Quotes from Jack Vance

I am a legalist and a financial expert, I admit as much; but my disregard for the law goes no farther.

Remark the difference, Lord Faide, between man and metal. A man's normal state is something near madness; he is at all times balanced on a knife-edge between hysteria and apathy. His senses tell him far less of the world then he thinks they do. It is a simple trick to deceive man, to posses him with a demon, to drive him out of his mind, to kill him. But metal is insensible; metal reacts only as its shape and condition dictates, or by the working of miracles.

You're so quiet and subdued! You worry me. Are you well?" "Quite well. Deflated, perhaps. I have been deserted by my enemies. The affair is over. I am done.

For the first time Gersen saw indigenous fauna of Moudervelt: a band of lizard-foxes, with gray-green pangolin scales and a single optic orb. They reared high to watch Gersen pass by; when he slowed the car they advanced with dancing sidelong steps, for purposes Gersen could not guess. He drove on, leaving the troop staring after him.

I know that the history of man is not his technical triumphs, his kills, his victories. It is a composite, a mosaic of a trillion pieces, the account of each man's accommodation with his conscience. This is the true history of the race.

The space age is thirty thousand years old. Men have moved from star to star in search of wealth and glory; the Gaean Reach encompasses a perceptible fraction of the galaxy. Trade routes thread space like capillaries in living tissue; thousands of worlds have been colonized, each different from every other, each working its specific change upon men who live there. Never has the human race been less homogenous.

What a paradox, what a fearful reproach, when the distinction of a few hundred miles — nay, as many feet or even inches! — can transform heinous crime to simple unqualified circumstance!

Q: So then they desist? A: Usually. Q: And if not? A: I pitch them into the sea.

Ripeness and amplitude were the first and most essential ingredients of true comeliness. Men liked to grasp something substantial when in a mood to do so: this was Queen Sollace's experience.

might have been the people which left ruins on the Fomalhaut planets, or the Hexadelts, or whoever carved Monument Cliff on Xi Puppis X.

I studied space dynamics, in all its phases, Gaean economics, the mathematical basis of trans-dimensional propulsion. I am familiar with Handbook to the Planets and Gaean Cosmography. In short, I am not just another dilettante! I am anxious to apply my knowledge to useful purposes.

Liane is feared by those who fear fear, loved by those who love love.

Experience, my dear lady, has taught me a sad truth: time flows in one direction only! As the days pass none of us grows younger. Sometimes we postpone glorious schemes only to discover in the end that they never have materialized! Procrastination is the thief of life!

No, no. I just can't accustom myself to that kind of talk, here on the esplanade, in peaceful Avente. But I suppose I'm actually enjoying it. If you're not a criminal, who or what are you?" "Kirth Gersen." "You must work for the IPCC." "No." "Then you must be on the Institute's Special Committee." "I'm just Kirth Gersen." He rose to his feet. "Let's walk for a bit.

Suldrun's son shall undertake Before his life is gone To sit his right and proper place at Cairbra an Meadhan. If so he sits and so he thrives Then he shall make his own The Table Round, to Casmir's woe, And Evandig the Throne.

Life is a peculiar commodity, with dimensions of its own. Still, if you were to live a million years, engaged in continual pleasures of mind, spirit and body, so that every day you discovered a new delight, or solved an antique puzzle, or overcame a challenge; even a single hour wasted in torpor, somnolence or passivity would be as reprehensible as if the fault were committed by an ordinary person, with scanty years to his life.

Like Earth, Navarth was old, irresponsible and melancholy, full of a dangerous mirth.

Humanity many times has had sad experience of super-powerful police forces … As soon as (the police) slip from under the firm thumb of a suspicious local tribune, they become arbitrary, merciless, a law unto themselves.

Cugel is a man of discernment! declared Bunderwal. I would rate him an applicant of fair to good quality, and I urge you to ignore his long spatulate fingers which I last noticed on Larkin the baby-stealer. There is a significant difference between the two: Larkin has been hanged and Cugel has not been hanged.

We make a notable company, declared Travante. I am as I am! Sir Pom-Pom is strong and brave, while Madouc is clever and resourceful. Also, with her copper-gold curls, her wry little face and her eyes of heartbreak blue she is both quaint and vastly appealing.

Madouc considered. 'I would like a wand to do transformations, a cap of invisibility, swift slippers to walk the air, a purse of boundless wealth, a talisman to compel the love of all, a mirror—' 'Stop!' cried Twisk. 'Your needs are excessive!

Elric spoke a mighty sermon, while Magre started the fire in his pit. Elric expounded, recited Scripture and sang the glories of the Faith. When he came to an end and declared his final 'Hallelujah!', Magre gave him a stoup of ale to ease his throat. Sharpening a knife he complimented Elric upon the fervour of his rhetoric. Then he smote off Elric's head, cut, drew, spitted, cooked and devoured the sanctified morsel with a garnish of leeks and cabbages.

Madouc took up the manure fork and raised it on high. Pymfyd dodged and threw his arm over his head. 'What are you up to?' 'Patience, Pymfyd! This tool symbolises a sword of fine steel!' Madouc touched the fork to Pymfyd's head. 'For notable valour on the field of combat, I dub you Sir Pom-pom, and by this title shall you be known henceforth. Arise, Sir Pom-pom! In my eyes, at least, you have proved your mettle!

But knowledge creates a craving for further knowledge. Where is the harm in knowledge?