Postal Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Postal. Here they are! All 100 of them:

Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Did I do anything last night that suggested I was sane?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Steal five dollars and you're a common thief. Steal thousands and you're either the government or a hero.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
What kind of man would put a known criminal in charge of a major branch of government? Apart from, say, the average voter.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
I commend my soul to any god that can find it.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Sometimes the truth is arrived at by adding all the little lies together and deducting them from the totality of what is known.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Speak softly and employ a huge man with a crowbar.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Look, he said to his imagination, if this is how you're going to behave, I shan't bring you again.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
People flock in, nevertheless, in search of answers to those questions only librarians are considered to be able to answer, such as "Is this the laundry?" "How do you spell surreptitious?" and, on a regular basis, "Do you have a book I remember reading once? It had a red cover and it turned out they were twins.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The U.S. Postal Service should hire him for an ad campaign. If he were at the mailbox every time you sent a letter, no one would use email ever again.
Cara Lynn Shultz (Spellbound (Spellbound, #1))
There is always a choice." "You mean I could choose certain death?" "A choice nevertheless, or perhaps an alternative. You see I believe in freedom. Not many people do, although they will of course protest otherwise. And no practical definition of freedom would be complete without the freedom to take the consequences. Indeed, it is the freedom upon which all the others are based.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
And no practical definition of freedom would be complete without the freedom to take the consequences. Indeed, it is the freedom upon which all the others are based.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
In defiance of Miss Maccalariat I'd like to commit hanky-panky with you, Miss Adora Belle Dearheart... well, certainly hanky, and possibly panky when we get to know one another better.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
You know how to pray, don’t you? Just put your hands together and hope.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
If he'd been a hero, he would have taken the opportunity to say, "That's what I call sorted!" Since he wasn't a hero, he threw up.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
There was no safety. There was no pride. All there was, was money. Everything became money, and money became everything. Money treated us as if we were things, and we died.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
See a pin and pick it up, and, all day long, you'll have a pin.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
If you kept changing the way people saw the world, you ended up changing the way you saw yourself.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The important thing is not to shout at this point, Vimes told himself. Do not…what do they call it…go postal? Treat this as a learning exercise. Find out why the world is not as you thought it was. Assemble the facts, digest the information, consider the implications. THEN go postal. But with precision.
Terry Pratchett (Thud! (Discworld, #34; City Watch, #7))
Welcome to fear, said Moist to himself. It's hope, turned inside out. You know it can't go wrong, you're sure it can't go wrong...But it might.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Never promise to do the possible. Anyone could do the possible. You should promise to do the impossible, because sometimes the impossible was possible, if you could find the right way, and at least you could often extend the limits of the possible. And if you failed, well, it had been impossible.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
ALWAYS REMEMBER that the crowd that applauds your coronation is the same crowd that will applaud your beheading. People like a show.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
What a place! What a situation! What kind of man would put a known criminal in charge of a major branch of government? Apart from, say, the average voter.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
They say that the prospect of being hanged in the morning concentrates a man's mind wonderfully; unfortunately, what the mind inevitably concentrates on is that, in the morning, it will be in a body that is going to be hanged.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
But, in truth, it had not exactly been gold, or even the promise of gold, but more like the fantasy of gold, the fairy dream that the gold is there, at the end of the rainbow, and will continue to be there forever - provided, naturally, that you don't go and look. This is known as finance.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Soon to come in licorice, orange, cinnamon, and banana, but not strawberry, because I hate strawberries.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Words have power, you understand? It is in the nature of our universe. Our library itself distorts time and space on quite a grand scale. Well, when the Post Office started accumulating letters, it was storing words. In fact, what was being created was what we call a 'gevaisa', a tomb of living words.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Raise the stakes! Always push your luck because no one else would push it for you.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Every organization needs at least one person who knows what's going on, and why it's happening, and who's doing it.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The people who guard the rainbow don't like those who get in the way of the sun.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Moist was sure doctors keep skeletons around to cow patients. Nyer, nyer, we know what you look underneath ...
