John Blacksad > John's Quotes

“There is really no good English translation for adab. It means behaving well or good etiquette. It is acting with heedfulness, beauty, refinement, graciousness, and respect for others. The Koran teaches us the importance of acting beautifully. "Do what is beautiful. God loves those who do what is beautiful." (2:195) ”
― Robert Frager, Heart, Self & Soul: The Sufi Psychology of Growth, Balance, and Harmony

“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there.

It doesn't matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“There must be something in books, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“And when he died, I suddenly realized I wasn’t crying for him at all, but for the things he did. I cried because he would never do them again, he would never carve another piece of wood or help us raise doves and pigeons in the backyard or play the violin the way he did, or tell us jokes the way he did. He was part of us and when he died, all the actions stopped dead and there was no one to do them the way he did. He was individual. He was an important man. I’ve never gotten over his death. Often I think what wonderful carvings never came to birth because he died. How many jokes are missing from the world, and how many homing pigeons untouched by his hands? He shaped the world. He did things to the world. The world was bankrupted of ten million fine actions the night he passed on.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

“I penetrated the outer cell membrane with a nanosyringe."
"You poked it with a stick?"
"No!" I said. "Well. Yes. But it was a scientific poke with a very scientific stick.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“Human beings have a remarkable ability to accept the abnormal and make it normal.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“I leaned to Dimitri. “Are all Russians crazy?” “Yes,” he said with a smile. “It is the only way to be Russian and happy at the same time.” “That’s…dark.” “That’s Russian!”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“Yes. There’ll be wars. Fought for the same reason most wars in ancient times were fought for: food. They’d use religion or glory or whatever as an excuse, but it was always about food. Farmlands and people to work that land.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“Oh thank God. I can’t imagine explaining “sleep” to someone who had never heard of it. Hey, I’m going to fall unconscious and hallucinate for a while. By the way, I spend a third of my time doing this. And if I can’t do it for a while, I go insane and eventually die. No need for concern.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“Math is not thinking. Math is procedure. Memory is not thinking. Memory is storage. Thinking is thinking. Problem, solution. You and me think same speed. Why, question?”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“It's a weird feeling, scientific breakthroughs. There's no Eureka moment. Just a slow, steady progression toward a goal. But man, when you get to that goal it feels good.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“For fifty thousand years, right up to the industrial revolution, human civilization was about one thing and one thing only: food. Every culture that existed put most of their time, energy, manpower, and resources into food. Hunting it, gathering it, farming it, ranching it, storing it, distributing it…it was all about food.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“I could see the Soyuz through the window. Old technology, to be sure, but easily the most reliable launch system ever made.”
― Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary

“Dışarıda en az iki cinayetin suçlusu gizleniyordu. Hem bir kadını hem de anılarımı öldürmüştü.”
― Juan Díaz Canales, Somewhere Within the Shadows

“+Her şeyi yerli yerine koymanın tadına doyum olmuyor. Bu “hobi”nin zevki nereden gelir, bilir misin?
-Hayır efendim.
+Bilmezsin elbette. Bak sana söyleyeyim: yararsızlığından gelir. Bir işe yaramaz, tuhaf olan da budur işte. Herhangi bir amacı olaydı, bütün çekiciliğini yitirirdi.”
― Juan Díaz Canales, Somewhere Within the Shadows

“Ne kadar güçlü olsalar da suçluların cezasız kalmadığı adaletli bir dünya düşlüyorum. Aslında ben içi temiz biriyim.”
― Juan Díaz Canales, Somewhere Within the Shadows

“Bay Statoc, oldukça yanlış bir adalet anlayışınız var. Adalet parayla ölçülmez. Para her şey değildir… Ölenleri diriltmek de mümkün değildir, öç almak isteyen ruhları yatıştırmak da.”
― Juan Díaz Canales, Somewhere Within the Shadows

“En sonunda güneş yüzünü gösterdi. Böyle günlerde bütün sorunların bir çözümü var sanıyor insan.”
― Juan Díaz Canales, Arctic-Nation