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“Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future.”
“Libraries should be open to all—except the censor. We must know all the facts and hear all the alternatives and listen to all the criticisms.
Com, now universally spoken, had replaced all others as the world’s only language. One of the primary reasons physical libraries had died out so easily was that not many people could read the old books without a special computer interface. Everything had been translated into Com and was available digitally. The paper editions were considered obsolete.
“All human knowledge that existed prior to seventy-five years ago is about to be lost.”
“We’re living in the longest period of peace in human existence. We enjoy the highest standard of living in history. Everyone is happy. Why censor books?”
In 2098, there is no privacy, and secrets are only good for a trip to prison or a death sentence.
“Save the books, and your life will have meant something. Let them burn, and it was just frittered away.”
Peace came at a price. War was easier to avoid than terrorism. The latter required constant monitoring. Who wouldn’t give up all their privacy in exchange for peace?
The government was more window dressing than a representative democracy. Corporations had long replaced nation states as the power centers.
“We have to save the books. They’re everything we are. They alone can bring the answer.”
Amazon didn’t sell physical books anymore, but they had become by far the world’s largest retailer. Amazon also made an impressive array of gadgets, including their own INU.
He speculated that all of the advanced civilizations capable of reaching us have evolved so far beyond us that they’ve vanished within themselves to another dimension, a higher realm.”
The ‘virtual’ world is not a place that feels very secure to me. It’s too difficult to tell what is real. It’s too easy to manipulate reality across the digital Field.”
remember that what you might disguise as fiction will be understood as fact by those searching for the truth.”
in 2098 skin color wasn’t the issue it had once been for the world. There had been much blending. The majority of people were a varied and lovely light shade of brown.
Only thirty-eight percent of those arrested were given a trial, as the Aylantik Constitution did not guarantee this right.
“Imp,” the slang for people with implants. Imps had become quite common in the past twenty years,
“My theory is that the one percent or, more precisely, the top one percent of the one percent, are actually running the world. The government, elections, and the other trappings of our glorious worldwide democracy are merely theatre.”
“A writer’s mind is a dangerous place to sit and think
“Books are more than words, they’re dreams, ideas, and answers, and that is why they fear them,”
Even before the devastating plague, humanity was on a collision course with annihilation. Global warming, water table and ocean contamination, air pollution, nuclear war, and the assorted ailments of over-population were creating an acidic-toxic stew.
I write fiction. I’m just working my way through the plot that is my life.”
“Some books are so alive that they never leave you. They only change you.”
Life is too short for retribution, grudges, and hate. Forgiveness is a beautiful power.”
“Isaac Asimov once wrote, ‘It isn't just a library, it is a space ship that will take you to the farthest reaches of the Universe, a time machine that will take you to the far past and the far future, a teacher that knows more than any human being, a friend that will amuse you and console you -- and most of all, a gateway, to a better, happier, and more useful life.’
“Circumstances define the man. No one wakes up and decides to be great. It’s the events he’s thrown into that determine if he is truly great. Survive or not is to be great or not.”
the Old Man of the Lake.
“Sometimes secrets get you killed, sometimes they can save your life, but secrets can also make extremely powerful weapons,”
“An ebook is like having a photo of a dead loved one. It’s convenient to look at and it will stir the mind, but it doesn’t breathe.”
He believed in books, more than in people, because everything was discoverable within the pages.
To Runit, the books were people. People about to be murdered.
Kurt Vonnegut would say. ‘The truth is, we know so little about life, we don't really know what the good news is and what the bad news
“They’re afraid. It’s the same as it always has been. A corrupt leader needs to control what the people think so they don’t revolt. There are three ways to do that: don’t allow them to learn anything that counters the official line, bombard them with propaganda disguised as news, and finally, give them a distraction, usually an enemy.”
How can we evolve to something higher when we insist on killing one another for profit?”
“The world is a complicated place,” Drast told a human lieutenant as they stood in the glowing shadows of endless images and data streams. “The smartest animal on Earth is also the least trustworthy. You can bloody well guess what a tiger will do, or a grizzly bear, or even a damn shark, but most humans? Hell, they can’t be counted on except to cut your throat . . . and they do that with a torgon smile on their face.”
“Novels hold more contentious ideas and contemplate far more truth than nonfiction,”
“If I don’t write every day, I’ll die. Not all at once, but a little at a time as the words clutter and clog my creative arteries until suddenly, in a quiet moment, I shall cease to breathe.”
“If I didn’t allow my humor to occasionally spare me from the insanity of this world, I would forget my place and either start giving suicidal speeches, or worse, I would become part of it.”
“Peace at gunpoint is not peace.”
Mark Twain’s words, “Truth is stranger than Fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.”
‘An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.’ Oscar Wilde.”
Kafka: ‘We ought to read only the kind of books that would stab us.’”
Life is a novel that no one bothers to write down.”
“There is no friend as loyal as a book,”
George Orwell said? ‘In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.’
‘He had learned the worst lesson that life can teach – that it makes no sense.’ Philip Roth,”
‘All that we don’t know is astonishing. Even more astonishing is what passes for knowing.’
“Victory always costs more than defeat, and change often commands a high price.”
The weight of moving the books was not nearly as heavy as falling in love . . .
In the middle of the night, with only pale light seeping into their caress, they took each other into their lonely grief, and trusted that this time abandonment would not follow them.