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
It was also a room full of books and made of books. There was no actual furniture; this is to say, the desk and chairs were shaped out of books. It looked as though many of them were frequently referred to, because they lay open with other books used as bookmarks.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Most investigators don't even know what the word means. You stop the cops from using informants and the only crimes they'd ever solve would be those by deranged postal workers who come to work once too often.
Andrew Vachss (False Allegations (Burke, #9))
Startled, I flinched "What are you doing?" "Keeping you from going postal." "You're doing it wrong.
L.B. Gregg (Catch Me If You Can (Romano and Albright, #1))
And the nice thing about a stake through the heart was that it also worked on non-vampires.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You can't just go around killing people!" "Why Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm. "What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?" "I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People," said the golem calmly. "I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be–– all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!" "No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Any ignorant fool can fail to turn someone else into a frog. You have to be clever to refrain from doing it when you know how easy it is.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Nothing-to-see is what most of the universe consists of.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
I wonder if it's like this for mountain climbers, he thought. You climb bigger and bigger mountains and you know that one day one of them is going to be just that bit too steep. But you go on doing it, because it’s so-o good when you breathe the air up there. And you know you'll die falling.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The Post Office was the underdog, and an underdog can always find somewhere soft to bite.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
But…but you can’t treat religion as a sort of buffet, can you? I mean, you can’t say yes please, I’ll have some of the Celestial Paradise and a helping of the Divine Plan but go easy on the kneeling and none of the Prohibition of Images, they give me wind. Its table d´hôte or nothing, otherwise…well, it would be silly.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
true freedom is so terrible that only the mad or the divine can face it with open eyes.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
A man can learn all of an opponent's weaknesses on that board,' said Gilt. 'Really?' said Vetinari, raising his eyebrows. 'Should not he be trying to learn his own?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Mr Horsefry was a youngish man, not simply running to fat but vaulting, leaping and diving towards obesity. He had acquired at thirty an impressive selection of chins, and now they wobbled with angry pride.* * It is wrong to judge by appearances. Despite his expression, which was that of a piglet having a bright idea, and his mode of speech, which might put you in mind of a small, breathless, neurotic but ridiculously expensive dog, Mr Horsefry might well have been a kind, generous and pious man. In the same way, the man climbing out of your window in a stripy jumper, a mask and a great hurry might merely be lost on the way to a fancy-dress party, and the man in the wig and robes at the focus of the courtroom might only be a transvestite who wandered in out of the rain. Snap judgements can be so unfair.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
You did what you were told or you didn't get paid, and if things went wrong it wasn't your problem. It was the fault of whatever idiot has accepted this message for sending in the first place. No one cared about you, and everyone at headquarters was an idiot. It wasn't your fault, no one listened to you. Headquarters had even started an Employee of the Month scheme to show how much they cared. That was how much they didn't care.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
I was secretly convinced that with such a marvel one would be able to write anything, from novels to encyclopedias, and letters whose supernatural power would surpass any postal limitations--a letter written with that pen would reach the most remote corners of the world, even that unknowable place to which my father said my mother had gone and from where she would never return.
Carlos Ruiz Zafón (The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, #1))
The only way to get something to turn up when you need it is to need it to turn up.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Did she go postal?” Russell grins at him, “You know, for pullin’ her portal on the island and sendin’ her to your safe house before the fight?” “Define postal?” Zephyr counters, his brows pulling together further. “Insanely angry,” Russell says. “Yes,” Zephyr nods his head adamantly, pointing at him. “She has not called me ‘sweetie’ since.” “Oooo,” Russell says, ducking his head and wrinkling his nose. “Doghouse.
Amy A. Bartol (Incendiary (The Premonition, #4))
Theres no stink more sorrorful than the stink of wet, burnt paper. It means: the end.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
People were strange like that. Steal five dollars and you were a petty thief. Steal thousands of dollars and you were either a government or a hero.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Welcome to fear, Moist said to himself. It's hope, turned inside out.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Where's the sense in promising to achive the achievable?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Pretty show, but you're wasting energy and time," Max said. "Mind if we get back to saving Horngate? You can go postal later.
