Orson Scott Card Quotes

Once you duct-tape a Ziploc bag to a man's chest, there's no going back.

People love to hear the brag of the local boy, because they want him to be great, but the foreigner must deny that he has any outstanding virtue - this is what will endear him to the locals.

I don't know why people who got what they need to be happy don't just go ahead and be happy.

Good people do not let others suffer needlessly.

I own the whole world, and folks haven't been keeping up too well on the payments.

I always tell what I believe. Whether it's true, I'm no more sure than any man.

I don't know a soul who doesn't maintain two separate lists of doctrines the ones that they believe that they believe; and the ones that they actually try to live by.

A rustic setting always suggests fantasy; to suggest science fiction, you need sheet metal and plastic. You need rivets.

It is the essence of dignity to pretend to desire what you cannot prevent.

I'm neutral on lying, seeing as how there's times when the truth just hurts people.

To expect wickedness from human beings is the best way I know of to avoid surprises. And when I am surprised, it's always pleasantly.

War was never so careful as to inflict suffering only where it was merited.

A weak King must be what other Kings have been; a strong King is himself, and from then on the meaning of the name of King is changed.

He jumped at the Giants face, clambered up his lip and nose, and began to dig in the Giant's eye.

'So if we can we'll kill every last of the buggers, and if they can they'll kill every last one of us. As for me,' said Ender, 'I'm in favor of surviving'.

Your dream is a good one. [. . .] The desire that is the very root of life itself: To grow until all the space you can see is part of you, under your control. It's the desire for greatness.

If you read to your kids you'll make readers out of them, partly because they'll associate reading with good parent time.

The only people who ever prize purity of ignorance are those who profit from a monopoly on knowledge.

Even the most introverted person alive is constantly hungry for human association

Folks always seemed to think that as long as they didn't know about something bad, it wasn't happening, so whoever told them actually caused it to be true.

When you really know someone, you can't hate him.

You take a step, then another. That's the journey. But to take a step with your eyes open is not a journey at all, it's a remaking of your own mind.

Who would I be, if other good souls did not make up for my shortcomings?

Science isn't done by consensus. It's done by rigorous testing.

It's simple. Nothing exists except in relation to something else.

If only we were wiser or better people, perhaps the gods would explain to us the mad, unbearable things they do.

There's a reason why every human society has fiction. It teaches us how to be 'good,' to behave in a way that is for the benefit of the whole community.

The only people who think children are carefree are the ones who've forgotten their own childhood.

[T]he politically correct are above the rules of ordinary civility, once they have identified you as an unbeliever in their religion.

Maybe we're the fools, for thinking we know things. Maybe humans are the only ones who can deal with the fact that nothing can ever be known at all.

The difference between science fiction and fantasy … is simply this: science fiction has rivets and fantasy has trees.

I've learned much, Father, and this above all: that no station in life is above any other, if it's occupied by someone with a good heart.

We don't admit it to ourselves, not until the very moment of death, but in that moment, we see all life before us and we understand how we chose, every day of our lives, the manner of our death.

Religion makes them crazy. Not a woman I ever met wasn't crazy with religion.

It just gripes me hollow, the way God always sneaks in to take the credit.

That is the ultimate power, to stare death in the face and be unafraid.

Knowing something may be a terrible burden to bear, but it holds no danger to them as aren't afraid of truth.

It wasn't so bad being a slave when your owner was yourself and stood up for you.

When both parties are lying and they both know the other party's lying, it comes powerful close to being the same thing as telling the truth.

My hands are clean, but not because I wasn't prepared to bloody them.

Rumors are the sauce of a dry life.

I have lived in the only decades I could have lived in, and hope to live through at least a few more.

Quim," she said, "don't ever try to teach me about good and evil. I've been there, and you've seen nothing but a map.

"We've devoted our lives to learning about them!" Miro said. Ender stopped. "Not from them."

I love you Ender. More than ever. No matter what you decide.

If desire did not dim the brain, nobody would ever get married, drunk, or fat. ~Val

Oh, I'll live Ender's life, too. It's so much more interesting than my own." ~Val

Perhaps every writer who thoroughly creates a fictional world will inevitably create a mirror of his own time and yet also create a world that no one else but him has ever visited.

I always think of books as being like people. Even the dull ones are worthy of decent respect, but you don't have to seek them out and spend time with them.

The old tale of Sleeping Beauty might end happily in French or English, but he was in Russia, and only a fool would want to live through the Russian version of any fairy tale.