106 quotes
She rummaged in a battered bag beside her, brought out a dirty spoon, and began to taste the beans as if they were one of the jams of paradise.
The Day of the Triffids (1951)
There is a sense of reason's fingernails scrabbling to keep their hold, as one slides towards something which is not accountable; not, by ordinary standards, quite sane...
Plan for Chaos (2009)
The Americans had got into the habit of regarding the moon as a piece of U.S.-bespoken real estate that they would get around to developing when they were ready.
The Outward Urge (1961)
"In the country you can at least grow things. You do have a chance. But a city is a sort of desert of bricks and stones. Once you've used up what is there, you're done for."
The Kraken Wakes (aka 'Out of the Deeps') (1953)
"What is the use of life?"
Wanderers of Time (1973)
Those are the methods of Earth; that is the honour of great companies, as you will know to your cost should you have dealings with them. They'll use you, and then break you. . . .
Sleepers of Mars (1973)
"No one but a fool would say that a man who seethes inside like a volcano is calm.
I only know that when I see a man so tormented and cheated, and with such a look in his eyes, he is dangerous."
Sleepers of Mars (1973)
I'd begun to grasp the principle that the less anybody knows, the less any squealer can give away. And it was easy to see that in a place where questioning was liable to assume the aspect of a blood-sport, the less one did know about other people's business, the better.
Plan for Chaos (2009)
'In the end, defeat, and the cold, must come. First to the system, then the galaxy, then the universe, and the rest will be silence. Not to admit that is a foolish vanity.' She paused. 'Yet one grows flowers because they are lovely - not because one wishes them to live for ever.'
The Seeds of Time (1956)
I found it difficult to believe that they are real people living real lives. For the first day I was constantly accompanied by the feeling that an unseen director would suddenly call 'Cut', and it would all come to a stop.
The Outward Urge (1961)
"To take an illustration—a bad one, I admit, but enough for our purpose—one may consider time as a river. You may turn boats adrift on it at many points, and they will all collect together at the same serious obstacle, whether they have travelled a hundred miles or two miles."
Wanderers of Time (1973)
There was often a great deal of grown-up fuss that seemed disproportionate to causes.
The ways of the world were very puzzling. . . .
The Chrysalids (aka 'Re-Birth') (1955)
'You know perfectly well that women can and do - or rather did - handle the most complicated and delicate machines when they took the trouble to understand them. What generally happens is that they're too lazy to take the trouble unless they have to.'
The Day of the Triffids (1951)
"A mind oppressed by a sense of sin can play a lot of nasty tricks. Nowadays they talk of guilt complexes and inhibitions. Names change: when I was a boy the same thing was known as a bad conscience . . ."
The Best of John Wyndham 1951-1960 (1973)
"There are, of course, risks. In fact, there are three distinct kinds of risk: the known ones which we can and shall prepare against; the known ones which we must trust to luck to avoid; and the entirely unknown."
Stowaway to Mars (originally Planet Plane / The Space Machine) (1935)
"I see death as the worm's opportunity. It is defeat. You can dress it as you like, with drama, or glory, or pomposity, and perhaps deceive yourself for the critical moment - but, nevertheless, the same worm comes - it is defeat..."
Plan for Chaos (2009)
She had an exasperating feeling that there was a principle somewhere that she had missed; a principle which once grasped would make the whole thing as clear as daylight. But if there was it continued to elude her.
Stowaway to Mars (originally Planet Plane / The Space Machine) (1935)
"And it all comes of this gallivanting about the Universe. I never did think much of it. Stick to your own planet, is what I say; it's quite big enough. But will they? Not so's you'd notice it. They go flinging themselves into space, and then what happens?" He paused aggrievedly.
Sleepers of Mars (1973)
Safe passage along the catwalk of one's own racial code must be achieved through long experience; it is harder still to climb from it to another, and when that other is as involved as a maze and is entirely supported by incomprehensible misconceptions, a foot is bound to slip through the fabric from time to time.
The Secret People (1935)
'Co-operation makes many things possible. Co-operation introduces a factor which is greater than the sum of its parts. [...] Such a tremendous thing - the ability to co-operate... It makes you wonder what we could do if we were really to co-operate.'
Web (1979)