Jack Vance Quotes

Why make plans? The sun might well go out tomorrow.

This is no science, this is art, where equations fall away to elements like resolving chords, and where always prevails a symmetry either explicit or multiplex, but always of a crystalline serenity.

I don't read other science fiction. I don't read any at all.

There are no absolute certainties in this universe. A man must try to whip order into a yelping pack of probabilities, and uniform success is impossible.

The inscrutability [of economics] is perhaps not unintentional. It gives endless employment to dialecticians who otherwise might become public charges or, at very worst, swindlers and tricksters.

The life we've been leading couldn't last forever. It's a wonder it lasted as long as it did.

I suffer from a spiritual malaise which manifests itself in outbursts of vicious rage.

I do not care to listen; obloquy injures my self-esteem and I am skeptical of praise.

Notice this rent in my garment; I am at a loss to explain its presence! I am even more puzzled by the existence of the universe.

Then there was Clark Ashton Smith, who wrote for Weird Tales and who had a wild imagination. He wasn't a very talented writer, but his imagination was wonderful.

I do read books. I suppose it's more or less the same thing, but at least I'm alone and I'm an individual. I can stop anytime I want, which I frequently do.

In fact, almost every job you get somebody watching you.

I never worked in an office in my life.

Good music always defeats bad luck.

The Vine of Life grows a single melon. The color of the heart is unknown until the rind is split.

Freedom, privileges, options, must constantly be exercised, even at the risk of inconvenience. Otherwise they fall into desuetude and become unfashionable, unorthodox—finally irregulationary.

There had been an attempt to humiliate him. It had not succeeded. He had paid, but pain, like pleasure, has no duration. Pride was an entity more persistent.

How I hate you, " he said softly. "If hate were stone I could build a tower into the clouds.

Until work has reached its previous stage nympharium privileges are denied to all.

Twango's hospitality, though largely symbolic, does him credit.

I would offer congratulations were it not for this tentacle gripping my leg.

One becomes sated with platitudes no less than honey, so that one often breaks another's bones in one's vexation.

I am not Cugel the Clever for nothing!

I understand the gist of your speculation, ' said Rhialto. 'It is most likely nuncupatory.