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Terry Pratchett Quotes - Page 40

All Quotes Accidents Adventure Age Arguing Art Atheism Atheist Authority Balance Beer Belief Blame Chaos Character Children Chocolate Choices Coffee Copper Country Crime Darkness Death Dementia Democracy Doubt Dying Effort End Of The World Evil Fate Feelings Fighting Finding Yourself Flying Food Football Fun Funeral Funny Genius Geography Giving Gold Goodbye Growing Up Hate Heart Heaven Hell History Home Horror House Humanity Hurt Husband Ignorance Imagination Inspiration Inspirational Jesus Journey Justice Killing Language Leaving Letting Go Life Life And Death Listening Literature Logic Losing Luck Lying Magic Mankind Manners Memories Military Moon Morning Motivational Mountain Observation Opportunity Pain Past Perspective Philosophy Police Pride Progress Purpose Quality Rain Reading Reality Religion Responsibility Romance Running Safety Sanity School Science Science Fiction Silence Sin Singing Sleep Smoking Son Soul Spring Students Stupidity Style Suffering Sunrise Travel Trust Truth Understanding Universe Violence Waiting Wall War Water Wife Winning Work Out Worry Writing
Sooner or later we're all someone's dog.

Sooner or later we're all someone's dog.

Terry Pratchett
Funny, Dog, Sooner Or Later
Terry Pratchett (2013). “Jingo: Stage Adaptation”, p.81, A&C Black

I've got wide tastes, but I don't like jazz.

Terry Pratchett
Taste, Jazz, Wide

Knowing that you are going to die is, I suspect, the beginning of wisdom.

Terry Pratchett
Knowing, Suspects, Dies
"Sex, death and nature: Laurie Penny interviews Terry Pratchett". www.newstatesman.com. November 21, 2012.

Opera happens because a large number of things amazingly fail to go wrong.

Terry Pratchett
Numbers, Opera, Failing
Terry Pratchett (2009). “Maskerade: (Discworld Novel 18)”, p.81, Random House

When you read, I'm sure you don't realize that your eyes are going backwards and forwards and to this place and that place. Mine don't do that.

Terry Pratchett
Eye, Realizing, Backwards

In the first book of my Discworld series, published more than 26 years ago, I introduced Death as a character; there was nothing particularly new about this - death has featured in art and literature since medieval times, and for centuries we have had a fascination with the Grim Reaper.

Terry Pratchett
Art, Book, Character

The ideal death, I think, is what was the ideal Victorian death, you know, with your grandchildren around you, a bit of sobbing. And you say goodbye to your loved ones, making certain that one of them has been left behind to look after the shop.

Terry Pratchett
Goodbye, Grandchildren, Thinking
"Discworld's Terry Pratchett On Death And Deciding". Interview with Steve Inskeep, www.npr.org. August 11, 2011.

I believe it should be possible for someone stricken with a serious and ultimately fatal illness to choose to die peacefully with medical help, rather than suffer.

Terry Pratchett
Believe, Suffering, Serious

Mum had done everything you need to educate a kid. She made me a kid who likes books and she told me about 'Wind in the Willows' and read it and I thought this is weird, Rat, Mole, Toad and my first ever Bolshie thought - you know about 'The Wind in the Willows.'

Terry Pratchett
Book, Kids, Wind
"Sir Terry Pratchett: hallucinating gently for a living". Interview with Corinne Podger, www.abc.net.au. April 30, 2011.

No one's policing their own minds more than an author. You spend a lot of time in your own head analysing what you think about things, and a philosophy comes.

Terry Pratchett
Philosophy, Thinking, Mind
"Terry Pratchett: 'I'm open to joy. But I'm also more cynical'" by Aida Edemariam, www.theguardian.com. September 1, 2010.

There was once a caustic comment from someone suggesting I was breeding a new race. Fans from different countries have married, amazing things like that. I've been to some of the weddings. I went to one here the other day, a pagan ceremony.

Terry Pratchett
Country, Race, Fans

I particularly admire are Mark Twain and Jerome K. Jerome who wrote in a certain tone of voice which was humane and understanding of humanity, but always ready to annotate its little foibles. I think I'd lay my cards down on that, and say that it's that that I'm trying to do.

Terry Pratchett
Thinking, Voice, Understanding

I regarded finding I had a form of Alzheimer's as an insult, and I decided to do my best to marshal any kind of forces that I could against this wretched disease. I have posterior cortical atrophy or PCA. They say, rather ingenuously, that if you have Alzheimer's it's the best form of Alzheimer's to have.

Terry Pratchett
Alzheimer's, Disease, Insult
"'A butt of my own jokes': Terry Pratchett on the disease that finally claimed him". www.theguardian.com. March 14, 2015.

I think when people mean that Discworld books have become darker they really mean the series is growing up. In 'The Colour of Magic' most of the city is set alight. It's a joke, in much the same way that the Earth is destroyed almost at the start of Douglas Adams's 'The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.'

Terry Pratchett
Growing Up, Book, Mean

I'm a fantasy writer, called a fantasy writer. But there's very little, apart from one or two basic concepts in 'I Shall Wear Midnight,' which are in fact fantasy. You have sticks that fly, but they're practical broomsticks, with a bloody great strap that you can hold on to so you don't fall off. And you try not to use them too often.

Terry Pratchett
Fall, Writing, Two

It cannot be said often enough that science fiction as a genre is incredibly educational - and I'm speaking the written science fiction, not 'Star Trek.' Science fiction writers tend to fill their books if they're clever with little bits of interesting stuff and real stuff.

Terry Pratchett
Stars, Clever, Real
"Sir Terry Pratchett: hallucinating gently for a living". Interview with Corinne Podger, www.abc.net.au. April 30, 2011.

My own books drive themselves. I know roughly where a book is going to end, but essentially the story develops under my fingers. It's just a matter of joining the dots.

Terry Pratchett
Book, Joining, Stories

The bravest person I've ever met was a young boy going through massive amounts of treatment for a very rare, complex and unpleasant disease. I last saw him at a Discworld convention, where he chose to take part in a game as an assassin. He died not long afterwards, and I wish I had his fortitude and sense of style.

Terry Pratchett
Boys, Games, Long

'Educational' refers to the process, not the object. Although, come to think of it, some of my teachers could easily have been replaced by a cheeseburger.

Terry Pratchett
Teacher, Educational, Thinking

Eight years involved with the nuclear industry have taught me that when nothing can possible go wrong and every avenue has been covered, then is the time to buy a house on the next continent.

Terry Pratchett
Eight, Years, House

For an author, the nice characters aren't much fun. What you want are the screwed up characters. You know, the characters that are constantly wondering if what they are doing is the right thing, characters that are not only screwed up but are self-tapping screws. They're doing it for themselves.

Terry Pratchett
Fun, Nice, Character

I must have read every issue of 'Punch' published in the 20th century, and I think in the process I picked up the true voice of English humour - that amiable, fairly liberal, laconic voice which you find in something like 'Three Men in a Boat.'

Terry Pratchett
Men, Thinking, Voice

I think I work much harder on the children's books. I suppose I enjoy that. I find it interesting that although there are more than 30 books in the Discworld series, it is the four that were written for children which have won the awards. I've never been quite certain why this is.

Terry Pratchett
Children, Book, Thinking
Interview conducted in advance of Terry Pratchett's National Book Festival appearance in Washington, D.C., www.epicreads.com. September 29, 2007.

I think I would like to go into modelling. Of course, I don't know how to do it, and wouldn't be any good at it if I did, so I'm going to employ someone to walk the catwalks on my behalf. It would still be me, of course.

Terry Pratchett
Thinking, Catwalk, Walks

I think perhaps the most important problem is that we are trying to understand the fundamental workings of the universe via a language devised for telling one another when the best fruit is.

Terry Pratchett
Thinking, Important, Trying

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