If Agatha had a twin, an exact duplicate, would I still feel she’s irreplaceable? And if I had a twin, would my value double, or be worth half as much?
Man is an onion made up of a hundred integuments, a texture made up of many threads. The ancient Asiatics knew this well enough, and in the Buddhist Yoga an exact technique was devised for unmasking the illusion of the personality. The human merry-go...
All causes are good,' Yallin told her calmly. 'And those exact same causes are all bad, depending on which side a body's on. Regent Pettibone and his followers certainly thought your mother's cause was a bad one. To my mind, causes aren't about good ...
why can't we love the right people? what is so wrong with us that we rush into situations to which we are manifestly unsuited, which will hurt us and others? why are we given emotions which we cannot control and which move in exact contradiction to w...
People used to tell me that when I smile I really warm up the room. Well, the moment someone told me about global warming I frowned, and in that exact moment it started to snow. So, if you see me walking around with a furrow on my brow, you’ll know...
She once said her songs were "mostly about myths, spirits, that kind of thing. Not fairies, stronger than that." Not fairies. Stronger than that: there's a fine phrase to bear in mind. Her lyrics are about the things that drive, or repulse, or empowe...
A kiss, when all is told, what is it? An oath taken a little closer, a promise more exact. A wish that longs to be confirmed, a rosy circle drawn around the verb 'to love'. A kiss is a secret which takes the lips for the ear, a moment of infinity hum...
It’s not enough to be able to lie with a straight face; anybody with enough gall to raise on a busted flush can do that. The first way to lie artistically is to tell the truth — but not all of it. The second way involves telling the truth, too, b...
There are still many unsolved problems about bird life, among which are the age that birds attain, the exact time at which some birds acquire their adult dress, and the changes which occur in this with years. Little, too, is known about the laws and ...
Death shows no favor. He is very fair: exacting the same advantages to all. Age, race, gender, or economic status does not cause discrimination within the company of Death. Of all marketing companies on the Earth, Death has surpassed them all: ensuri...
Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official, save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the country. It is patriotic to support him insofar as he efficiently serves t...
People who think with their epidermis or their genitalia or their clan are the problem to begin with. One does not banish this specter by invoking it. If I would not vote against someone on the grounds of 'race' or 'gender' alone, then by the exact s...
In politics as in philosophy, my tenets are few and simple. The leading one of which, and indeed that which embraces most others, is to be honest and just ourselves and to exact it from others, meddling as little as possible in their affairs where ou...
Hugo Cabret: I'd imagine the whole world was one big machine. Machines never come with any extra parts, you know. They always come with the exact amount they need. So I figured, if the entire world was one big machine, I couldn't be an extra part. I ...
Jane: Are you lost? The Unmarried Mother: No I'm looking for someone. Thanks, I'll just wait. Jane: Well, you know what they say about good things happening to those who wait. The Unmarried Mother: But only the things left behind by those who hustle ...
Louie: Where'd they send you? James Cole: 1990. Louie: '90! How was it? Good drugs? Lots of pussy? Hey, Bob, you do the job? You find out the big info? Army of the 12 Monkeys? James Cole: I was supposed to be 1996. Louie: Science ain't an exact scien...
Robin Hood: I'll organize revolt, exact a death for a death, and I'll never rest until every Saxon in this shire can stand up free men and strike a blow for Richard and England. Prince John: Are you finished? Robin Hood: I'm only just beginning. From...
Patrick Bateman: Paul Allen has mistaken me for this dickhead Marcus Halberstram. It seems logical because Marcus also works at P&P and in fact does the same exact thing I do and he also has a penchant for Valentino suits and Oliver Peoples glasses. ...
This success permits us to hope that after thirty or forty years of observation on the new Planet [Neptune], we may employ it, in its turn, for the discovery of the one following it in its order of distances from the Sun. Thus, at least, we should un...
The riot had taken on a beauty of its own now. Arcs of gasoline fire under the crescent moon. Crimson tracer in mystical parabolas. Phosphorescence from the barrels of plastic bullet guns. A distant yelling like that of men below decks in a torpedoed...
More people are leaving TV behind to read my books than ever before. In the last year alone I gained over two readers (three, to be exact). So I’d like to take a moment and say thanks mom, dad, and kidnap victim I keep chained in the basement.
