Terry Pratchett Quotes

756 Sourced Quotes

What did I tell you about Mister Safety Catch?' said Vimes weakly. When Mister Safety Catch Is Not On, Mister Crossbow Is Not Your Friend,' recited Detritus, saluting.

Terry Pratchett
When they're standing right in front of you, kings are a kind of speech impediment.

Terry Pratchett
But…but you can't treat religion as a sort of buffet, can you? I mean, you can't say yes please, I'll have some of the Celestial Paradise and a helping of the Divine Plan but go easy on the kneeling and none of the Prohibition of Images, they give me wind. Its table d'hôte or nothing, otherwise... well, it would be silly.

Terry Pratchett
I think you should be proud of not being worse than just deeply introverted and socially maladjusted.

Terry Pratchett
Young man, the games we play are lessons we learn. The assumptions we make, things we ignore, and things we change make us what we become.

Terry Pratchett
It's going to look pretty good, then, isn't it," said War testily, "the One Horseman and Three Pedestrians of the Apocalypse.

Terry Pratchett
Normally its narrow streets were crowded with stalls, and people from all over the Carpet. They'd all be trying to cheat one another in that open-and-above-board way known as 'doing business'.

Terry Pratchett
The thing about football - the important thing about football - is that it is not just about football.

Terry Pratchett
You take a bunch of people who don't seem any different from you and me, but when you add them all together you get this sort of huge raving maniac with national borders and an anthem.

Terry Pratchett
Anyway, why would you trust anything written down? She certainly didn't trust "Mothers of Borogravia!" and that was from the government. And if you couldn't trust the government, who could you trust? Very nearly everyone, come to think of it...

Terry Pratchett
The truth is a fog, in which one man sees the heavenly host and the other one sees a flying elephant.

Terry Pratchett
It seems sensible to me that we should look to the medical profession, that over the centuries has helped us to live longer and healthier lives, to help us die peacefully among our loved ones in our own home without a long stay in God's waiting room.

Terry Pratchett
Oh. I see. People don't want to see what can't possibly exist.

Terry Pratchett
Go on, prove me wrong. Destroy the fabric of the universe. See if I care.

Terry Pratchett
Bringing about Armageddon can be dangerous. Do not attempt it in your own home.

Terry Pratchett
Oh, come on. Revelation was a mushroom dream that belonged in the Apocrypha. The New Testament is basically about what happened when God got religion

Terry Pratchett
Granny Weatherwax was not lost. She wasn't the kind of person who ever became lost. It was just that, at the moment, while she knew exactly where SHE was, she didn't know the position of anywhere else.

Terry Pratchett
It occurred to me that at one point it was like I had two diseases – one was Alzheimer's and the other was knowing I had Alzheimer's.

Terry Pratchett
Are you a devious, plotting, unreliable madman? Ah, good, then you can be my most trusted advisor.

Terry Pratchett
Some things are fairly obvious when it's a seven-foot skeleton with a scythe telling you them

Terry Pratchett
The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to the presence of those who think they've found it.

Terry Pratchett
Ankh-Morpork! Pearl of cities! This is not a completely accurate description, of course — it was not round and shiny — but even its worst enemies would agree that if you had to liken Ankh-Morpork to anything, then it might as well be a piece of rubbish covered with the diseased secretions of a dying mollusc.

Terry Pratchett
There is a rumour going around that I have found God. I think this is unlikely because I have enough difficulty finding my keys, and there is empirical evidence that they exist.
But it is true that in an interview I gave recently I did describe a sudden, distinct feeling I had one hectic day that everything I was doing was right and things were happening as they should.
It seemed like the memory of a voice and it came wrapped in its own brief little bubble of tranquillity. I'm not used to this.
As a fantasy writer I create fresh gods and philosophies almost with every new book … But since contracting Alzheimer's disease I have spent my long winter walks trying to work out what it is that I really, if anything, believe.

Terry Pratchett
The Deftmenes are mad and the Dumii are sane, thought Snibril, and that's just the same as being mad except that it's quieter. If only you could mix them together, you'd end up with normal people.

Terry Pratchett
There's one thing you can say for air pollution, you get utterly amazing sunrises.

Terry Pratchett
She folded her arms and then shouted, "Right you thieving scunners! How dare you steal Miss Treason's funeral meats!" "Oh, waily, waily, it's the foldin' o' the arms, the foooldin' o' the aaaarmss!" cried Daft Wullie, dropping to the ground and trying to cover himself with leaves. Around him Feegles started to wail and cower and Big Yan began to bang his head on the rear wall of the dairy.

Terry Pratchett
Either dragons should exist completely or fail to exist at all, he felt. A dragon only half-existing was worse than the extremes.

Terry Pratchett
Look, that's why there's rules, understand? So that you think before you break 'em.

Terry Pratchett
I know that I am a small, weak man, but I have amassed a large library; I dream of dangerous places.

Terry Pratchett
But is all this true?" said Brutha. Didactylos shrugged. "Could be. Could be. We are here and it is now. The way I see it is, after that, everything tends towards guesswork." "You mean you don't KNOW it's true?" said Brutha. "I THINK it might be," said Didactylos. "I could be wrong. Not being certain is what being a philosopher is all about.

Terry Pratchett