Christian Cook > Christian's Quotes

“Brake lights, brake lights, brake lights; a domino topple of red stop lights ripples back from some non-event up ahead. Some idiot blew his nose too abruptly and a Mexican wave of mini traffic lights all went red in neat little pairs.

There are no green lights on a motorway to tell you that you can go. You just go when you can. Another short burst of hemmed in freedom until the next tsunami of ‘stop’ floods the road.”
― Christian Cook, WordPlay Showcase

“He never raised a hand to us. He always said that inflicting pain, even as a last resort, was a sign that intelligence had been exhausted. He said smacking just passed on violence as an inheritance. But he was not soft with his words; when he called you to order, it pulled you up sharp. It wasn’t just a case of not teaching children to hit out. He believed the far more important lesson for the child was to realise that there are always words. However bad a child’s behaviour, there were always more words; the time to stop talking was never a point he would reach.”
― Christian Cook

“When you’re on the dance floor screaming louder than the amps and dancing to the pulse of the lights, you’re in the bubble. As soon as the bubble bursts, that it, you’re now outside it all. The swinging arms of the crowd become shutting barriers; the lights blind you and force you back; the deafening music becomes a solid wall of impenetrable sound.

It’s like you stop being one of the actors and turn into one of the film crew behind the scenes. You just have to stand back and watch in silence; the fake set slides away from you on wheels and you’re left in the dark shadows, waiting for the director to shout, ‘Cut!’ just so you can move again.

As soon as you step foot inside a club, you know that you have to keep in that bubble moment; keep drinking; keep dancing; keep mingling. Until one drink too many, exhausted from the dancing, you mingle beyond the last person in the club and fall outside the moment. Then it’s lost forever and you end up sitting next to a sleeping drunk or leaning against a pile of discarded coats.”
― Christian Cook, Gem Street. The First Collection 2012

“I enjoy waking up before the weather.
It never rains at 4:00AM. Yes, it’s always cold, but it’s not an uncomfortable cold; it’s the cold of an engine at rest, a day that has yet to fire into life. At this time, everything is fresh and crisp, as if it’s new and still in its wrapping.
Sunsets are beautiful, but the light fades to darkness. It’s like watching a candle burn itself out. The dawn is the birth of a new day; the sun spills colours into the clouds like a child’s paintbrush swirling in a pot of water. The countryside has such a beautiful sadness about it; a distant tractor ambles slowly along a furrowed field like a tear on a cheek.”
― Christian Cook, Hitler Did It

“Everything you have is now worth nothing and yet nothing, true nothing, is worth everything to you. For a man covered in shameful lies, to suddenly possess nothing would be a luxury. If you cannot even grasp the true value of nothing then how can you possibly appreciate the cost of all the shiny trinkets weighing down your feeble life?”
― Christian Cook, The Tipping Point: An Anthology of Short Stories

“Anya's final sweep of the bow was as if she had delivered the coup de grâce in a sword duel. The last note reverberated around the empty theatre until only the white noise from the speakers remained, lapping back in like a gentle wave.
It was probably the most beautiful rendition I had heard her perform, but there was no applause; there was only silence.

I flicked my eyes across to Malcolm, the theatre director, but his gaze was transfixed on a particular seat. Even Anya, rigid and breathless with the violin at her side, was staring at that same seat.”
― Christian Cook, Momaya Annual Review 2011: Greed

“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.

"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he observed.

"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.”
― Joseph Heller, Catch-22

“Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.”
― Joseph Heller

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
― George Orwell, 1984

“Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. ”
― George Orwell

“Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout with some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.”
― George Orwell, Why I Write

“Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness.”
― George Orwell

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night

“Those who believe in telekinetics, raise my hand.”
― Kurt Vonnegut

“I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can't see from the center.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Player Piano

“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, If This Isn't Nice, What Is?: Advice for the Young

“And so it goes...”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five

“Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.”
― Kurt Vonnegut

“The true measure of a man is not his intelligence or how high he rises in this freak establishment. No, the true measure of a man is this: how quickly can he respond to the needs of others and how much of himself he can give.”
― Philip K. Dick

“The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use them.”
― Philip K. Dick

“It really seems to me that in the midst of great tragedy, there is always the horrible possibility that something terribly funny will happen.”
― Philip K. Dick

“Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly.”
― Franz Kafka

“Beyond a certain point there is no return. This point has to be reached.”
― Franz Kafka

“Writing is a deeper sleep than death.
Just as one wouldn't pull a corpse from its grave,
I can't be dragged from my desk at night.”
― Franz Kafka

“We need the books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us.”
― Franz Kafka

“Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy.”
― Franz Kafka

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.”
― Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time

“Don't Panic.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.”
― Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy