Quotes from Poul Anderson

Better a life like a falling star, brief bright across the dark, than the long, long waiting of the immortals, loveless and cheerlessly wise.

Arthur C. Clarke

I wrote the first book, Harvest of Stars, and as I was writing it, I saw that certain implications had barely been touched on... It's perfectly obvious that two completely revolutionary things are going on, with cybernetics, and biological science.

What five books would I like to be remembered for? Well... Tau Zero, I like that one especially. It was somewhat of a tour de force, and I think it got across what I was trying for.

A fanatic's willingness to kill or be killed in the service of a cause cannot prove the rightness of that cause.

A man isn't really alive till he has something bigger than himself and his own little happiness, for which he'd gladly die.

A fanatic is a man who, when he's lost sight of his purpose, redoubles his effort.

In Harvest of Stars, there is this notion, not original with me of course, that it will become possible to download at least the basic aspects of a human personality into a machine program.

Why do people in this age think their own impoverished lives must be the norm of the universe?

Two lives met across death and centuries. To ask what it meant is meaningless. There is no destiny. But sometimes there is bravery

We live with our archetypes, but can we live in them?