Life

Aaah, Terry Pratchett. Author of more than 20 books set on the Discworld, a land of magic and absurdity. His style is something akin to what would happen if Monty Python redid Lord of the Rings for a group of highly educated people. Sort of. He's hard to describe.

Anyway. This is a collection of my favorite quotes from Pratchett's works and interviews, in no particular order.

Cuius testiculos habes, habeas cardia et cerebellum.
(When you've got them where it counts, their hearts and minds will follow)
-------Terry Pratchett
, all

He didn't administer a reign of terror, just the occasional light shower.
-------Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
politics, humor, Vetinari, all

The Patrician was not a man you shook a finger at unless you wanted to end up being able to count only to nine.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Vetinari, all

You had to hand it to the Patrician, he [the President of the Thieves' Guild] admitted grudgingly. If you didn't, he sent men to come and take it away.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
Humor, all

You need a special kind of mind to rule a city like Ankh-Morpork, and Lord Vetinari had it. But then, he was a special kind of person.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
politics, all

And when the Patrician was unhappy, he became very democratic. He found intricate and painful ways of spreading that unhappiness as far as possible.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
politics, humor, all

The ... Patrician had never been a gloater, you could say that for him. If he wanted you dead, you never even heard about it.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
, all

Crime was always with us, he reasoned, and therefore, if you were going to have crime, it at least should be organized crime.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
, all

'Never build a dungeon you wouldn't be happy to spend the night in yourself,' said the Patrician, laying out the food on the cloth. 'The world would be a happier place if more people remembered that.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
politics, humor, all

'Never trust any ruler who puts his faith in tunnels and bunkers and escape routes. The chances are that his heart isn't in the job.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
politics, humor, all

'I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are the good people and the bad people. You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
politics, humor, all

'Every evil tyrant has a plan to rule the world. The good people don't seem to have the knack.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
humor, politics, all

Yes, it was fascinating. You could become famous just for being, well, famous. It occurred to him that this was an extremely dangerous thing and he might probably have to have someone killed one day, although it would be with extreme reluctance. [footnote: On his part, that is. Their reluctance probably goes without saying.]
-------Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
movies, humor, fame, all

'Dismantling a person is sometimes necessary.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms)
politics, assassination, torture, all

'They think they want good government and justice for all, Vimes, yet what is it they really crave, deep in their hearts? Only that things go on as normal and tomorrow is pretty much like today.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay)
politics, all

The Patrician was against printing because if people knew too much it would only bother them.
-------Terry Pratchett, Jingo
humor, Vetinari, press, newspapers, education, all

'For some reason the slaughter of thousands of people tends to stick in the memory.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
history, humor, military, war, all

'The problem with mercenaries,' said the Patrician, 'is that they need to be paid to start fighting. And, unless you are very lucky, you end up paying them even more to stop.'
-------Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
military, all

'Taxation, gentlemen, is very much like dairy farming. The task is to extract the maximum amount of milk with the minimum of moo. And I am afraid to say that these days all I get is moo.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
politics, all

'Let's have no fighting, please. This is, after all, a council of war.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
military, humor, all

'Simple men to see the simple truth.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
proverb, all

'A week is a long time in politics.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
proverb, all

'It is in the nature of people to turn on their leaders when they fail to be lucky.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
politics, humor, all

'...history changes all the time. It is constantly being re-examined and re-evaluated, otherwise how would we be able to keep historians occupied? We can't possibly allow people with their sort of minds to walk around with time on their hands.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
academia, humor, all

'Putting up a statue to someone who tried to stop a war is not very, um, statuesque. Of course, if you had butchered five hundred of your own men out of arrogant carelessness, we'd be melting the bronze already.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)
military, humor, all

[Vetinari] always suspected the poetic description of Time like an ever-rolling stream. Time, in his experience, moved more like rocks ... sliding, pressing, building up force underground and then, with one jerk that shakes the crockery, a whole field of turnips mysteriously slips sideways by six feet.
-------Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant
, all

'Not natural, in my view, sah. Not in favor of unnatural things.'
Vetinari looked perplexed. 'You mean, you eat your meat raw and sleep in a tree?'
-------Sgt. Colon and Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant)
humor, condoms, all

'If it continues long enough, even a reign of terror may become a fondly remembered period. People believe they want justice and wise government but, in fact, what they really want is an assurance that tomorrow will be very much like today.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, Feet if Clay)
politics, all

'It'll end in trouble, my lord.'
Lord Vetinari sighed. 'In my experience, practically everything does,' he said. 'That is the nature of things. All we can do is sing as we go.'
-------Terry Pratchett, The Truth
life, politics, all

'I have certainly noticed that groups of clever and intelligent people are capable of really stupid ideas.'
-------Lord Vetinari (Terry Pratchett, The Truth)
humor, politics, education, all

