock and wipes its beak on it. Well, when the little bird has worn the mountain down to the size of a grain of sand . . . that's the day I'll marry you, Rob Anybody Feegle!

He thought of the deep crevasses and windy caves of Underlay, and the stories of the creatures that dwelt there. Of course, he didn't believe in them. He'd told them, because the handing on of an oral mythology was very important to a developing culture, but he didn't believe in supernatural monsters. He shivered. He hoped they didn't believe in him.

It is said that the gods play games with the lives of men. But what games, and why, and the identities of the actual pawns, and what the game is, and what the rules are - who knows? Best not to speculate. Thunder rolled... It rolled a six.