Tessera

Micah@rincewind.run · 4w ago

Discworld QOTD, from The Last Hero “Ask people to imagine an animal god and they will, basically, come up with the idea of someone in a really bad mask. Men have been much better at inventing demons, which is why there are so many.”

Discworld QOTD, from Mort

Discworld QOTD, from Interesting Times

The statue looked like porcelain. It had been painted quite realistically. One Sun Mirror seemed an ordinary sort of man. You would not have pointed him out in a crowd as Emperor material. But this man, with his little round hat and little round shield and little round men on little round ponies, had glued together a thousand warring factions into one great Empire, often using their own blood to do it.
Rincewind looked closer. Of course, it was just an impression, but around the set of the mouth and the look of the eyes there was an expression he’d last seen on the face of Ghenghiz Cohen.
It was the expression of someone who was absolutely and totally unafraid of anything.

Discworld QOTD, from The Last Hero “Ask people to imagine an animal god and they will, basically, come up with the idea of someone in a really bad mask. Men have been much better at inventing demons, which is why there are so many.”

Discworld QOTD, from Eric

Discworld QOTD, from Interesting Times

Discworld QOTD, from The Wee Free Men

She’s a little know-it-all,” said Miss Tick.
“Right. Just like you. She impressed you, right? I know she did because you were quite nasty to her, and you always do that to people who impress you.”
“Do you want to be turned into a frog?”
“Well, now, let me see . . .” said the toad sarcastically. “Better skin, better legs, likelihood of being kissed by a princess one hundred percent improved . . . why, yes. Whenever you’re ready, madam.”

Discworld QOTD, from Eric

Discworld QOTD, from Pyramids

“Right. Good. So noon would be age 35, am I right? Now considering that most children can toddle at a year or so, the four legs reference is really unsuitable, wouldn’t you agree? I mean, most of the morning is spent on two legs. According to your analogy—” he paused and did a few calculations with a convenient thighbone—“only about twenty minutes immediately after 00:00 hours, half an hour tops, is spent on four legs. Am I right? Be fair.”
“Well—” said the Sphinx.
“By the same token you wouldn’t be using a stick by six p.m. because you’d be only, er, 52,” said Teppic, scribbling furiously. “In fact you wouldn’t really be looking at any kind of walking aid until at least half past nine, I think. That’s on the assumption that the entire lifespan takes place over one day which is, I believe I have already pointed out, ridiculous. I’m sorry, it’s basically OK, but it doesn’t work.”

Discworld QOTD, from The Wee Free Men

Discworld QOTD, from Feet of Clay

Another priest said, “Is it true you’ve said you’ll believe in any god whose existence can be proved by logical debate?”
“Yes.”
Vimes had a feeling about the immediate future and took a few steps away from Dorfl.
“But the gods plainly do exist,” said a priest.
“It Is Not Evident.”
A bolt of lightning lanced through the clouds and hit Dorfl’s helmet. There was a sheet of flame and then a trickling noise. Dorfl’s molten armor formed puddles around his white-hot feet.
“I Don’t Call That Much Of An Argument,” said Dorfl calmly, from somewhere in the clouds of smoke.

Discworld QOTD, from Pyramids

Discworld QOTD, from Soul Music

TELL ME, said Death, after a while, WAS I . . . WILL I BE . . . AM I A GOOD GRANDFATHER?
Susan bit her lip thoughtfully.
“If I tell you, won’t that be a paradox?”
NOT FOR US.
“Well . . . you’ve got bony knees.”
Death stared at her.
BONY KNEES?
“Sorry.”

Discworld QOTD, from Feet of Clay

Discworld QOTD, from Unseen Academicals

“You see, the thing about football is that it is not about football. It is a most fascinating multi-dimensional philosophy, an extrusion, as it were, of what Doctor Maspinder promulgated in Das Meer von Unvermeidlichkeit. Now, you would say to me, I am sure,” he went on, “What of the 4–4–2 or even the 4–1–2–1–2, yes? And my answer to that would be, there is only the one. Traditionally we say there are eleven players in the team, but that is because of our rather feeble perceptions. In truth, there is only the one and therefore, I would say,” he gave a little laugh, “daring to adapt a line from The Doors of Deception: it does not matter whether you win or lose so long as you score the most goals.”

Discworld QOTD, from Soul Music

Discworld QOTD, from Moving Pictures

“Now, there’s some new words I want you to learn,” said Gaspode. “Think you can?”
“I hope so.”
“‘Per-cent-age of the gross,’” said Gaspode. “There. Think you can remember it?”
“‘Per-cent-age of the gross,’” said Victor.
“Good lad.”
“What does it mean?”
“Don’t you worry about that,” said Gaspode. “You just have to say it’s what you want, OK. When the time’s right.”
“When will the time be right, then?” said Victor.
Gaspode grinned nastily. “Oh, I reckon when Dibbler’s just got a mouthful of food’d be favorite.”

