Quotes from Orson Scott Card

The classes were valuable, but the real education was the game.

Because these fools always look up for power. People above you, they never want to share power with you. Why you look to them? They give you nothing. People below you, you give them hope, you give them respect, they give you power, cause they don't think they have any, so they don't mind giving it up.

What did this portend? He still breathed, the instruments did not change, his heart beat on. But he called to Peter. Did this mean that he longed to live the life of his child of the mind, Young Peter? Or in some kind of delirium was he speaking to his brother the Hegemon? Or earlier, his brother as a boy. Peter, wait for me. Peter, did I do well? Peter, don't hurt me. Peter, I hate you. Peter for one smile of yours I'd die or kill. What was his message?

It had to be a trick or you couldn't have done it.

I be crazy too, little buddy, but at least when I be craziest, I be floating all alone in space and the crazy, she float out of me, she soak into the walls, and she don't come out till there be battles and little boys bump into the walls and squish out de crazy.

Ender knew that at this moment he might be able to walk out of the room and end the battle. The way he had escaped from the battleroom after drawing blood. But the battle would only be fought again. Again and again until the will to fight was finished. The only way to end things completely was to hurt Bonzo enough that his fear was stronger than his hate.

the power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can't kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and one will ever save you.

And what? What's the other choice? To passively let things happen and then say: Tut-tut, what at botch that was? Don't we all manipulate people? Even if we openly ask them to make a choice, don't we try to frame it so they'll chose as we think they should?

But it was not the boyish grin she had known when he bounded along the low-gravity inner corridors of Battle School. This smile had weariness in it, and old fears long mastered but still present. It was the smile of wisdom.

He had lots of deaths, but that was OK, games were like that, you died a lot until you got the hang of it

It's about me, or people wouldn't be so anxious to keep me from knowing about it. The absence of information is information. ~ Ender

Keep this in mind - it only works because what's between you, that's real, that's what matters. Billions of those connections between human beings. That's what you're fighting to keep alive.

You were the one who threatened us with an Inquisitor, the Bishop reminded him. With a smile. The Speaker's smile was just as chilly. And you're the one who told the people I was Satan and they shouldn't talk to me.

I imagine it feels like bathing in ice to the person touching her. But how does it feel to her? Cold as she is, it must surely burn like fire.

You don't know who a person is until you see how he acts when given unexpected power. He hasn't rehearsed for the part. So what you see is what he is.

You can deny any sacrifice by claiming that it made the sufferer feel so good to do it that it really wasn't a sacrifice at all, but just another selfish act.

Will he always come between us? Yes, said Ela. Like a bridge he'll come between us, not a wall.

Individuals might be bred to sacrifice themselves, but the race as a whole can never decide to cease to exist.

All dreams. If there was love or pity for him, it was only in his dreams.

Bean sighed inwardly. It never failed. Whenever he had any conversation with Ender, it turned into an argument.

There was some enthusiasm for a Caliban village, but it quickly dissipated when people contemplated a future village school and what the mascot might look like.

Compassion is what you're good at. I'm better at complex searches through organized data structures.

Once you realize that power will always end up with the sort of people who crave it, I think that there are worse people who could have it than Peter.

You deplore what I did, but you still want to know the results of my research.