36 quotes
Only the mockingbird sings at the edge of the woods.
Mockingbird (1980)
He thought, looking at the cat, if only you were the intelligent species on this world. And then, smiling wryly, maybe you are.
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
The woman beside me hesitated a moment, and then said softly, “This man is different, Mary. He’s a Reader.”
Mockingbird (1980)
“But, damn it, you’re not gods.”
“No, but have your gods ever saved you before?”
“I don’t know. No, of course not.”
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
It always horrified Bryce to see professors fawn on businessmen—the very men they ridiculed in their private conversations—whenever a research contract might be in the offing.
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
Smart is smart. I’m glad there’s some around somewhere.
Mockingbird (1980)
He had never seen anything funny about monkeys.
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
I must get inside that library! I must have books again. If I cannot read and learn and have things that are worth thinking about, I would rather immolate myself than go on living.
Mockingbird (1980)
“I want you to save the world, Mr. Newton.”
Newton’s smile did not change, and his reply was immediate. “Is it worth saving, Nathan?”
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
What is my Individuality good for, anyway? And is it truly holy, or was I only taught that because the robots who taught me were programmed by someone, once, to say it?
Mockingbird (1980)
He was, if not happy, too busy to be unhappy.
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
It is the greatest achievement of my life. Yes, I have used that word: a great achievement. My learning to read was an achievement. Nobody knows that but me.
Mockingbird (1980)
I feel free and strong. If I were not a reader of books I could not feel this way. Whatever may happen to me, thank God that I can read, that I have truly touched the minds of other men.
Mockingbird (1980)
It all began, I suppose, with learning to build fire—to warm the cave and keep the predators out. And it ended with time-release Valium.
Mockingbird (1980)
I was not as awed by Rules as I had once been.
Mockingbird (1980)
Are you from Venus? Jupiter? Philadelphia?
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
Bryce thought for a minute. Then he laughed at his situation: using a Martian, in a bar, for a confessor. But perhaps it was appropriate.
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)
I knew that there had been books in the ancient world, of course, and that most of them were probably from that time before television, but I had no idea there were that many.
Mockingbird (1980)
Until learning how to read I had lived in a whole underpopulated world of self-centered, drug-addicted fools, all of us living by our Rules of Privacy in some crazy dream of Self-Fulfillment.
Mockingbird (1980)
When literacy died, so had history.
Mockingbird (1980)