I have to ask, sir…Why does it have to be done like this?”Vetinari smiled. “Can you keep a secret, Mister Lipwig?””Oh, yes, sir. I’ve kept lots.””Capital. And the point is, so can I. You do...

He only drinks when he gets depressed,’ said Carrot. ‘Why does he get depressed?’ ‘Sometimes it’s because he hasn’t had a drink.

I dinna want to disappoint ye, but we’s in a cellar right here, and it’s full o’ tatties.’After a while a voice said: ‘So where izzit?”Maybe it’s got the day off?”What’s a demon need a...

‘Luck is my middle name,’ said Rincewind, indistinctly. ‘Mind you, my first name is Bad.’

Build a man a fire, and he’ll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life.

Only in our dreams are we free. The rest of the time we need wages.

WHO KNOWS WHAT EVIL LURKS IN THE HEART OF MEN?The Death of Rats looked up from the feast of the potato. SQUEAK, he said.Death waved a hand dismissively. WELL, YES, OBVIOUSLY ME, he said. I...

YOU’RE ONLY PUTTING OFF THE INEVITABLE, he said.That’s what being alive is all about.

[Science fiction is] out in the mainstream now. You can tell by the way mainstream literary authors pillage SF while denying they’re writing it!

And so Mort came at last to the river Ankh, greatest of rivers. Even before it entered the city, it was slow and heavy with the silt of the plains, and by the time it...

This is Art holding a Mirror up to Life. That’s why everything is exactly the wrong way around.

Big fat hairy monkey, hands a couple of octaves wide?

“Surely you have considered terrorist activity?”There was another pause. Then the spokesman said, in the quiet tones of someone who has had enough and who is going to quit after this and raise chickens somewhere,...

The universe, they say, depended for its operation on the balance of four forces which they identified as charm, persuasion, uncertainty, and bloody-mindedness.

Noble dragons don’t have friends. The nearest they can get to the idea is an enemy who is still alive.

Where’s the pleasure in bein’ the winner if the loser ain’t alive to know they’ve lost?

Who knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men? A copper, that’s who. (…)You saw how close men lived to the beast. You realized that people like Carcer were not mad. They were incredibily...

Even our fears make us feel important, because we fear we might not be.

There are the people of the day, and the creatures of the night. And it’s important to remember that the creatures of the night aren’t simply the people of the day staying up late because...

Little crimes breed big crimes. You smile at little crimes and then big crimes blow your head off.

People on the side of The People always ended up disappointed, in any case. They found that The People tended not to be grateful or appreciative or forward-thinking or obedient. The People tended to be...

People flock in, nevertheless, in search of answers to those questions only librarians are considered to be able to answer, such as “Is this the laundry?” “How do you spell surreptitious?” and, on a regular...

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.

Legitimate First watched them go as they walked away. Sergeant Colon felt he was being measured up.”I’ve always wondered about his name,” said Nobby, turning and waving. “I mean…Legitimate?””Can’t blame a mother for being proud,...

Vimes awoke with a noseful of camel. There are far worse awakenings, but not as many as you might think.

The forest of Skund was indeed enchanted, which was nothing unusual on the Disc, and was also the only forest in the whole universe to be called — in the local language — Your Finger...

You know it’s going to be Mary the Maid, or someone like her, and there’s going to be two men and she will end up with the nice one, and there has to be misunderstandings,...

You’re free to wear whatever you want, you know that.””Yes, sir. And then I thought about Dee. And I watched the king when he was talking to you, and… well, I can wear what I...

You can’t map a sense of humor. Anyway, what is a fantasy map but a space beyond which There Be Dragons? On the Discworld we know that There Be Dragons Everywhere. They might not all...

Sooner or later we’re all someone’s dog

She’d stopped reading the kind of women’s magazine that talked about romance and knitting and started reading the kind of women’s magazine that talked about orgasms, but apart from making a mental note to have...

In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.

How can you protect yourself by carrying a sword if you don’t know how to use it?’Not me, sir. Other people. They see the sword and don’t attack me,’ said Maladict patiently.Yes, but if they...

Wisdom is one of the few things that looks bigger the further away it is.

The female mind is certainly a devious one, my lord.” Vetinari looked at his secretary in surprise. “Well, of course it is. It has to deal with the male one.

What have I always believed?That on the whole, and by and large, if a man lived properly, not according to what any priests said, but according to what seemed decent and honest inside, then it...

The intelligence of that creature known as a crowd is the square root of the number of people in it.

How many books are there?” said Masklin.”Hundreds! Thousands!””Do you know what they’re all about?”Gurder looked at him blankly. “Do you know what you’re saying?” he said.”No. But I want to find out.””They’re about everything! You’d...

And that’s when I first learned about evil. It is built in to the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself,...

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...

To animals they were just the weather, just part of everything. But humans arose and gave them names, just as people filled the starry sky with heroes and monsters, because this turned them into stories....

She heard him mutter, ‘Can you take away this grief?”I’m sorry,’ she replied. ‘Everyone asks me. And I would not do so even if I knew how. It belongs to you. Only time and tears...

I DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU, he said, BUT I COULD MURDER A CURRY.

The Librarian was not familiar with love, which had always struck him as a bit ethereal and soppy, but kindness, on the other hand, was practical. You knew where you were with kindness, especially if...

Good evening, gentlemen!’ said the vampire. ‘Please pay attention. I am a reformed vampire, which is to say, I am a bundle of repressed instincts held together with spit and coffee. It would be wrong...

Veil, you see, if I vas to say something portentous like “zer dark eyes of zer mind” back home in Uberwald, zer would be a sudden crash of thunder,’ said Otto. ‘And if I vas...

Maurice watched them argue again. Humans, eh? Think they’re lords of creation. Not like us cats. We know we are. Ever see a cat feed a human? Case proven.

Nanny’s philosophy of life was to do what seemed like a good idea at the time, and do it as hard as possible. It had never let her down.

Taxation, gentlemen, is very much like dairy farming. The task is to extract the maximum amount of milk with the minimum amount of moo.

I thought you were all law-abiding? Oh, yes, sir. Very law-abiding. Just not very merciful.