Terry Pratchett Quotes

756 Sourced Quotes

Aziraphale collected books. If he were totally honest with himself he would have to have admitted that his bookshop was simply somewhere to store them. He was not unusual in this. In order to maintain his cover as a typical second-hand book seller, he used every means short of actual physical violence to prevent customers from making a purchase. Unpleasant damp smells, glowering looks, erratic opening hours - he was incredibly good at it.

Terry Pratchett
This was not a fairy-tale castle and there was no such thing as a fairy-tale ending, but sometimes you could threaten to kick the handsome prince in the ham-and-eggs.

Terry Pratchett
They know that people need witches; they need the unofficial people who understand the difference between right and wrong, and when right is wrong and when wrong is right. The world needs the people who work around the edges. They need the people who can deal with the little bumps and inconveniences. And little problems. After all, we are almost all human. Almost all of the time.

Terry Pratchett
Oh, he did his best to make their short lives miserable, because that was his job, but nothing he could think up was half as bad as the stuff they thought up themselves.

Terry Pratchett
He'sh mad?' 'Sort of mad. But mad with lots of money.' 'Ah, then he can't be mad. I've been around; if a man hash lotsh of money he'sh just ecshentric.

Terry Pratchett
London was not designed for cars. Come to that, it wasn't designed for people. It just sort of happened. This created problems, and the solutions that were implemented became the next problems, five or ten or a hundred years down the line.

Terry Pratchett
And these are your reasons, my lord?" "Do you think I have others?" said Lord Vetinari. "My motives, as ever, are entirely transparent." Hughnon reflected that 'entirely transparent' meant either that you could see right through them or that you couldn't see them at all.

Terry Pratchett
Some pirates achieved immortality by great deeds of cruelty or derring-do. Some achieved immortality by amassing great wealth. But the captain had long ago decided that he would, on the whole, prefer to achieve immortality by not dying.

Terry Pratchett
You are in favour of the common people? said Dragon mildly. The common people? said Vimes. They're nothing special. They're no different from the rich and powerful except they've got no money or power. But the law should be there to balance things up a bit. So I suppose I've got to be on their side.

Terry Pratchett
What was supposed to be so special about a full moon? It was only a big circle of light. And the dark of the moon was only darkness. But halfway between the two, when the moon was between the worlds of light and dark, when even the moon lived on the edge...maybe then a witch could believe in the moon.

Terry Pratchett
We sleepwalk through our lives, because how could we live if we were always this awake?

Terry Pratchett
Perhaps it would be simpler if you just did what you're told and didn't try to understand things.

Terry Pratchett
Behind him the Master of Ceremonies cleared his throat. His eyes took on a distant, glazed look.The Stealer of Souls, he said in the faraway voice of one whose ears aren't hearing what his mouth is saying, Defeater of Empires, Swallower of Oceans, Thief of Years, The Ultimate Reality, Harvester of Mankind, the-ALL RIGHT, ALL RIGHT. I CAN SEE MYSELF IN.

Terry Pratchett
'I thought the rule was that all monks were shaved.' 'Oh, Soto says he is bald under the hair,'said Lu Tze. 'He says the hair is a separate creature that just happens to live on him.

Terry Pratchett
Remember - that which does not kill us can only make us stronger. And that which does kill us leaves us dead!

Terry Pratchett
Unseen University had never admitted women, muttering something about problems with the plumbing, but the real reason was an unspoken dread that if women were allowed to mess around with magic they would probably be embarrassingly good at it…

Terry Pratchett
He had never been interested in stories at any age, and had never quite understood the basic concept. He'd never read a work of fiction all the way through. He did remember, as a small boy, being really annoyed at the depiction of Hickory Dickory Dock in a rag book of nursery rhymes because the clock in the drawing was completely wrong for the period.

Terry Pratchett
That, lad," he said proudly, "was some of the worst poetry I have heard for a long time. It was offensive to the ear and a torrrture to the soul....We'll make a gonnagle out of ye yet!

Terry Pratchett
I don't see what's so triffic about creating people as people and then gettin' upset 'cos they act like people.

Terry Pratchett
Legends don't have to make sense. They just have to be beautiful. Or at least interesting.

Terry Pratchett
The girls were expected to grow up to be somebody's wife. They were also expected to read and write, those being considered soft indoor jobs that were too fiddly for the boys.

Terry Pratchett
I staggered into a Manchester bar late one night on a tour and the waitress said "You look as if you need a Screaming Orgasm". At the time this was the last thing on my mind...

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

Terry Pratchett
It was then that Marvin got religion. Not the quiet, personal kind, that involves doing good deeds and living a better life; not even the kind that involves putting on a suit and ringing' people's doorbells; but the kind that involves having your own TV network and getting people to send you money.

Terry Pratchett
Every step is a first step if it's a step in the right direction.

Terry Pratchett