Quotes...got any? — Legacy Forums

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#121

You're doing a good job, of course everything you've made in the last four hours are rags, but you've made them in a very efficient manner.

No I don't know what wrong with it, that's your job. I just know there is something wrong with it.

Don't make me get out my green marker.

Socks not picked up, yarn not tied on, not using the blue lights or the blue dye, what do you do for the 8 hours you are here?

That's your opinion. It's my job to tell you that you are wrong.

~ all me at work. i'm such an ass :D

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#122

To do all that one is able to do, is to be a man; to do all that one would like to do, is to be a god.

-Napoleon Bonaparte

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#123

Q:"you could start by telling me how it feels to hunt down other varient thirteen for the cudlips at the UN" (ie: his fellow mutants)
A:"Remunerative"-Black man, (known as 'Thirteen' in the US) By richard K morgan

"Are you going to get drunk?"
"Of course I am. If i've got to talk to myself, I don't see why I should do it sober" -altered carbon (the guy is in two bodies)

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#124

"Some of my best friends are hallucinations." - me

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#125

"May you slay a thousand children." -Teblor saying of good luck...

House of Chains - Erikson

"IT'S SNOWING!!!" - Myself when ash from a nearby wildfire was falling in nice, pretty, snow-sized flakes.

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#126

"This is a family-oriented hell hole." - one of my co-workers

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#127

Oh, you have been to some of the places my family vacationed when I was younger. I swear Mad Max/ Cyberpunk nomads stay at better RV parks than we did in those days.

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#128

Young women should not go alone on dark nights, even in Oxfordshire. But any prowling maniac would have had more than his work cut out if he had accosted Anathema Device. She was a witch, after all. And precisley because she was a witch, and therefore sensible, she put little faith in protective amulets ands spells; she saved it all for a foot-long bread knife which she kept in her belt.
-Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, Good Omens

Quotes from Strolencon 07

#129

The convention, such that it was, generated some great things...

In a flat computer voice, "Turn right. Turn right."

"Checking traffic."

"The floor does what?"

"This would make a great sub."

"Take a card."

"Dude, your luck sucks this weekend."

"Who would of thought that skill at Guitar Hero would let you run a DVD player?"

"No worries, the flight can't be delayed that long."

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#130

"Nachos? When did I put nachos in my boot?" - My Friend Charlie, smelling his shoes at the gaming table.

*Busts into Taxidermist's back door* "I'm lookin' for the Black Lotus!" - Me
"Who the hell are you?" - Taxidermist (GM)
"They're called the Lotus Dragons" - Dru, the GM
"Oh, then I cast Charm Person on the Taxidermist." - Me

"I have learned much in my studies." - Arq, the Changeling, trying to maintan his disguise as an Elderly Scholar after blasting a Kobold with Eldritch Energy.

"I have the strength and intelligence of a tank!" - Me

"If it hurts it means you're still alive." - I think it was the Russian guy from DOA3

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#131

"Vecna is working on other potential applications for the robot technology..." :shock:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6729745.stm

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#132

Not too long ago... playing Streets of Rage with my Father:

My Dad: "What is that?"
Me: "I think it's a fudgicle.. Let me eat it."
Dad: "Ok."
Me: "Sweet! Full heal!"

Me: "Oww."
Dad: "What?"
Me: "That was me you just kicked in the head."

Me: "Don't push 'A' unless we are losing."
*Police Car drive onscreen, guy pops out and fire explosive rounds at the enemies*
Dad: "Did you do that?"

There were a few others I cant recall, but I'll try to ply more vieo games with my Dad and see what else we say.

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#133

"You have to be 100% behind someone to stab them in the back." Cant rememmber who that was, might have been said earlier in the post, i didnt read all 9 pages lol. Still a good quote.

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#134

Observations, by George Carlin

--Here’s my favorite form of government. I don’t think we should be governing ourselves. What we need is a king, and every now and then if the king’s not doing his job, we kill him.

