The Dark Forest (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #2)

by Liu Cixin

Without the fear of heights, there can be no appreciation for the beauty of high places.

Ten thousand times the web could be destroyed, and ten thousand times the spider would rebuild it. There was neither annoyance nor despair, nor any delight, just as it had been for a billion years.

“In my experience, any thinking is liable to go off the rails. You should just go to sleep.”

For the majority of people, what they love exists only in the imagination. The object of their love is not the man or woman of reality, but what he or she is like in their imagination. The person in reality is just a template used for the creation of this dream lover. Eventually, they find out the differences between their dream lover and the template. If they can get used to those differences, then they can be together. If not, they split up. It’s as simple as that. You differ from the majority in one respect: You didn’t need a template.”

‘In this war lies the fate of the country, but what does it matter next to individual rights and freedoms? All of you just do your best.’”

that people who are sensitive to beauty are good by nature, and if they’re not good, then they can’t appreciate beauty.”

One might be able to find her beauty among these works of art, but yours eclipses them,

‘If I don’t go to hell, who will?’

The past was like a handful of sand you thought you were squeezing tightly, but which had already run out through the cracks between your fingers. Memory was a river that had run dry long ago, leaving only scattered gravel in a lifeless riverbed. He had lived life always looking out for the next thing, and whenever he had gained, he had also lost, leaving him with little in the end.