Christopher Saunders > Christopher's Quotes

“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
― George Orwell

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.”
― Maximilien Robespierre

“Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.”
― E.L. Doctorow

“...it has always been my temperament to prefer a tiny amount of the excellent to a plenitude of the mediocre...”
― Robert Harris, An Officer and a Spy

“The Running Man is a sci-fi action story based on a novel by Stephen King, built around a nightmare vision of America in 2017—thirty years from when we were shooting. The economy is in a depression, and the United States has become a fascist state where the government uses TV and giant screens in the neighborhoods to distract people from the fact that nobody has a job.”
― Arnold Schwarzenegger, Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story

“As a nation, we began by declaring that 'all men are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all men are created equal, except negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.' When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty – to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.”
― Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln Letters

“In a sick country every step to health is an insult to those who live on its sickness.”
― Bernard Malamud, The Fixer

“But I still state unhesitatingly, that for pure, vacillating stupidity, for superb incompetence to command, for ignorance combined with bad judgment --in short, for the true talent for catastrophe -- Elphy Bey stood alone. Others abide our question, but Elphy outshines them all as the greatest military idiot of our own or any other day.
Only he could have permitted the First Afghan War and let it develop to such ruinous defeat. It was not easy: he started with a good army, a secure position, some excellent officers, a disorganized enemy, and repeated opportunities to save the situation. But Elphy, with the touch of true genius, swept aside these obstacles with unerring precision, and out of order wrought complete chaos. We shall not, with luck, look upon his like again.”
― George MacDonald Fraser, Flashman