--I think someone could make a lot of money if they set up a little stand at the Grand Canyon and sold Yo-Yos with 500-foot strings.

--Sometimes they say the winds are calm. Well, if they’re calm, they’re not really f@%#$%$ winds, are they?

--Most of the time people feel okay. Probably it’s because at that moment they’re not actually dying.

--After decades of research murder investigators now say that in most cases husbands kill wives, wives kill husbands, children kill parents, and parents kill children. Want to know what I say? "No s**t Sherlocks!"

--You know what you rarely see? A ninety-three-year-old guy working on his resume.

--I hope no one ever asks me to show them the ropes. I have no idea where they are. Maybe I could pull some strings to find out.

--If there really are multiple universes, what do they call the thing they’re all a part of?

--I think a great title for a travel book would be Doorway to Norway

--I never worry that all hell will break loose. My concern is that only part of hell will break loose and be much harder to detect.

--Want to know what your cat is really thinking right now? “I sure would love to eat a rat right about now”

--And remember, if you practice throwing a discus alone, you have to go get it yourself.

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#135

"I had a Chuck Norris joke, but it kicked me in the head and I forgot it."

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#136

Babylon Five

Emperor Cartagia: "How will this end?"
Kosh: "In fire."

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#137

Originally Posted by Center-of-All
"No, you didn't die. Defeat is far too interesting and useful a tool to be wasted on starting over. "

While it is not a sig line, though it could be, it is advice to live by. That is why, in my game system, 4 points of impairment buys "taken out of play". While this can be death, it just means the damage done puts the character out of comission for a while: coma, long lingering wound, wound with infection that causes delirium, and so on.

In playtest, the best use of this was something like this.
"Finally, I clipped 4 impairment on him?"
"Sigh. You are going to invoke death on him?"
"No. We go through a dance of death. I attack with renewed vigor. He parries desperately. I advance. He gives ground. He leaps away, trying to get some distance. I follow him. We go over here.. over there.. and back and forth along the edge. Then... I thrust... he twists out of the way.. he does the cartoonish waving of his arms as he tries to maintain his balance.. and slips as I reach out for him. We peer over the edge, because by now everyone else has killed off the minion. We watch him fall down the chasm towards the river. Bounce off a rocky cliff side.
and again. and again.. and we lose him in the mist.
"Cool. So he is dead?" (This player was in to killing things).
"Nah, he is bruised, broken, and scarred, but he will be back... after a large number of adventures."
"What?" other players say incredulously.
"I watch Blake 7 disc 1 and this Sherlock Homes episode last weekend."
"We can take the best this guy can throw at us. As long as he is alive, the GM will keep throwing him at us. We know him. We won't have to learn all this new information about the new big bad guy. He won't feel compelled to make a bigger and badder villian that we might not be able to defeat. "
"Okay that was Blake 7, What about Sherlock Homes?"
"Oh the bad guys always survive going over the cliffs... especially if we say, "Nobody could survive that."
Okay take 6 Player Points and an extra 800 xp just for scene alone and the explanation. And remind me later to get you the Prince of Amber series. I think you will like what happens to the hero.

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#138

Charles de Lint Author
www.charlesdelint.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Lint

A long time ago a bunch of people reached a general consensus as to what's real and what's not and most of us have been going along with it ever since.

As far as I'm concerned, the only difference between fact and what most people call fiction is about fifteen pages in the dictionary.

I think you're all mad. But that's part and parcel of being an artistic genius, isn't it?

I want to touch the heart of the world and make it smile.

I'm not Chinese. I thrive in interesting times.

If you're not ready to die, then how can you live?

It's good to have mysteries. It reminds us that there's more to the world than just making do and having a bit of fun.

Life is like art. You have to work hard to keep it simple and still have meaning.

Not everything has to mean something. Some things just are.

One expected growth, change; without it, the world was less, the well of inspiration dried up, the muses fled.

Remember the quiet wonders. The world has more need of them than it has for warriors.

Stone walls confine a tinker; cold iron binds a witch; but a musician's music can never be fettered, for it lives first in her heart and mind.