Tourist, Rincewind decided, meant "idiot".
-------Terry Pratchett, The Colour of Magic
humor, all

"Let's just say that if complete and utter chaos was lightning, he'd be the sort to stand on a hilltop in a thunderstorm wearing wet copper armour and shouting 'All gods are bastards'."
-------Rincewind discussing Twoflower (Terry Pratchett, The Colour of Magic)
humor

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks.
-------Terry Pratchett, Equal Rites
humor, all

"It would seem that you have no useful skill or talent whatsoever," he said. "Have you thought of going into teaching?" -------Terry Pratchett, Mort
humor, education, insult, all

"Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards because a refusal often offends, I read somewhere."
-------Terry Pratchett, Mort
humor, all

Poets have tried to describe Ankh-Morpork. They have failed. Perhaps it's the sheer zestful vitality of the place, or maybe it's just that a city with a million inhabitants and no sewers is rather robust for poets, who prefer daffodils and no wonder.
-------Terry Pratchett, Mort
humor, all

Ankh-Morpork had dallied with many forms of government and had ended up with that form of democracy known as One Man, One Vote. The Patrician was the Man; he had the Vote.
-------Terry Pratchett, Mort
politics, Vetinari, all

"Sodomy non sapiens," said Albert under his breath.
"What does that mean?"
"Means I'm buggered if I know."
-------Terry Pratchett, Mort
humor, all

There were a few seconds of total silence as everyone waited to see what would happen next. And then Nijel uttered the battle cry that Rincewind would never quite forget to the end of his life. "Erm," he said, "excuse me..."
-------Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
humor, all

"I'm not going to ride on a magic carpet!" he hissed. "I'm afraid of grounds." "You mean heights," said Conina. "And stop being silly." "I know what I mean! It's the grounds that kill you!"
-------Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
humor, all

"I meant," said Iplsore bitterly, "what is there in this world that makes living worthwhile?" Death thought about it. "CATS," he said eventually, "CATS ARE NICE."
-------Terry Pratchett, Sourcery
pets, humor, all

The duke had a mind that ticked like a clock and, like a clock, it regularly went cuckoo.
-------Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters
humor, all

"'Tis not right, a woman going into such places by herself." Granny nodded. She thoroughly approved of such sentiments so long as there was, of course, no suggestion that they applied to her.
-------Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters
feminism, humor, women, all

In fact, no gods anywhere play chess. They prefer simple, vicious games, where you Do Not Achieve Transcendence but Go Straight to Oblivion; a key to the understanding of all religion is that a god's idea of amusement is Snakes and Ladders with greased rungs.
-------Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters
humor, all

All assassins had a full-length mirror in their rooms, because it would be a terrible insult to anyone to kill them when you were badly dressed.
-------Terry Pratchett, Pyramids
humor, all

A good bookshop is just a genteel Black Hole that knows how to read.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
books, humor, all

All dwarfs are by nature dutiful, serious, literate, obedient and thoughtful people whose only minor failing is a tendency, after one drink, to rush at enemies screaming "Arrrrrrgh!" and axing their legs off at the knee.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
humor, all

It's a metaphor of human bloody existence, a dragon. And if that wasn't bad enough, it's also a bloody great hot flying thing.
-------Captain Vimes (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
humor, life, all

The three rules of the Librarians of Time and Space are: 1) Silence; 2) Books must be returned no later than the date last shown; and 3) Do not interfere with the nature of causality.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
humor, all

A number of religions in Ankh-Morpork still practiced human sacrifice, except that they didn't really need to practice any more because they had got so good at it.
-------Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
religion, humor, all

The gods of the Disc have never bothered much about judging the souls of the dead, and so people only go to hell if that's where they believe, in their deepest heart, that they deserve to go. Which they won't do if they don't know about it. This explains why it is so important to shoot missionaries on sight.
-------Terry Pratchett, Eric
religion, humor, all

The consensus seemed to be that if really large numbers of men were sent to storm the mountain, then enough might survive the rocks to take the citadel. This is essentially the basis of all military thinking.
-------Terry Pratchett, Eric
humor, all

The sergeant put on the poker face which has been handed down from NCO to NCO ever since one protoamphibian told another, lower ranking protoamphibian to muster a squad of newts and Take That Beach.
-------Terry Pratchett, Eric
humor, military, all

People who used magic without knowing what they were doing usually came to a sticky end. All over the entire room, sometimes.
-------Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
humor, all

"Well, 'scuse me. I was jus' tryin' to save the world."
-------Gaspode the Wonder Dog (Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures)
humor, all

"Can't sing. Can't dance. Can handle a sword a little."
-------Victor's resume (Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures)
movies, humor, all