Diana Pharaoh Francis (Bitter Night (Horngate Witches, #1))
If it takes the entire army and navy to deliver a postal card in Chicago, that card will be delivered.
Grover Cleveland
Oh, that's just Thud! That's easy!" yapped a voice. Both men turned to look at Horsefry, who had been made perky by sheer relief. "I used to play it when I was a kid," he burbled. It's boring. The dwarfs always win!" Gilt and Vetinari shared a look. It said: While I loathe you and every aspect of your personal philosophy to a depth unplummable by any line, I'll credit you at least with not being Crispin Horsefry.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
It was a little like stealing. It was exactly like stealing. It was, in fact, stealing. But there was no law against it because no one knew the crime existed, so is it really stealing if what’s stolen isn’t missed? And is it stealing if you’re stealing from thieves? Anyway, all property is theft, except mine.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Freedom may be mankind’s natural state, but so is sitting in a tree eating your dinner while it is still wriggling.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
-Why do you live in hotels? -It simplifies postal matters, it eliminates the nuisance of private ownership, it confirms me in my favorite habit-- the habit of freedom.
Vladimir Nabokov
I curse when I get really upset. Letting off steam that way makes me feel a little bit better. I've been through a lot, but I have never had the urge to go postal. I thank fuck for that.
Oliver Markus Malloy (Bad Choices Make Good Stories - Going to New York (How The Great American Opioid Epidemic of The 21st Century Began, #1))
I curse when I get really upset. Letting off steam that way makes me feel a little bit better. I've been through a lot, but I have never had the urge to go postal. I thank fuck for that.
Oliver Markus (Sex and Crime: Oliver's Strange Journey)
His mouth said: "Would you like to have dinner tonight?" For just the skin of a second, Miss Dearheart was surprised, but not half as surprised as Moist. Then her natural cynicism reinflated. "I like to have dinner every night. With you? No. I have things to do. Thank you for asking." "No problem," said Moist, slightly relieved.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Stanley always followed the rules. All sorts of things could go wrong if you didn't. So far he'd done 1:Upon Discovery of the Fire, Remain Calm. Now he'd come to 2: Shout 'Fire!' in a Loud, Clear Voice. 'Fire!' he shouted, and then ticked off 2 with his pencil. Next was: 3: Endeavour to Extinguish Fire If Possible. Stanley went to the door and opened it. Flames and smoke billowed in. He stared at them for a moment, shook his head, and shut the door. Paragraph 4 said: If Trapped by Fire, Endeavour to Escape. Do Not Open Doors If Warm. Do Not Use Stairs If Burning. If No Exit Presents Itself Remain Calm and Await a) Rescue or b) Death.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
He had never imagined so clearly the consequences of mailing a letter—the impossibility of retrieving it from the iron mouth of the box; the inevitability if its steady progress through the postal system; the passing from bag to bag and postman to postman until a lone man in a van pulls up to the door and pushes a small pile through the letterbox. It seemed suddenly horrible that one's words could not be taken back, one's thoughts allowed none of the remediation of speaking face to face.
Helen Simonson (Major Pettigrew's Last Stand)
He made a noise like an owl. Since Moist was no ornithologist, he did this by saying “woo woo.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
You have made quite a splash,” said Vetinari, smiling, “as the fish said to the man with the lead weight tied to his feet.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
It was the heart of any scam or fiddle -- keep the punter uncertain, or, if he is certain, make him certain of the wrong thing.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
It was a thought that should not have been thoughted.
Terry Pratchett
The mere fact you're delivering any will help, I'm sure," said Professor Pelc, smiling like a doctor telling a man not to worry, the disease is only fatal in 87 per cent of cases.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
What kind of man would put a known criminal in charge of a major branch of government? Apart from, say, the average voter.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
So here I am, my affections torn between a postal service that never feeds me but can tackle a challenge and one that gives me free tape and prompt service but won't help me out when I can't remember a street name. The lesson to draw from this, of course, is that when you move from one country to another you have to accept that there are some things that are better and some things worse, and there is nothing you can do about it. That may not be the profoundest of insights to take away from a morning's outing, but I did get a free doughnut as well, so on balance I guess I'm happy.