The best artists know what to leave out.

The few wonders of the world only exist while there are those with the sight to see them.

The fey wonders of the world only exist while there are those with the sight to see them.

The problem with children is that you have to put up with their parents.

The road leading to a goal does not separate you from the destination; it is essentially a part of it.

The thing with pretending you're in a good mood is that sometimes you can.

There are few joys to compare with the telling of a well-told tale.

When all's said and done, all roads lead to the same end. So it's not so much which road you take, as how you take it.

Why did men worship in churches, locking themselves away in the dark, when the world lay beyond its doors in all its real glory?

Witchery is merely a word for what we are all capable of.

Without mysteries, life would be very dull indeed. What would be left to strive for if everything were known?

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#139

From the Sword of Truth Series

Meeting of Two Worlds
"There is nothing that exists that has only one side"
Darken Rahl

Letting go of the past
"Only a fool walks into the future backwards"
General Trimack

Noble Causes
"Nothing gained without cost is valued".
Richard Rahl

Resolve
"Hesitation can be the end of you.... or those you care about."
Mistress Cara

Dedication
"If the road is easy, you're likely going the wrong way". First Wizard Zeddiah Zu'l Zorander

Choosing your battles
"Life is far too precious to be casually squander on useless causes."
Richard Rahl

Freedom
There is no right way for the world to be. The only right is that people be allowed to live their own life."
Richard Rahl

Deserve Victory
There is no guarantee that if you try you will succeed. But without trying, you will assure failure and the lives of dread for you yourself and your children."
Richard Rahl

The Books in Wiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sword_of_Truth

TheTV show
http://www.legendoftheseeker.com/characters.html

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#140

Favorite quotes from A Song of Ice and Fire

I prefer my history dead. Dead history is writ in ink, the living sort in blood.
--Rodrik Harlaw

Now it begins" said Arthur Dayne
"No", Ned said sadly. "Now it ends."

“First lesson: stick them with the pointy end” -Jon

"Give me sweet lies, and keep your bitter truths." --Tyrion Lannister

"Tears are not a woman's only weapon." -Cersei Lannister

That's no law, just a sword. Happens I got one too.
--Yoren

pronounced it admirable. Doubtless if I showed him the content of my privy, he would pronounce it admirable as well.
--Jaime

We look at mountains and call them eternal, and so they seem…but in the course of time, mountains rise and fall, rivers change their courses, stars fall from the sky, and great cities sink beneath the sea. Even gods die, we think. Everything changes.
--Maester Luwin

My father is very good at doing nothing. He calls it thinking.
--Arienne Martell

Rhaegar fought nobly.
Rhaegar fought valiantly.
Rhaegar fought honorably.
And Rhaeger died.
--Ser Jorah Mormont

The Red Viper (circling Gregor Cleghane with his spear): "Do you know who I am?"
Gregor Cleghane (watching, huge sword in hand): "Some dead man."

Cersei: (her face bruising from Robert's blow) "I shall wear this as a badge of honor."
Robert Baratheon: "Wear it in silence or I'll honor you again."

Syrio Florel, to Arya: "Fear cuts deeper than swords."

The Hound: "There are no true knights, no more than there are gods. If you can't protect yourself, die and get out of the way of those who can. Sharp steel and strong arms rule this world, don't ever believe any different."
Sansa: "You're awful."
The Hound: "I'm honest. It's the world that's awful. Now fly away little bird, I'm sick of you peeping at me."

Tyrion the dwarf: "What sort of man do you take me for?"
Cersei: "A small and twisted one."

Cersei: "Love is poison. A sweet poison, yes, but it will kill you all the same."

Eddard Stark: "If you would take a man's life, you owe it to him to look him into his eyes and hear his final words. And if you cannot bear to do that, then perhaps the man does not deserve to die."

Tyrion: "I am sorry for your loss as well, Joffrey."
King Joffrey: "What loss?"
Tyrion: "Your royal father? A large fierce man with a black beard; you'll recall him if you try. He was king before you."

