Quotes by Terry Pratchett

About Terry Pratchett:

Sir Terence David John is best known for his Discworld series of about 40 volumes. Pratchett's first novel, The Carpet People, was published in 1971, and since his first Discworld novel, The Colour of Magic, was published in 1983, he wrote two books a year on average. His 2011 Discworld novel Snuff was at the time of its release the third-fastest-selling hardback adult-readership novel since records began in the UK, selling 55,000 copies in the first three days.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Destiny was funny stuff, he knew. You couldn’t trust it. Often you couldn’t even see it. Just when you knew you had it cornered, it turned out to be something else—coincidence, maybe, or providence. You barred the door against it, and it was st...

Terry Pratchett

There were only three times in your life when it was proper to come through the front door, and you were carried every time.

Terry Pratchett

A man walked across the moors from Razorback to Lancre town without seeing a single marshlight, head-less dog, strolling tree, ghostly coach or comet, and had to be taken in by a tavern and given a drink to unsteady his nerves.

Terry Pratchett

Things that try to look like things often do look more like things than things.

Terry Pratchett

This book was written using 100% recycled words.

Terry Pratchett

Everywhere's been where it is ever since it was first put there. It's called geography.

Terry Pratchett

Someone has to do it. It's all very well calling for eye of newt, but do you mean Common, Spotted or Great Crested? Which eye, anyway? Will tapioca do just as well? If we substitute egg white will the spell a) work b) fail or c) melt the bottom out o...

Terry Pratchett

You're- you're not going to force me to go back are you?" he said. "Um?" said the duke. He waved his hand irritably. "No, no," he said. "Not at all. Just call in at the torturer on your way out. See when he can fit you in.

Terry Pratchett

The Fool held his breath. On long nights on the hard flagstones he had dreamed of women like her. Although, if he really thought about it, not much like her; they were better endowed around the chest, their noses weren’t so red and pointed, and the...

Terry Pratchett

She never sent the castle to sleep”, said Granny, “that’s just and old wife’s tale. She just stirred up time a little. It’s not as hard as people think, everyone does it all the time. It’s like rubber, is time, you can stretch it to suit ...

Terry Pratchett

It is true that words have power, and one of the things they are able to do is get out of someone’s mouth before the speaker has the chance to stop them.

Terry Pratchett

The calendar of the Theocracy of Muntab counts down, not up. No-one knows why, but it might not be a good idea to hang around and find out.

Terry Pratchett

We got the spell exactly right. Except for the ingredients. And most of the poetry. And it probably wasn’t the right time. And Gytha took most of it home for the cat, which couldn’t of been proper.

Terry Pratchett

We ain’t going to curse anyone,” said Granny firmly. “It hardly ever works if they don’t know you’ve done it.

Terry Pratchett

Witches just aren’t like that,” said Magrat. “We live in harmony with the great cycles of Nature, and do no harm to anyone, and it’s wicked of them to say we don’t. We ought to fill their bones with hot lead." The other two looked at her wi...

Terry Pratchett

At last the magic caught, and she managed to vault clumsily onto it before it trundled into the night sky as gracefully as a duck with one wing missing.

Terry Pratchett

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

Terry Pratchett

Personally, I think the best motto for an educational establishment is: 'Or Would You Rather Be a Mule?'

Terry Pratchett

I think the best thing I ever did with my life was stand up and say I've got Alzheimer's.

Terry Pratchett

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

You can't trample infidels when you're a tortoise. I mean, all you could do is give them a meaningful look.

Terry Pratchett

Author Bio

  • NameTerry Pratchett
  • DescriptionEnglish author
  • AliasesTerence David John "Terry" Pratchett; Terence David John Pratchett; Sir Terry Pratchett
  • BornApril 28, 1948
  • DiedMarch 12, 2015
  • CountryUnited Kingdom
  • ProfessionWriter; Novelist; Journalist
  • WorksGood Omens; Nation
  • AwardsOfficer Of The Order Of The British Empire; Margaret Edwards Award; Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize