Now writing is just working your way toward the border that the innermost secret draws around itself, and to cross that line would mean self-destruction. But writing is also an attempt to respect the borderline only for the truly innermost secret, an...
Tyrion cocked his head sideways. “Did you mean to answer your damned riddle, or only to make my head ache worse?” Varys smiled. “Here, then. Power resides where men believe it resides. No more and no less.” “So power is a mummer’s trick?�...
Communism deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society: all that it does is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labor of others by means of such appropriation. It has been objected, that upon the abolition of private p...
My father once told me that there are no gods; only the cruel manipulations of evil people who pretended that their power was good and their exploitation was love. But if there are no gods; why are we so hungry to believe in them? Just because evil l...
I do forget sometimes how much it means for certain men—for certain people—to be able to provide their loved ones with material comforts and protection at all times. I forget how dangerously reduced some men can feel when that basic ability has b...
... I will get a First Class Honors degree and I will become a scientist... And I know I can do this because I went to London on my own, and because I solved the mystery of Who Killed Wellington? and I found my mother and I was brave and I wrote a bo...
Prayer does not blind us to the world, but it transforms our vision of the world, and makes us see it, all men, and all the history of mankind, in the light of God. To pray 'in spirit and in truth' enables us to enter into contact with that infinite ...
On a Tuesday they were we, and by Friday they were dead and they buried them in the courtyard side by side, oh, my love, and they buried them dies by side" breaking away from Gideon with some reluctance, Sophie, rose to her feet and dusted off her dr...
Will began to straighten up, to turn away from the bed. And as he did, he felt something wrap tightly around his wrist. He glanced down and saw Jem’s hand braceleting his own. For a moment he was too shocked to do anything but stare. “I am not de...
The defiance of the good atheist hurled at an apparently ruthless and idiotic cosmos is really an unconscious homage to something in or behind that cosmos which he recognizes as infinitely valuable and authoritative: for if mercy and justice were rea...
You will get exactly what you deserve Polly,” comes the firm reply, “you can trust me on that… But if you do – trust me I mean – I promise you an unparalleled climax.” She pauses, gazing deep into my frightened green eyes. “It’s your ...
To fuel yet another war this time against Iraq by cynically manipulating people's grief, by packaging it for TV specials sponsored by corporations selling detergent and running shoes, is to cheapen and devalue grief, to drain it of meaning. What we a...
Severian moved toward her, kneeling in front of her. His voice was pleading when he said, "When I return I mean to make you mine." "Do not return here Milord." She tried to pull away but some pain she saw in his face kept her eyes locked on him. "I a...
W turned on his heel and began walking toward the door at the far wall. And by walking I mean, of course, not moving at all, at least not to the naked eye, because his strides could only be measured in micrometers. His creaky legs made barely the tin...
The real battle for Christians today is not Armageddon, it is the battle for a sensible approach to that ancient library of books we call the Bible. The Bible was written by human beings, with all the longings, prejudices and illusions that character...
Not that I'm complaining. It was better than my old dream, where Harma Dogshead was feeding me to her pigs." "Harma's dead." Jon said. "But not the pigs. They look at me the way Slayer used to look at ham. Not to say that the wildlings mean us harm. ...
He who has experienced the mystery of the nature is full of life, full of love, full of joy. Radiance emanates from the whole existence itself, it does not know the meaning of holding back. It is pure giving-giving of love. For the great writers, lov...
A human being without the proper empathy or feeling is the same as an android built so as to lack it, either by design or mistake. We mean, basically, someone who does not care about the fate which his fellow living creatures fall victim to; he stand...
Some people have great ideas maybe once or twice in their life, and then they discover electricity or fire or outer space or something. I mean, the kind of brilliant ideas that change the whole world. Some people never have them at all... I get them ...
..., and sometimes there's just no point in arguing with him. "Yeah, okay 'me, Jeff, and Evan, sitting in a tree...'" Chris claps his hands triumphantly. "That's right, baby!" Than a more serious expression comes across his face. "But, in a tree? Rea...
That's just how white folks will do you. It wasn't merely the cruelty involved; I was learning that black people could be mean and then some. It was a particular brand of arrogance, an obtuseness in otherwise sane people that brought forth our bitter...