Varys the Spider: "There is no creature on earth half so terrifying as a truly just man."

Jaime: "Even if the boy does live, he will be a cripple. Worse than a cripple. A grotesque. Give me a good clean death."
Tyrion: "Speaking for the grotesques, I beg to differ. Death is so terribly final, while life is full of possibilities."

Bran: "Can a man still be brave when he's afraid?"
Eddard: "That's the only time a man can be brave."

Theon Greyjoy: "Why should a man humble himself when the world is so full of men eager to do that job for him?"

Littlefinger (to Eddard): "I did warn you not to trust me, you know."

Unknown swordsman at the Red Wedding: "Jaime Lannister sends his regards."

Ser Jorah Mormont (to Daenerys, who hesitates at using an army of brutalized eunuch-soldiers to regain her throne): "Your grace...Rhaegar fought [for his throne] valiantly. Rhaegar fought nobly. Rhaegar fought honourably. And Rhaegar died."

“I am sorry for your loss as well, Joffrey,” the dwarf said.
“What loss?”
“Your royal father? A large fierce man with a black beard; you’ll recall him if you try. He was king before you.”

"I seldom fling children from towers to improve their health. Yes, I meant for him to die."

“Never forget who you are, for surely the world won’t. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness. Armor yourself in it, & it will never be used to hurt you.” –Tyrion

“All dwarves may be bastards, yet not all bastards need be dwarves.” –Tyrion

"

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#141

"For once in my life, I want to see someone get killed" -Bend of the River

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#142

'Here's my strategy on the Cold War:
We win, they lose.' - Ronald Reagan

'The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.' -Ronald Reagan

'The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.' - Ronald Reagan

'Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.' - Ronald Reagan

'I have wondered at times about what the Ten Commandments would have looked like if Moses had run them through the U.S. Congress.' - Ronald Reagan

'The taxpayer: That's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination.' - Ronald Reagan

'The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.' - Ronald Reagan

'It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.' - Ronald Reagan

'Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it' - Ronald Reagan

'Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed, there are many rewards; if you disgrace yourself, you can always write a book.' - Ronald Reagan

'No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is as formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.' - Ronald Reagan

'If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under.' - Ronald Reagan

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#143

Mark Twain

“Now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates.”

“When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.”

“The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right.”

“There is nothing so annoying as to have two people talking when you're busy interrupting.”

“Don't go around saying the world owes you a living; the world owes you nothing; it was here first”

“Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.”

“The most interesting information comes from children, for they tell all they know and then stop”

“Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.”

“A man's character may be learned from the adjectives which he habitually uses in conversation”

“All generalizations are false, including this one.”

“Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.”

“To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.”

“The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want, drink what you don't like, and do what you'd rather not.”

“When angry, count to four. When very angry, swear.”

“But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?”

“Substitute "d**n" every time you're inclined to write "very"; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be”

“Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thought that is forever flowing through one's head.”

“A monarch, when good, is entitled to the consideration which we accord to a pirate who keeps Sunday School between crimes; when bad, he is entitled to none at all.”

(and much more)

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#144

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in

large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.
-Voltaire

Only the dead have seen the end of the war.
-George Santayana

The victor will never be asked if he told the truth.
-Adolf Hitler

When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die.
-Jean-Paul Sartre

Yesterday, December seventh, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United

States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces

of the Empire of Japan.
-Franklin D. Roosevelt

We are time's subjects, and time bids be gone.
-William Shakespeare

A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of

Paul.
-George Bernard Shaw

Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.
-Steven Wright

Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing.
-Robert Benchley

Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.
-Mark Twain

He would make a lovely corpse.
-Charles Dickens

I distrust camels, and anyone else who can go a week without a drink.
-Joe E. Lewis

I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through

not dying.
-Woody Allen

I intend to live forever. So far, so good.
-Steven Wright

I like children - fried.
-W. C. Fields

I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me.
-Fred Allen

I was the kid next door's imaginary friend.
-Emo Philips

I want my food dead. Not sick. Not wounded. Dead.
-Woody Allen

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#145

St. Bernard of Clairvaux (on gargoyles):

"What are these fantastic monsters doing in the cloisters under the very eyes of the brothers as they read? What is the meaning of these unclean monkeys, strange savage lions and monsters? To what purpose are here placed these creatures, half beast, half man? I see several bodies with one head and several heads with one body. Here is a quadruped with a serpent's head, there a fish with a quadruped's head, then again an animal half horse, half goat... Surely if we do not blush for such absurdities we should at least regret what we have spent on them."

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#146

"And how can man die better than facing fearful odds, for the ashes of his fathers or the temples of his gods?"

This pretty much sums up my current character's beliefs.

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#147

True glory consists in doing what deserves to be written; in writing what deserves to be read.
-- Pliny the Elder

Nine people can't make a baby in a month.
- Fred Brooks

Girls marry for love. Boys marry because of a chronic irritation that causes them to gravitate in the direction of objects with certain curvilinear properties.
-- Ashley Montagu

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso.

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#148

Quotes I found from a list I had a while ago.

All the worlds a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts William Shakespeare

to have no heroes is to have no aspiration, to live on the momentum of the past, to be thrown back upon routine, sensuality, and narrow self Charles Horton Cooley Sociologist

Did I request thee Maker, from my clay to mould me man. Did I solicit thee from darkness to promote me. Milton Paradise Lost

“...there’s a hell of a good universe next door; let’s go”
– E.E. Cummings

If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional creatures are sometimes more real then people with bodies and heartbeats Richard Bach, "Illusions"

"Lord, grant me a hard head, and a soft wall to beat it on"

“That Which Exists is Allowed.” John Lilly, The Center of the Cyclone

“With knowledge comes power. With practice comes wisdom.”

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." -- Edmund Burke

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." -- Martin Luther King

"The eye only sees what the mind is prepared to comprehend." -- Henri Bergson

"When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil." -- Max Lerner

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." -- Lord Acton

"The high-minded man must care more for the truth than for what people think." -- Aristotle

"We cannot expect to breed respect for law and order among people who do not share the fruits of our freedom." -- Hubert Humphrey

"In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell

"Life is like a grindstone - whether it grinds you down or polishes you up depends on what you're made of." -- unknown

"In matters of principle, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with the current." -- Thomas Jefferson

Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark. Professionals built the Titanic. Unknown

Heroes have a infinite capacity for stupidity. Thus legends are born. Unknown

Reality is what exists when you wake up.

Pain is just the exit wound of fear leaving your body.

"Where Were You Fellows When The Paper Was Blank?" Fred Allen (1894-1956)

"The otaku, the passionate obsessive, the information age's embodiment of the connoisseur." William Gibson
""The superfluous is very necessary." -- Voltaire

It is a bad plan that admits no modification Publicist Syrus

A straight line may be the shortest distance between two points, but it is by no means the most interesting. Dr. Who Jon Pertwee

Remember, you are braver than you believe, you are stronger than you seem, and you are smarter than you think A. A. Milne

It's not denial. I'm just very selective about what I accept as reality Calvin, Calvin and Hobbes

The best way to predict the future is to invent it.
The X-Files

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.
Aristotle.

QUOTE: The story never ends. It's this part of the telling that will end. J. Michael Straczynski.

Quote: Since the universe is curved, there cannot be any truly straight answers. J. Michael Straczynski.

Quote: That's the great thing about being alive...there's always a new trauma waiting just around the corner for you to learn from and draw upon. J. Michael Straczynski.

Keep quote: Mark Twain said, "Never write a scene until you have finished it to your satisfaction." Meaning in your head. You should always play the scene over and over in your head, filling it out further and further each time, until you can play it like a movie. Then, when it's all worked out, you sit down and transcribe it. This is kinda how I work. I finish a scene, load up what I need to do in the next scene...and distract myself, here on the boards, doing something else, and gradually filling out the scene over and over until it's crystal clear. Then when you sit down to write it, it goes quickly.