Bill Bryson (I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away)
An imagination is a terrible thing to bring along.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Ahh! They're all just pins!
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Adora Belle fought back, and to make sure fought back even before she was attacked.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The greatest threat to a robust, autonomous civil society is the ever-growing Leviathan state and those like Obama who see it as the ultimate expression of the collective. Obama compounds the fallacy by declaring the state to be the font of entrepreneurial success. How so? It created the infrastructure - roads, bridges, schools, Internet - off which we all thrive. Absurd. We don't credit the Swiss postal service with the Special Theory of Relativity because it transmitted Einstein's manuscript to the Annalen der Physik.
Charles Krauthammer (Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes and Politics)
Moist made a mental note: envelopes with a stamp already on, and a sheet of folded paper inside them: Instant Letter Kit, Just Add Ink! That was an important rule of any game: always make it easy for people to give you money.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
The figure stopped to cough long and hard, making a noise like a wall being hit repeatedly with a bag of rocks. Moist saw that it had a beard of the short bristled type that suggested that its owner had been interrupted halfway through eating a hedgehog.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Ubili su nam riječi koje smo smatrali svetima, prostituisali ih, učinili zastavama pod kojima marširaju gazeći čovjeka. Zar možemo više upotrebljavati riječi bratstvo, mir, solidarnost, sreća, jednakost, ljubav, sloboda. Otete su nam, prešle su u drugi tabor, postale su znamenje nasilja u ovom jedinom svijetu koji nas se tiče, jer drugog nemamo. Treba izmišljati druge riječi, a ne znamo kako i ne znamo koje. Ili da se ponovo sjetimo drevnih: zemlja, narod, življenje. Možda i ćutanje. A možda i: krik, koji neće niko čuti, jer niko nikoga više ne čuje i ne razumije...
Meša Selimović (Ostrvo)
Nevertheless, he picked up a piece of smashed chair. It had splintered nicely. And the nice thing about a stake through the heart was that it also worked on non-vampires.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
That was an important rule of any game: always make it easy for people to give you money.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
There was a definite feel about Adora Belle Dearheart that a lid was only barely holding down an entire womanful of anger.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
GENERALLY PEOPLE LIKE TO MOVE ON, Death hinted. THEY LOOK FORWARD TO AN AFTERLIFE. “I Will Stay Here, Please.” HERE? THERE’S NOTHING TO DO HERE, said Death. “Yes, I Know,” said the ghost of the golem. “It Is Perfect. I Am Free.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
We appreciate your coming to us with a copy of your letter to your sister, but it was unnecessary. Your offense was known to us even before the letter's receipt by your sister. Effective as of September 15 the primary responsibility of our isle's new assistant chief postal inspector has been to scan all post for use of illegal letters of the alphabet, then to make nightly reports to the Council. A report has been put on file on your behalf, your official sentence to be forthwith in issuance.
Mark Dunn (Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters)
You are aware, are you, that painting a few stars on a perfectly ordinary broomstick doesn’t mean it will get airborne?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
all freedom is limited, artificial, and therefore illusory, a shared hallucination at best. No sane mortal is truly free, because true freedom is so terrible that only the mad or the divine can face it with open eyes.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Winter arrived with December, and the world continued to suffer the loss of the Internet and most forms of communication. Supply chains were disrupted. The only mass form of personal communication was the letter, and postal workers were having their worst year ever, as they were actually meeded. Food was becoming scarcer and more expensive, as was fuel for vehicles and heating. Major cities experienced riots on a regular basis, spurred on by religious fervor and want. Civilization was on the brink of collapse.
