Shabnam Nadiya's Blog, page 8

"Language does this to our memories–simplifies, solidifies, codifies, mummifies. An oft-told..."

“Language does this to our memories–simplifies, solidifies, codifies, mummifies. An oft-told story is like a photograph in a family album; eventually, it replaces the moment it was meant to capture.”

- Karen Joy Fowler, We are All Completely Beside Ourselves

"We put all our politicians in prison as soon as they’re elected. Don’t..."

““We put all our politicians in prison as soon as they’re elected. Don’t you?”

“Why?”

“It saves time.””

- Terry Pratchett, The Last Continent

"Saifa moved across the lawn, feet hidden by her dress.The cat was gone.The cat had known..."

“Saifa moved across the lawn, feet hidden by her dress.

The cat was gone.

The cat had known better.

And before any of them.”

- Alexander Maksik, A Marker to Measure Drift

slackmistress:(via 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Hitler —...

slackmistress:

(via 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Hitler — Medium)

This is brilliant.

"As she moved through the tide pools and across the worn rocks, she forgot where she was walking, and..."

“As she moved through the tide pools and across the worn rocks, she forgot where she was walking, and then where she was on the earth. She remembered that she’d made a decision to stay in this place but could not say what this place was, so she reminded herself that if she were to fall she might split her head open, or drown, or break an ankle and that she’d have to be cautious wherever she was, that she did not want to die yet, after all the opportunities she’d had to die, she would not die here of all places. Then she felt her feet touch the coarse sand of the black beach where she’d spent the first night. She sat down with her back to the rocks and again watched the sidewalk curve away from her.”

- Alexander Maksik, A Marker to Measure Drift

"Granny Weatherwax was often angry. She considered it one of her strong points. Genuine anger was one..."

“Granny Weatherwax was often angry. She considered it one of her strong points. Genuine anger was one of the world’s great creative forces. Bu you had to learn how to control it. That didn’t mean you let it trickle away. It meant you dammed it, carefully, let it develop a working head, let it drown whole vallyes of the mind and then, just when the whole structure was about to collapse, opened a tiny pipeline at the base and let the iron-hard stream of wrath power the turbines of revenge.”

- Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters

"Cosmopolitan as they were, the poeple of Morpork had a breezy, no-nonsense approach to the nonhuman..."

“Cosmopolitan as they were, the poeple of Morpork had a breezy, no-nonsense approach to the nonhuman races, i.e. hit them over the head with a brick and throw them in the river. This did not apply to trolls, naturally,because it is very difficult to be racially prejudiced against creatures seven feet tall who can bite through walls, at least for very long. But people three feet high were absolutely designed to be discriminated against.”

- Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters

"It would be a pretty good bet that the gods of a world like this probably do not play chess and..."

“It would be a pretty good bet that the gods of a world like this probably do not play chess and indeed this is the case. In fact no gods anywhere play chess. They haven’t got the imagination. Gods prefer simple, vicious games, where you Do Not Achieve Transcendence but Go Straight to Oblivion; a key to the understanding of all religion is that a god’s idea of amusement is Snakes and Ladders with greased rungs.”

- Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters.

Nadine Gordimer - Banquet Speech

Nadine Gordimer - Banquet Speech:

“When I began to write as a very young person in a rigidly racist and inhibited colonial society, I felt, as many others did, that I existed marginally on the edge of the world of ideas, of imagination and beauty. These, taking shape in poetry and fiction, drama, painting and sculpture, were exclusive to that distant realm known as ‘overseas’. It was the dream of my contemporaries, white and black, to venture there as the only way to enter the world of artists. It took the realisation that the colour bar – I use that old, concrete image of racism – was like the gate of the law in Kafka’s parable, which was closed to the supplicant throughout his life because he didn’t understand that only he could open it. It took this to make us realise that what we had to do to find the world was to enter our own world fully, first. We had to enter through the tragedy of our own particular place.”

"Good or bad, do it as you. Too many lies and there’s no truth to go back to."

“Good or bad, do it as you. Too many lies and there’s no truth to go back to.”

- Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment