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700cd3b
|
That was great. They're calling him Buttwatcher now. Just "Watcher" in front of the teachers, but everybody knows what he's watching."
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Orson Scott Card |
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18a61c0
|
it seemed a part of her life, to step from the ancient to the modern, back and forth. She felt rather sorry for those who knew only one and not the other. It was better, she thought, to be able to select from the whole menu of human achievements than to be bound within one narrow range.
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traditional-society
modern-society
modern
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Orson Scott Card |
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f172dbc
|
You get all the pleasures of the puppeteer.
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graff
manipulation
|
Orson Scott Card |
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a1b53ae
|
He woke up and fought another battle and won. Then he went to bed and slept again and dreamed again and then he woke up and won again and slept again and he hardly noticed when waking became sleeping. Nor did he care.
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sleep
life
truth
purpuse
ender
genius
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Orson Scott Card |
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4bfba5f
|
I learned to separate the story from the writing, probably the most important thing that any storyteller has to learn-- that there are a thousand right ways to tell a story, and ten million wrong ones, and you're a lot more likely to find one of the latter than the former your first time through the tale. (Introduction to Ender's Game)
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writing
storytelling
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Orson Scott Card |
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d53b12a
|
If God created our will, then he's responsible for every choice we make... So-- as I recall, the official philosophical answer is that free will doesn't exist. Only the illusion of free will, because the causes of hour behavior are so complex that we can't trace them back. If you've got one line of dominoes knocking each other down, one by one, then you can always say, look, this domino fell because that one pushed it. But when you have an ..
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want
freedom
philosophy
dominoes
|
Orson Scott Card |
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2f7beaa
|
So that's it?" asked the expendable. "Final decision," said Ram. "And it's the right one." "Why do you think so?" "Because we live or die, we'll learn something important from jumping into the fold. Thousands of future travelers will either follow us or not. But if we don't make the jump, we'll learn nothing, have no new options." "A lovely speech. It has been sent back to Earth. It will inspire millions." "Shut up," said Ram."
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Orson Scott Card |
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0509509
|
I had no idea we planned to be so ruthless." "It was not publicized or even discussed with the political arm of the colonization program. Ruthlessness was necessary but wins no votes." "But this is not our world, to treat however we want!" "Visiting here as students of an alien evolutionary tradition would not be either cost-effective or, ultimately, successful. We would inevitably contaminate Garden, or worse yet, become contaminated and b..
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Orson Scott Card |
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c3b3df9
|
There was some enthusiasm for a Caliban village, but it quickly dissipated when people contemplated a future village school and what the mascot might look like.
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Orson Scott Card |
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9f08e53
|
Bean was tired of talking about this. She looked so happy when she talked about God, but he hadn't figured it out yet, what God even was. It was like, she wanted to give God credit for every good thing, but when it was bad, then she either didn't mention God or had some reason why it was a good thing after all. As far as bean could see, though, the dead kids would rather have been alive, just with more food. If God loved them so much and he..
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suffering
religion
god
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Orson Scott Card |
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5f3d998
|
You deplore what I did, but you still want to know the results of my research.
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hypocrisy
|
Orson Scott Card |
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e4fba6c
|
No single] explanation will ever contain the final answer for all time, for all hearers. There is always, ALWAYS more to learn.
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religion
|
Orson Scott Card |
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d535b69
|
Because here's the thing--we don't give a shit about fairness here. We're soldiers. Soldiers do not give the other guy a sporting chance. Soldiers shoot in the back, lay traps and ambushes, lie to the enemy and outnumber the other bastard every chance they get. Your kind of murder only works among civilians. And you were too cocky, too stupid, too insane to realize it.
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soldiers
fairness
|
Orson Scott Card |
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6f532c6
|
And yet.. even if you had been right, it would only have been by accident. A broken clock is right two times a day.
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Orson Scott Card |
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a8d3c1b
|
So the I.F. is spying on Earth." "Just as a mother spies on her children at play in the yard." "Good to know you're looking out for us, Mummy."
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spying
|
Orson Scott Card |
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b61aa09
|
It [seed of doubt] made Ender listen to what people meant, instead of what they said. It made him wise.
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|
Orson Scott Card |
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2b05f8f
|
What did this portend? He still breathed, the instruments did not change, his heart beat on. But he called to Peter. Did this mean that he longed to live the life of his child of the mind, Young Peter? Or in some kind of delirium was he speaking to his brother the Hegemon? Or earlier, his brother as a boy. Peter, wait for me. Peter, did I do well? Peter, don't hurt me. Peter, I hate you. Peter for one smile of yours I'd die or kill. What wa..
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Orson Scott Card |
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0516d07
|
And what? What's the other choice? To passively let things happen and then say: "Tut-tut, what at botch that was"? Don't we all manipulate people? Even if we openly ask them to make a choice, don't we try to frame it so they'll chose as we think they should?"
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Orson Scott Card |
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7bc0768
|
He committed the crime of stupidity while under my command," said Citizen. "Oh my," said Rigg. "They're handing out the death penalty for that these days?"
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military
|
Orson Scott Card |
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4b340da
|
What good were the rules of time when the rules of magic contradicted them.
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Orson Scott Card |
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f81af4f
|
Our understanding of doctrine is not perfect, and no matter what the popes have said, I don't believe for a moment that God is going to damn for eternity the billions of children he allowed to born and die without baptism. No, I think you're likely to go to hell because, despite all your brilliance, you are still quite amoral. Sometime before you die, I pray most earnestly that you will learn that there are higher laws that transcend mere s..
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Orson Scott Card |
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785a5ee
|
You were the one who threatened us with an Inquisitor," the Bishop reminded him. With a smile. The Speaker's smile was just as chilly. "And you're the one who told the people I was Satan and they shouldn't talk to me."
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religion
|
Orson Scott Card |
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5af3f20
|
Eko brushed a tear from her eye, and Immo jeered at her, but father held up a hand. "Never mock a tender heart," he said." --
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sentiment
mockery
|
Orson Scott Card |
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4f99ae2
|
I hope you had fun, I hope you had a nice, nice time being happy, Ender. It might be the last time in your life.
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life
|
Orson Scott Card |
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7fddb9f
|
Only a wise man could see my people so clearly in so short a time. Only a ruthless one would say it all out loud. Your virtue and your flaw- we need them both.
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Orson Scott Card |
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342c931
|
No army had ever fragmented itself like that before, but ender was not planning to do anything that had been done before, either.
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Orson Scott Card |
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ee6514b
|
Alai saw the tears but had the grace not to say so. "They're fartheads, Ender, they won't even let you take anything you own." Ender grinned and didn't cry after all. "Think I should strip and go naked?" Alai laughed, too. On impulse Ender hugged him, tight, almost as if he were Valentine. He even thought of Valentine then and wanted to go home. "I don't want to go," he said. Alai hugged him back. "I understand them, Ender. You are the bes..
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sad
|
Orson Scott Card |
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084ff2e
|
Don't make fun of me!" Ender said. "I'm afraid I'm going crazy."
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life
truth
crazyness
ender
genius
|
Orson Scott Card |
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4dfcf53
|
If there were no goodness in people, mankind would still be confined to loping across a Savannah somewhere on Earth, watching the elephants rule, or some other more compassionate species.
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|
evolution
elephants
|
Orson Scott Card |
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3236a0d
|
Ender knew that at this moment he might be able to walk out of the room and end the battle. The way he had escaped from the battleroom after drawing blood. But the battle would only be fought again. Again and again until the will to fight was finished. The only way to end things completely was to hurt Bonzo enough that his fear was stronger than his hate.
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Orson Scott Card |
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69c310f
|
the power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can't kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and one will ever save you.
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war
strength
warrior
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Orson Scott Card |
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f7fa96f
|
But it was not the boyish grin she had known when he bounded along the low-gravity inner corridors of Battle School. This smile had weariness in it, and old fears long mastered but still present. It was the smile of wisdom.
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Orson Scott Card |
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21f56a8
|
He was not prepared to deal with my mistake, thought Jane, and he did not understand the suffering his response would cause me. He is innocent of wrong -doing, and so am I. We shall forgive each other and go on. It was a good decision, and Jane was proud of it. The trouble was, she couldn't carry it out. Those few seconds in which parts of her mind came to a halt were not trivial in their effect on her. There was trauma, loss, change; she ..
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jane
forgive
|
Orson Scott Card |
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5a34a49
|
Characters, as most writers understand, are truly developed through their relationships with others.
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Orson Scott Card |
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d36e89f
|
Valentine went back to class without answering. That night Demosthenes published a scathing denunciation of the population limitation laws. People should be allowed to have as many children as they like, and the surplus population should be sent to other worlds, to spread mankind so far across the galaxy that no danger, no invasion could ever threaten the human race with annihilation. "The most noble title any child can have," Demosthenes w..
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identity
third
valentine
importance
|
Orson Scott Card |
|
defee64
|
Ender leaned his head against the wall of the corridor and cried until the bus came. I am just like Peter. Take my monitor away, and I am just like Peter.
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|
Orson Scott Card |
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3386914
|
What about this? A colony of nothing but Battle School grads. If they bred true, they'd be the smartest military minds in the galaxy. Then they'd come home and take over Earth. OK, not that.
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|
genius-children
peter-wiggin
colonization
|
Orson Scott Card |
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f869b3f
|
Endurance, after all, was a kind of victory; a kind of heroism, too.
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|
Orson Scott Card |
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5916783
|
Mine mine mine. That was the curse and power of human beings--that what they saw and loved they had to have. They could share it with other people but only if they conceived of those people as being somehow their own. What we own is ours. What you own should also be ours. In fact, you own nothing, if we want it. Because you are nothing. We are the real people, you are only posing as people in order to try to deprive us of what God means us ..
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petra-arkanian
tribalism
selfishness
|
Orson Scott Card |
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cf15498
|
There is no harder job than parenting. There is no human relationship with such potential for great achievement and awful destructiveness, and despite all the experts who write about it, no one has the slightest idea whether any decision will be right or best or even not-horrible for any particular child. It is a job that simply cannot be done right.
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Orson Scott Card |
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2a649b1
|
You own nothing?
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|
Orson Scott Card |
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ddb2340
|
In the silence, the bear died. It was a cute death, with funny music.
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|
Orson Scott Card |
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b8527e8
|
Will we be extinguished? What difference does it make then, the ones of us who had plans, what does it matter the work we've done? The children we've raised? He looked pointedly at Olhado. "What will it matter then, that you have such a big happy family, if you're all erased in one instant by that ... bomb? "Not one moment of my life with my family has been wasted," said Olhado quietly. "But the point of it is to go on, isn't it? To conn..
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|
Orson Scott Card |
|
071b471
|
I am a Gordian knot. Don't unravel, just slice.
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Orson Scott Card |