Mark A. Rayner (The Fridgularity)
Ahora la Maga no estaba en mi camino, y aunque conocíamos nuestros domicilios, cada hueco de nuestras dos habitaciones de falsos estudiantes en París, cada tarjeta postal abriendo una ventanita Branque o Ghirlandaio o Max Ernst contra las molduras baratas y los papeles chillones, aun así no nos buscaríamos en nuestras casas. Preferíamos encontrarnos en el puente, en la terraza de un café, en un cine-club agachados junto a un gato en cualquier patio del barrio latino. Andábamos sin buscarnos pero sabiendo que andábamos para encontrarnos.
Julio Cortázar (Hopscotch)
You hardly know me and yet you invited me out on a date,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘Why?’ Because you called me a phoney, Moist thought. You saw through me straight away. Because you didn’t nail my head to the door with your crossbow. Because you have no small talk. Because I’d like to get to know you better, even though it would be like smooching an ashtray. Because I wonder if you could put into the rest of your life the passion you put into smoking a cigarette. In defiance of Miss Maccalariat I’d like to commit hanky-panky with you, Miss Adora Belle Dearheart… well, certainly hanky, and possibly panky when we get to know one another better. I’d like to know as much about your soul as you know about mine… He said: ‘Because I hardly know you.’ ‘If it comes to that, I hardly know you, either,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘I’m rather banking on that,’ said Moist. This got a smile. ‘Smooth answer. Slick. Where are we really eating tonight?
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
Being an absolute ruler today was not as simple as people thought. At least, it was not simple if your ambitions included being an absolute ruler tomorrow. There were subtleties. Oh, you could order men to smash down doors and drag people off the dungeons without trial, but too much of that sort of thing lacked style and anyway was bad for business, habit-forming and very, very dangerous for your health. A thinking tyrant, it seemed to Vetinari, had a much harder job than a ruler raised to power by some idiot vote-yourself-rich system like democracy. At least they could tell the people he was their fault.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The machine couldn’t be stopped and certainly shouldn’t be destroyed, the wizard said. Destroying the machine might well cause this universe to stop existing, instantly. On the other hand, the Post Office was filling up, so one day Chief Postal Inspector Rumbelow had gone into the room with a crowbar, had ordered all the wizards out, and belted the machine until things stopped whirring. The letters ceased, at least. This came as a huge relief, but nevertheless, the Post Office had its Regulations, and so the chief postal inspector was brought before Postmaster Cowerby and asked why he had decided to risk destroying the whole universe in one go. According to Post Office legend, Mr. Rumbelow had replied: “Firstly, sir, I reasoned that if I destroyed the universe all in one go, no one would know; secondly, when I walloped the thing the first time, the wizards ran away, so I surmised that unless they has another universe to run to they weren’t really certain; and lastly, sir, the bloody thing was getting on my nerves. Never could stand machinery, sir.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
- Svako doba je teško, a svoje najteže - govorio je tiho. - Kao u davno pećinsko vrijeme, kad su poplave, divlje zvijeri, teške bolesti prijetile opstanku ljudi, evo danas stihija besmisla prijeti samom životu. Samo, teže neko ikakva slijepa stihija ranije. Danas služimo stvarima, ne znajući pravu vrijednost ničemu. Obezvrijedili su riječi kojima su se ljudi zaklanjali kao štitom i koje su nas hranile nadom. Ubili su nam riječi koje smo smatrali svetima, prostituisali ih, učinili zastavama pod kojima marširaju gazeći čovjeka. Zar možemo više upotrebljavati riječi bratstvo, mir, solidarnost, sreća, jednakost, ljubav, sloboda?! Otete su nam, prešle u drugi tabor, postale su znamenje nasilja u ovom jedinom svijetu koji se nas tiče, jer drugog nemamo. Treba izmišljati druge riječi, a ne znamo kako, i ne znamo koje. Ili da se ponovo sjetimo drevnih: zemlja, narod, življenje. Možda i: ćutanje. A možda i: krik, koji neće niko čuti, jer nikoga više ne čuje i ne razumije, ali važan je za nas, i jer je to jedino što još možemo učiniti u ovom svijetu bučnih mašina i agresivnog besmisla, hidrogenskih bombi i ideoloških rafala.