*********The best writing (IMO) is natural writing, where the words on the page flow very naturally, very smoothly. Every once in a while, you pull out all thestylistic tricks, you thunder and lightning all over the page, when needed for effect...but it's the writing free of artifice that seems, for me, to work well. If you hang out with writers long enough, the really *good* ones, you learn soon enough that most of them talk exactly the way they write. Lemme give you a forinstance...when Asimov was first struggling as a writer, he had lunch with his agent one day. He was having a hard time describing things, using language to paint pictures. The agent said, "You know how Hemingway would describe the sun rising in the morning?" No, Asimov said, leaning in...how? "The sun rose in the morning."

Modify this Chekov's rule of playwriting: If there's a gun on the wall in act 1 scene 1, you must use it by
act 3 scene 3. Similarly, if you fire the gun in act 3, you must show it in act one. I do try to play fair with the audience, and either hint at or point to what's coming in various ways, so that if you back up all the episodes, it's right there in front of you.

QUOTE: The storyline began millions of years ago. We're coming in in the middle of the story. But then, that can be said of all of us. J. Michael Straczynski.

Orson Scott Card once said, "And since every writer has about ten thousand pages of utter drivel in them, you might as well start now so you can get a good portion of that out of your way while you're still young. After all, you learn more about writing from writing a 100,000-word manuscript than you ever will from any writing class or writing book (and I say that as a teacher of writing classes and a writer of
writing books)."

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#149

When in doubt, reload and aim for the head.

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#150

"If violence was not your last resort, you failed to resort to enough of it."
--The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Pirates

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#151

A man is a fool not to put everything he has, at any given moment, into what he is creating. You're there now doing the thing on paper. You're not killing the goose, you're just producing an egg. So I don't worry about inspiration, or anything like that. It's a matter of just sitting down and working. I have never had the problem of a writing block. I've heard about it. I've felt reluctant to write on some days, for whole weeks, or sometimes even longer. I'd much rather go fishing, for example, or go sharpen pencils, or go swimming, or what not. But, later, coming back and reading what I have produced, I am unable to detect the difference between what came easily and when I had to sit down and say, "Well, now it's writing time and now I'll write." There's no difference on paper between the two.

– Frank Herbert

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#152

"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is."
-Attributed to Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut

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#153

1. "You mean they killed her?" asked David.

They ate her," said Brother Number One. "With porridge. That's what 'ran away and was never seen again' means in these parts. It means 'eaten.'"

Um and what about 'happily ever after'?" asked David, a little uncertainly. "What does that mean?"

"Eaten quickly," said Brother Number One."

2. "He had quite liked the dwarves. He often had no idea what they were talking about, but for a group of homicidal, class-obsessed small people, they were really rather good fun."

3. "On more than one occasion David, in his urge to explore the darker corners of the bookshelves, had found himself wearing strands of spider silk in his face and hair, causing the web's creator to scuttle into a corner and crouch balefully, lost in thoughts of arachnoid revenge."

--John Connolly (The Book of Lost Things)

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#154

Support your local Universe

Really, words to live by.

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#155

“The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress.”
—Philip Roth

“To gain your own voice, you have to forget about having it heard.”
—Allen Ginsberg,

“Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of 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

“It ain’t whatcha write, it’s the way atcha write it.”
—Jack Kerouac

“I don’t care if a reader hates one of my stories, just as long as he finishes the book.”
—Roald Dahl

“We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.”
—Ernest Hemingway

“Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works.”
—Virginia Woolf

“Each writer is born with a repertory company in his head. Shakespeare has perhaps 20 players. … I have 10 or so, and that’s a lot. As you get older, you become more skillful at casting them.”
—Gore Vidal

“We’re past the age of heroes and hero kings. … Most of our lives are basically mundane and dull, and it’s up to the writer to find ways to make them interesting.”
—John Updike