In retrospect, Victor was always a little unclear about those next few minutes. That's the way it goes. The moments that change your life are the ones that happen suddenly, like the one where you die.
-------Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
humor, all

WHAT CAN THE HARVEST HOPE FOR, IF NOT FOR THE CARE OF THE REAPER MAN?
-------Death (Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man)
life, proverb, all

Nanny Ogg quite liked cooking, provided there were other people around to do things like chop up the vegetables and wash the dishes afterwards.
-------Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad
humor, all

"You can't go around building a better world for people. Only people can build a better world for people. Otherwise it's just a cage."
-------Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad
religion, life, all

[Dydactylos'] philosophy was a mixture of three famous schools -- the Cynics, the Stoics and the Epicureans -- and summed up all three of them in his famous phrase, "You can't trust any bugger further than you can throw him, and there's nothing you can do about it, so let's have a drink."
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor, all

Words are the litmus paper of the minds. If you find yourself in the power of someone who will use the word "commence" in cold blood, go somewhere else very quickly. But if they say "Enter", don't stop to pack.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor, all

The trouble with being a god is that you've got no one to pray to.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
Religion, humor, all

There are hardly any excesses of the most crazed psychopath that cannot easily be duplicated by a normal kindly family man who just comes in to work every day and has a job to do.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
life, people, all

The people who really run organizations are usually found several levels down, where it is still possible to get things done.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor, bureaucracy, all

"What's a philosopher ?" said Brutha. "Someone who's bright enough to find a job with no heavy lifting," said a voice in his head.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor, all

Om began to feel the acute depression that steals over every realist in the presence of an optimist.
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor, all

"Now we've got a truth to die for!"
"No. Men should die for lies. But the truth is too precious to die for."
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
, all

"I like the idea of democracy. You have to have someone everyone distrusts," said Brutha. "That way, everyone's happy."
-------Terry Pratchett, Small Gods
humor

The shortest unit of time in the multiverse is the New York Second, defined as the period of time between the traffic lights turning green and the cab behind you honking.
-------Terry Pratchett, Lords and Ladies
humor, all

The Monks of Cool, whose tiny and exclusive monastery is hidden in a really cool and laid-back valley in the lower Ramtops, have a passing-out test for a novice. He is taken into a room full of all types of clothing and asked: Yo, my son, which of these is the most stylish thing to wear? And the correct answer is: Hey, whatever I select.
-------Terry Pratchett, Lords and Ladies
humor, all

Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.
-------Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms
humor, inspiration, all

I mean, I wouldn't pay more than a couple of quid to see me, and I'm me.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett)
humor, conventions, book signing, all

I think that sick people in Ankh-Morpork generally go to a vet. It's generally a better bet. There's more pressure on a vet to get it right. People say "it was god's will" when granny dies, but they get angry when they lose a cow.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, medicine, religion, all

This isn't life in the fast lane, it's life in the oncoming traffic.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

Never trust any complicated cocktail that remainds perfectly clear until the last ingredient goes in, and then immediately clouds.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
bar, alcohol, drinking, all

I didn't go to university. Didn't even finish A-levels. But I have sympathy for those who did.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
academia, humor, education, all

That seems to point up a significant difference between Europeans and Americans. A European says: "I can't understand this, what's wrong with me?" An American says: "I can't understand this, what's wrong with him?"
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

Oh, come on. Revelation was a mushroom dream that belonged in the Apocrypha. The New Testament is basically about what happened when God got religion.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
religion, humor, all

'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, alt.fan.pratchett
education, humor, teaching, all

I once absend-mindedly ordered Three Mile Island dressing in a restaurant and, with great presence of mind, they brought Thousand Island Dressing and a bottle of chili sauce.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

Over the centuries, mankind has tried many ways of combating the forces of evil...prayer, fasting, good works and so on. Up until Doom, no one seemed to have thought about the double-barrel shotgun. Eat leaden death, demon...
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, video games, religion, all

You can't make people happy by law. If you said to a bunch of average people two hundred years ago "Would you be happy in a world where medical care is widely available, houses are clean, the world's music and sights and foods can be brought into your home at small cost, travelling even 100 miles is easy, childbirth is generally not fatal to mother or child, you don't have to die of dental abcesses and you don't have to do what the squire tells you" they'd think you were talking about the New Jerusalem and say 'yes'.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, life, happiness, all

I must confess the the activities of the UK governments for the past couple of years have been watched with frank admiration and amazement by Lord Vetinari. Outright theft as a policy had never occured to him.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett [Lord Vetinari is the rather Machiavellian ruler of the fictional city in Pratchett's books]
politics, humor, insult, all

I save about twenty drafts -- that's ten meg of disc space -- and the last one contains all the final alterations. Once it has been printed out and received by the publishers, there's a cry here of 'Tough shit, literary researchers of the future, try getting a proper job!' and the rest are wiped.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
writing, academia, humor, all

Mind you, the Elizabethans had so many words for the female genitals that it is quite hard to speak a sentence of modern English without inadvertently mentioning at least three of them.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, swearing, language, all

I reckon that Stonehege was build by the contemporary equivalent of Microsoft, whereas Avebury was definitely an Apple circle.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
computers, humor, all

Death isn't on line. If he was, there would be a sudden drop in the death rate. Although it'd be interesting to see if he'd post things like: DON'T YOU THINK I SOUND LIKE JAMES EARL JONES?
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
computers, internet, humor, all

Too many people want to have written.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
writing, all

What your soldier wants-- really, really wants -- is no-one shooting back at him.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
military, all

You can't remember the plot of the Dr Who movie because it didn't have one, just a lot of plot holes strung together. It did have a lot of flashing lights, though.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, scifi, all

Dream on. British TV Is The Best In The World is on a par with the statement about how British Justice Is The Envy Of The World ("Hey, Miguel, how come we can't convict innocent people so quickly and expensively?")
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

I found while driving in Wyoming that wearing a stetson and driving a beat-up pickup meant you could go as fast as you like, while the police picked up Californian winnebagos that went one mph over 55. After all, they wanted to bring money into the state, not merely circulate it.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, life, all

I always call it 'Tour Flu', because two or three weeks in hot bookshops with hundreds of people usually produces an ailment of some kind. Going on tour is like a box of rare diseases -- you never know what you're going to get.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

Let's see, now... in HOGFATHER there are a number of stabbings, someone's killed by a man made of knives, someone's killed by the dark, and someone just been killed by a wardrobe. It's a book about the magic of childhood. You can tell.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, writing, children, all

If it wasn't for the fun and money, I really don't know why I'd bother.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, writing, all

I do note with interest that old women in my books become young women on the covers... this is discrimination against the chronologically gifted.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, all

There are no inconsistencies in the Discworld books; ocassionally, however, there are alternate pasts.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, writing, all

Experience has taught me that you feel better on a flight if you avoid chicken fat in plastic sauce.
-------Terry Pratchett on the joys of travelling the world by plane
humor, all

It's not Brits who think American readers are a bunch of whinging morons with the geo-social understanding of a wire coathanger, it's American editors.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, writing, all

I don't think I've ever been critical of the money Douglas Adams makes, especially since, as has been tactfully pointed out, I myself have had to change banks having filled the first one up.
-------Terry Pratchett, alt.fan.pratchett
humor, writing, all

"People...(including everyone who interviews me for their Uni magazine, 'cos I must have done a hundred of those things) Rule I of interviews should be:
Write a list of your main questions to fix things in your mind; Throw it away; Start the interview; Then LISTEN to what the guy is saying so that you can follow any interesting thread; Because if you don't, then what you'll get is a quiz, not an interview.
Sigh... It happens to me all the time:
Q Where did you get the idea for the Discworld?
A I stole it from an old man I met and now I've decided to tell you all.
Q Who is your favourite character?
Sigh..."
-------Terry Pratchett
journalism, writing

"How do I write? God, this is embarrassing. Look, I just do it. It's pictures in the head and memories and thinking about things and it all comes together. It's something I do."
-------Terry Pratchett
writing

"1) Watch everything, read everything, and especially read outside your subject -- you should be importing, not recycling.
2) Use a wordprocessor... why do I feel this is not unnecessary advice here? It makes everything mutable. It's better for the ego. And you can play games when all else fails.
3) Write. For more than three years I wrote more than 400 words every day. I mean, every calendar day. If for some reason, in those pre-portable days, I couldn't get to a keyboard, I wrote hard the previous night and caught up the following day, and if it ever seemed that it was easy to do the average I upped the average. I also did a hell of a lot of editing afterwards but the point was there was something there to edit. I had a more than full-time job as well. I hate to say this, but most of the successful (well, okay... rich) authors I know seem to put 'application' around the top of the list of How-to-do-its. Tough but true."
-------Terry Pratchett on writing.
writing

"Yes, Dave Gemmell and Neil Gaiman were both journalists. So was Bob Shaw. So was I. It's good training because:
1) any tendency to writers' block is burned out of you within a few weeks of starting work by unsympathetic news editors;
2) you very quickly learn the direct link between writing and eating;
3) you pick up a style of sorts;
4) you get to hang around in interesting places;
5) you learn to take editing in your stride, and tend to be reliable about deadlines;
6) you end up with an ability to think at the keyboard and reduce the world to yourself and the work in hand -- you have to do this to survive in a world of ringing telephones and shouting sub-editors.
None of this makes you talented or good, but it does help you make the best of what you've got."
-------Terry Pratchett
writing, all