Meša Selimović (Ostrvo)
People flock in, nevertheless, in search of answers to those questions only librarians are considered to be able to answer, such as “Is this the laundry?” “How do you spell surreptitious?” and, on a regular basis, “Do you have a book I remember reading once? It had a red cover and it turned out they were twins.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
One can think about someone far away and one can hold on to someone nearby; everything else is beyond human power. Writing letters, on the other hand, means exposing oneself to the ghosts, who are greedily waiting precisely for that. Written kisses never arrive at their destination; the ghosts drink them up along the way. It is this ample nourishment which enables them to multiply so enormously. People sense this and struggle against it; in order to eliminate as much of the ghosts’ power as possible and to attain a natural intercourse, a tranquility of soul, they have invented trains, cars, aeroplanes—but nothing helps anymore: These are evidently inventions devised at the moment of crashing. The opposing side is so much calmer and stronger; after the postal system, the ghosts invented the telegraph, the telephone, the wireless. They will not starve, but we will perish.
Franz Kafka (Letters to Milena)
Not doing any magic at all was the chief task of wizards—not "not doing magic" because they couldn't do magic, but not doing magic when they could do and didn't. Any ignorant fool can fail to turn someone else into a frog. You have to be clever to refrain from doing it when you knew how easy it was. There were places in the world commemorating those times when wizards hadn't been quite as clever as that, and on many of them the grass would never grow again.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
The displacement of class politics by identity politics has been very confusing to older Marxists, who for many years clung to the old industrial working class as their preferred category of the underprivileged. They tried to explain this shift in terms of what Ernest Gellner labeled the “Wrong Address Theory”: “Just as extreme Shi’ite Muslims hold that Archangel Gabriel made a mistake, delivering the Message to Mohamed when it was intended for Ali, so Marxists basically like to think that the spirit of history or human consciousness made a terrible boob. The awakening message was intended for classes, but by some terrible postal error was delivered to nations.
Francis Fukuyama (Political Order and Political Decay: From the Industrial Revolution to the Globalization of Democracy)
After death, you go on a very long way, that is going up. As you go, little by little, your features change. Your nose and ears retract in the flesh of your face like the little legs of a shellfish. Your fingers retract in your palm, your hands rebsorb in your shoulders. The same, your feet retract to your hips and you don’t walk anymore, you just float along a red brick wall, on which you leave your shadow like a streched disk. You are so round, that you become translucent and begin to see on all sides at once. While we are alive, we see through a postal box, but after death, we see around, with all our skin. Floating and looking at the the brick wall closer and closer, we get to a round place. There, in the middle, there is a cell, for we are in a mother’s womb. We enter the cell, and as the stages of our birth take place, we can see through the eyes of all beings, of the flea, of the rabbit, of the cat, the dog, the monkey, the man.. and with a little bit of luck, we can see through the eyes of the wonderful beings that follow the human being. A dead man is now looking at you through my eyes.
Mircea Cărtărescu
But the engine started, eventually, after a bunch of popping and churning, and then it idled, wet and lumpy. The transmission was slower than the postal service. She rattled the selector into reverse, and all the mechanical parts inside called the roll and counted a quorum and set about deciding what to do. Which required a lengthy debate, apparently, because it was whole seconds before the truck lurched backward. She turned the wheel, which looked like hard work, and then she jammed the selector into a forward gear, and first of all the reversing committee wound up its business and approved its minutes and exited the room, and then the forward crew signed on and got comfortable, and a motion was tabled and seconded and discussed. More whole seconds passed, and then the truck slouched forward, slow and stuttering at first, before picking up its pace and rolling implacably toward the exit gate.