“Know your literary tradition, savor it, steal from it, but when you sit down to write, forget about worshiping greatness and fetishizing masterpieces.”
—Allegra Goodman

“There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be.”
—Doris Lessing

“Style means the right word. The rest matters little.”
—Jules Renard

“I do not over-intellectualize the production process. I try to keep it simple: Tell the damned story.”
—Tom Clancy

“One thing that helps is to give myself permission to write badly. I tell myself that I’m going to do my five or 10 pages no matter what, and that I can always tear them up the following morning if I want. I’ll have lost nothing—writing and tearing up five pages would leave me no further behind than if I took the day off.”
—Lawrence Block

“I think the deeper you go into questions, the deeper or more interesting the questions get. And I think that’s the job of art.”
—Andre Dubus

“People say, ‘What advice do you have for people who want to be writers?’ I say, they don’t really need advice, they know they want to be writers, and they’re gonna do it. Those people who know that they really want to do this and are cut out for it, they know it.”
—R.L. Stine

“Remember: Plot is no more than footprints left in the snow after your characters have run by on their way to incredible destinations.”
—Ray Bradbury

“There is only one plot—things are not what they seem.”
—Jim Thompson

“Anyone who is going to be a writer knows enough at 15 to write several novels.”
—May Sarton

“I think all writing is a disease. You can’t stop it.”
—William Carlos Williams

“The most beautiful things are those that madness prompts and reason writes.”
—Andre Gide

“Literature is strewn with the wreckage of men who have minded beyond reason the opinions of others.”
—Virginia Woolf

“Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now.”
—Annie Dillard

Re: Quotes...got any?

#156

Quotes by Robert McKee, Author or Story: Style, Structure, Substance, and the Principles of Screenwriting

“Do research. Feed your talent. Research not only wins the war on cliche, it's the key to victory over fear and it's cousin, depression.”

“Given the choice between trivial material brilliantly told versus profound material badly told, an audience will always choose the trivial told brilliantly.”

“When we want mood experiences, we go to concerts or museums. When we want meaningful emotional experience, we go to the storyteller.”

“Write every day, line by line, page by page, hour by hour. Do this despite fear. For above all else, beyond imagination and skill, what the world asks of you is courage, courage to risk rejection, ridicule and failure. As you follow the quest for stories told with meaning and beauty, study thoughtfully but write boldly. Then, like the hero of the fable, your dance will dazzle the world.”

“Good story' means something worth telling that the world wants to hear. Finding this is your lonely task...But the love of a good story, of terrific characters and a world driven by your passion, courage, and creative gifts is still not enough. Your goal must be a good story well told.”

“True character is revealed in the choices a human being makes under pressure - the greater the pressure, the deeper the revelation, the truer the choice to the character's essential nature.”

“Stories are the creative conversion of life itself into a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience. They are the currency of human contact.”

“In a world of lies and liars, an honest work of art is always an act of social responsibility.”

“In comedy laughter settles all arguments.”

“The Law of Diminishing Returns is true of everything in life, except sex, which seems endlessly repeatable with effect.”

“Boredom is the inner conflict we suffer when we lose desire, when we lack a lacking.”

“Story is metaphor for life and life is lived in time.”

If the story you're telling, is the story you're telling, you're in deep shit.”

“We rarely know where we are going; writing is a discovery.”

“Most of life's actions are within our reach, but decisions take willpower.”

“What happens is fact, not truth. Truth is what we think about what happens.”

“In life two negatives don't make a positive. Double negatives turn positive only in math and formal logic. In life things just get worse and worse and worse.”

“Secure writers don't sell first drafts. They patiently rewrite until the script is as director-ready, as actor-ready as possible. Unfinished work invites tampering, while polished, mature work seals its integrity.”

“Deus ex machina not only erases all meaning and emotion, it's an insult to the audience. Each of us knows we must choose and act, for better or worse, to determine the meaning of our lives...Deus ex machina is an insult because it is a lie.”

“No matter our talent, we all know in the midnight of our souls that 90 percent of what we do is less than our best.”