The Prometheus Man Quotes

“Do you work in construction?”

“Deconstruction.”

“I’m sorry?”

“I work in deconstruction.”

“You mean demolition?”

“No.”

“I don’t understand. Is there a difference?”

“With demolition, you destroy something in order to rebuild it into something else. With deconstruction, you destroy something so that it can never exist again.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“The corridor was so long he could barely see the galvanized steel door at the end. As he made his way down, a sense of deep unreality set in. The unrealness of the place was so intoxicating he could barely stand it. He glanced at the steel door. And he was overwhelmed by the feeling that he’d gone as far as a person could, that he’d left behind everything he’d ever known.

It was so silent in the hallway he could hear his own breath. And for a moment he was what a person really is: just the naked, frightened will to know. To finally understand.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“A disturbing look came into Karl’s eyes. “The man we’re looking for doesn’t care about money or power or some cause. He isn’t a part of society.”

“Then what’s he part of?”

“Whatever’s waiting for us all out there.” Karl stared off, indicating the darkness surrounding them. He was in another place now. “He’s part of the world whose strangeness is matched only by its hostility. The world that grew people 100,000 years ago and will grow something even worse to kill them off in another 100,000. You can still see it sometimes if you really look: the darkness we tell ourselves we’ve conquered. The horrors we inflict and the far bigger horror inflicted on us. And surrounding it all: the emptiness. The silence. And the oceans and oceans of absolutely nothing.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“For a moment, he wondered what the human race really was. What was its true nature once you boiled off all the triumphant bullshit. And what he saw wasn’t creators or even murderers but slavers. For all of human history, one segment of the population kept another pressed into service. All the great empires were built on forced labor and tribute collected on pain of annihilation. The Romans conquered half the world because maintaining their life-style required a quarter million new slaves each year. The Portuguese and the British started the African slave trade and plundered the New World, killing millions of Africans and Indians. And what did they do it for? Sugar. Rum. Tobacco. Luxury goods.

Now the species had opened up a new frontier for itself: harvesting each other. The truth about the human race had always been obvious. Karl was staring right at it. There was nothing people wouldn’t seize, nothing they wouldn’t suck into their veins, to grow their own power and peace of mind.

This is hell, and we are its demons.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“People like you scare me.”

“People like what?”

“People who believe in things.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“After he found the shirt, he saw what it might—just might—be possible to do. He wanted to rise up, above the smallness and powerlessness of his life, just for a moment. And be, for that moment, better than he actually was and higher than he had any right to be. He knew it wouldn’t last, just as he knew he wouldn’t be coming back. But the possibilities were so great they would scare you—they would ache in your heart—when you made that decision: save nothing for the fall down.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man

“The possibilities were so great they would scare you—they would ache in your heart—when you made that decision: save nothing for the fall down.”
― Scott Reardon, The Prometheus Man