Lee Child (Personal (Jack Reacher, #19))
Miss Dearheart gave him a very brief look, and shook her head. There was movement under the table, a small fleshy kind of noise and the drunk suddenly bent forward, colour draining from his face. Probably only he and Moist heard Miss Dearheart purr: ‘What is sticking in your foot is a Mitzy “Pretty Lucretia” four-inch heel, the most dangerous footwear in the world. Considered as pounds per square inch, it’s like being trodden on by a very pointy elephant. Now, I know what you’re thinking: you’re thinking, “Could she press it all the way through to the floor?” And, you know, I’m not sure about that myself. The sole of your boot might give me a bit of trouble, but nothing else will. But that’s not the worrying part. The worrying part is that I was forced practically at knifepoint to take ballet lessons as a child, which means I can kick like a mule; you are sitting in front of me; and I have another shoe . Good, I can see you have worked that out. I’m going to withdraw the heel now.’ There was a small ‘pop’ from under the table. With great care the man stood up, turned and, without a backward glance, lurched unsteadily away. ‘Can I bother you?’ said Moist. Miss Dearheart nodded, and he sat down, with his legs crossed. ‘He was only a drunk,’ he ventured. ‘Yes, men say that sort of thing,’ said Miss Dearheart.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
What was magic, after all, but something that happened at the snap of a finger? Where was the magic in that? It was mumbled words and weird drawings in old books, and in the wrong hands it was as dangerous as hell, but not one half as dangerous as it could be in the right hands. The universe was full of the stuff; it made the stars stay up and the feet stay down. But what was happening now . . . this was magical. Ordinary men had dreamed it up and put it together, building towers on rafts in swamps and across the frozen spines of mountains. They’d cursed and, worse, used logarithms. They’d waded through rivers and dabbled in trigonometry. They hadn’t dreamed, in the way people usually used the word, but they’d imagined a different world, and bent metal around it. And out of all the sweat and swearing and mathematics had come this . . . thing, dropping words across the world as softly as starlight.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))
While most ‘pinheads’ do indeed begin with a casually acquired flashy novelty pin, followed by the contents of their grandmothers’ pincushion, haha, the path to a truly worthwhile collection lies not in the simple disbursement of money in the nearest pin emporium, oh no. Any dilettante can become ‘kingpin’ with enough expenditure, but for the true ‘pinhead’ the real pleasure is in the joy of the chase, the pin fairs, the house clearances, and, who knows, a casual glint in the gutter that turns out to be a well-preserved Doublefast or an unbroken two-pointer. Well is it said: ‘See a pin and pick it up, and all day long you’ll have a pin.
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33))
Look, Bob, what part of this don't you understand, eh? It's a matter of style, okay? A proper brawl doesn't just happen. You don't just pile in, not anymore. Now, Oyster Dave here--put your helmet back on, Dave--will be the enemy in front, and Basalt, who, as we know, don't need a helmet, he'll be the enemy coming up behind you. Okay, it's well past knuckles time, let's say Gravy there has done his thing with the Bench Swipe, there's a bit of knife play, we've done the whole Chandelier Swing number, blah blah blah, then Second Chair--that's you, Bob--you step smartly between their Number Five man and a Bottler, swing the chair back over your head, like this--sorry, Pointy--and then swing it right back onto Number Five, bang, crash, and there's a cushy six points in your pocket. If they're playing a dwarf at Number Five, then a chair won't even slow him down, but don't fret, hang on to the bits that stay in your hand, pause one moment as he comes at you, and then belt him across both ears. They hate that, as Stronginthearm here will tell you. Another three points. It's probably going to be freestyle after that but I want all of you, including Mucky Mick and Crispo, to try for a Double Andrew when it gets down to the fist-fighting again. Remember? You back into each other, turn around to give the other guy a thumping, cue moment of humorous recognition, then link arms, swing round and see to the other fellow's attacker, foot or fist, it's your choice. Fifteen points right there if you get it to flow just right. Oh, and remember we'll have an Igor standing by, so if your arm gets taken off do pick it up and hit the other bugger with it, it gets a laugh and twenty points. On that subject, do remember what I said about getting everything tattooed with your name, all right? Igors do their best, but you'll be on your feet much quicker if you make life easier for him and, what's more, it's your feet you'll be on. Okay, positions, everyone, let's run through it again...
Terry Pratchett (Going Postal (Discworld, #33; Moist von Lipwig, #1))