Discworld QOTD, from Unseen Academicals

Going Postal is one of the most purely fun Discworld books but it also has some of the very most moving passages in the entire series, which obviously took on an even stronger meaning after the Embuggerance a man is not dead while his name is still spoken GNU Terry Pratchett

Discworld QOTD, from Going Postal

“We keep that name moving in the Overhead,” he said, and it seemed to Princess that the wind in the shutter arrays above her blew more forlornly, and the everlasting clicking of the shutters grew more urgent. “He’d never have wanted to go home. He was a real linesman. His name is in the code, in the wind, in the rigging, and the shutters. Haven’t you ever heard the saying ‘Man’s not dead while his name is still spoken’?”

Discworld QOTD, from Moving Pictures

Discworld QOTD, from Witches Abroad “Most witches don’t believe in gods. They know that the gods exist, of course. They even deal with them occasionally. But they don’t believe in them. They know them too well. It would be like believing in the postman.”

Discworld QOTD, from Going Postal

Discworld QOTD, from Jingo

The crowd looked at the last melon. They were street people. They knew the score. When the object can be under one of three things, and it’s already turned out not to be under two of them, then the one place it was certainly not going to be was under the third. Only some kind of gullible fool would believe something like that. Of course there was going to be a trick. There always was a trick. But you watched it, in order to see a trick done well.
Lord Vetinari raised the melon nevertheless, and the crowd nodded in satisfaction. Of course it wasn’t there. It’d be a pretty poor day for street entertainment if things were where they were supposed to be.

Discworld QOTD, from Witches Abroad “Most witches don’t believe in gods. They know that the gods exist, of course. They even deal with them occasionally. But they don’t believe in them. They know them too well. It would be like believing in the postman.”

Discworld QOTD, from Night Watch

“That’s how we work, see? None of the cadres knows about the other ones!”
“Really. Do they know about you?” said Vimes.
For a moment, Reg’s face clouded.
“Pardon?”
“Well, you said you don’t know about them,” said Vimes. “So . . . do they know about you?” He wanted to add: You’re a cell of one, Reg. The real revolutionaries are silent men with poker-player eyes and probably don’t know or care if you exist. You’ve got the shirt and the haircut and the sash and you know all the songs, but you’re no urban guerrilla. You’re an urban dreamer. You turn over rubbish bins and scrawl on walls in the name of The People, who’d clip you round the ear if they found you doing it. But you believe.

Discworld QOTD, from Jingo

Discworld QOTD, from Carpe Jugulum

“That’ll be the King,” said Granny. “Big Aggie’s given him some of her brose, by the sound of it. He’ll save the day.”
“Er . . . hasn’t the day been saved?”
“Oh, he’s the King. It looks like it might be a nice day, so let him save it. You’ve got to give kings something to do. Anyway, after a drink from Big Aggie he won’t know what day it is. We’d better get down there.”

Discworld QOTD, from Night Watch

Discworld QOTD, from The Fifth Elephant

Now this he understood. It wasn’t damn politics, where good and bad were just, apparently, two ways of looking at the same thing or, at least, were described like that by the people who were on the side Vimes thought of as “bad.”
It was all too complicated and, where it was complicated, it meant that someone was trying to fool you. But on the street, in hot pursuit, it was all so clear. Someone was going to be still standing at the end of the chase, and all you had to concentrate on was making sure it was you.

Discworld QOTD, from Carpe Jugulum

Micah@rincewind.run · last wk.

Discworld QOTD, from Thief of Time ‘“Are you actually human?” “Hah! As human as you are. I won’t say I haven’t got a few skeletons in the family closet, though.” There was something about the way she said it . . . “That wasn’t just a figure of speech, was it,” said Lobsang flatly.’

Discworld QOTD, from The Fifth Elephant

Micah@rincewind.run · last wk.

Discworld QOTD, from Making Money

Mrs. Lavish laughed. “Ah, yes. Just like the forthright and reassuring grasp of my late husband. No honest man has a handshake as honest as that. How in the world has it taken you so long to find the financial sector?”
Moist looked around. They were alone, his calves were sore, and there was no fooling some people. What we have here, he told himself, is a Mk.1 Feisty Old Lady: turkey neck, embarrassing sense of humor, a gleeful pleasure in mild cruelty, direct way of speaking that flirts with rudeness and, more important, also flirts with flirting. Likes to think she’s “no lady.” Game for anything that doesn’t carry the risk of falling over and with a look in her eye that says “I can do what I like, because I am old. And I have a soft spot for rascals.” Old ladies like that were hard to fool, but there was no need to. He relaxed. Sometimes it was a sheer relief to drop the mask.

Discworld QOTD, from Thief of Time ‘“Are you actually human?” “Hah! As human as you are. I won’t say I haven’t got a few skeletons in the family closet, though.” There was something about the way she said it . . . “That wasn’t just a figure of speech, was it,” said Lobsang flatly.’