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2dd3020
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Young women should not go alone on dark nights, even in Oxfordshire. But any prowling maniac would have had more than his work cut out if he had accosted Anathema Device. She was a witch, after all. And precisely because she was a witch, and therefore sensible, she put little faith in protective amulets and spells; she saved it all for a foot-long bread knife which she kept in her belt.
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Terry Pratchett |
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d0c98e8
|
But what we have here is not a nice girl, as generally understood. For one thing, she's not beautiful. There's a certain set to the jaw and arch to the nose that might, with a following wind and in the right light, be called handsome by a good-natured liar. Also, there's a certain glint in her eye generally possessed by those people who have found that they are more intelligent than most people around them but who haven't yet learned that o..
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intelligence
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terry pratchett |
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e6d226a
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Brother Preptil, the master of the music, had described Brutha's voice as putting him in mind of a disappointed vulture arriving too late at the dead donkey.
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music
scavengers
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Terry Pratchett |
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1397b55
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The night was as black as the inside of a cat.
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Terry Pratchett |
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0567bfa
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I mean, it's one thing saying you've got the best god, but sayin' it's the only real one is a bit of a cheek, in my opinion. I know where I can find at least two any day of the week. And they say everyone starts out bad and only gets good by believin' in Om, which is frankly damn nonsense.
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religion
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Terry Pratchett |
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27cacb2
|
Well, child? Aren't you going to try to turn me into some kind of unspeakable creature? I don't think I shall bother, madam, seeing as you are making such a good job of it yourself!
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humor
sarcasm
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Terry Pratchett |
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f10f02c
|
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 not need to know."
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secrets
vetinari
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Terry Pratchett |
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33b107b
|
All around him people were eating their unfood wih, if not actual evidence of enjoyment, then with no more actual disgust than was to be found in burger chains all over the planet. He stood up, took his tray over to the PLEASE DISPOSE OF YOUR REFUSE WITH CARE receptacle, and dumped the whole thing. If you had told him that there were children starving in Africa he would have been flattered that you'd noticed.
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Terry Pratchett |
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e31f60b
|
Aristocrats don't notice philosophical conundra. They just ignore them. Philosophy includes contemplating the possibility that you might be wrong, sir, and a real aristocrat knows that he is always right. It's not vanity, you understand, it's built-in absolute certainty. They may sometimes be as mad as a hatful of spoons, but they are always definitely and certainly mad.
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being-wrong
being-right
aristocrats
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Terry Pratchett |
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597cb68
|
Where I come from, Annagramma, they have the Sheepdog Trials. Shepherds travel there from all over to show off their dogs. And there're silver crooks and belts with silver buckles and prizes of all kinds, Annagramma, but do you know what the big prize is? No, you wouldn't. Oh, there are judges, but they don't count, not for the big prize. There is - there was a little old lady who was always at the front of the crowd, leaning on the hurdles..
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Terry Pratchett |
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8006db6
|
Her books on alchemy were marvellous objects, every page a work of the engraver's art, but they nowhere contained instructions like "Be sure to open a window". They have instructions like "Adde to the Zinc untile Rising Gas Yse Vigorousky Evolved", but never added "Don't Doe Thys Atte Home" or even "And Say Fare-Thee-Welle to Thy Eyebrows."
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humourous
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Terry Pratchett |
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1846dc7
|
Shut up sergeant. You're a free troll. That's an order" Sam Vimes"
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terry-pratchett
the-fifth-elephant
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Terry Pratchett |
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c05a57a
|
He's going to arrest the Patrician, Vimes told himself, the thought trickling through his brain like an icy rivulet. He's actually going to arrest the Patrician. The supreme ruler. He's going to arrest him. This is what he's actually going to do. The boy doesn't know the meaning of the word "fear." Oh, wouldn't it be a good idea if he knew the meaning of the word "survival"..."
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Terry Pratchett |
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1641074
|
She prowled the city on moonlit nights, and OK, there was the occasional chicken, but she always remembered where she'd been and went round the next day to shove some money under the door. It was hard to be a vegetarian who had to pick bits of meat out of her teeth in the morning. She was definately on top of it, though. It was easy to be a vegetarian by day. It was preventing yourself from becoming a humanitarian at night that took the rea..
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Terry Pratchett |
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f24c478
|
He stared at his feet. "I'm still very ignorant," he said, "but at least I'm ignorant about really important things."
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Terry Pratchett |
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8ef6d7e
|
Think critically about what you are told. Do not accept the word of authority unthinkingly. Science is not a belief system: no belief system instructs you to question the system itself. Science does. (There are many scientists, however, who treat it as a belief system. Be wary of them.)
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Terry Pratchett |
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20ae591
|
Never f*!k with the ineffable.
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religion
humor
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Neil Gaiman Terry Pratchett |
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31cb286
|
Only Ron's dog was watching William. He considered that it had, for a dog, a very offensive and knowing look. A couple of months ago someaone had tried to hand William the old story about there being a dog in the city that could talk. (...) The dog in front of William didn't look as if it could talk, but it DID look as if it would swear.
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Terry Pratchett |
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f69871e
|
Why does everyone run toward a blood-curdling scream?" mumbled the Senior Wrangler. "It's contrary to all sense."
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Terry Pratchett |
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e119e11
|
Then it came to her. She did deserve to die. And she was alone. She never would be. Not while her land was beneath her boots. land. The land of the Achings. She was Tiffany Aching. Not Granny Weatherwax, but a witch in her own right. A witch who knew exactly who she was and how she wanted to do things. Her way. And she had not failed, because she had barely begun...
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tiffany-aching
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Terry Pratchett |
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6740a3a
|
It was a still night, tinted with the promise of dawn. A crescent moon was just setting. Ankh-Morpork, largest city in the lands around the Circle Sea, slept. That statement is not really true On the one hand, those parts of the city which normally concerned themselves with, for example, selling vegetables, shoeing horses, carving exquisite small jade ornaments, changing money and making tables, on the whole, slept. Unless they had insomnia..
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funny
humor
poetic-simile
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Terry Pratchett |
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b635ec5
|
Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.
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Terry Pratchett |
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523a696
|
It would take a lot to faze a copper from the Met. It would take, for example, a huge, battered car that was nothing more nor less than a fireball, a blazing, roaring, twisted metal lemon from Hell, driven by a grinning lunatic in sunglasses, sitting amid the flames, trailing thick black smoke, coming straight at them through the lashing rain and the wind at eighty miles per hour. That would do it every time.
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Terry Pratchett |
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afdbeb1
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Of all the forces in the universe, the hardest to overcome is the force of habit.
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humor
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Terry Pratchett |
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120105b
|
a man needs no camel to ride to hell, yea, nor horse, nor mule; a man may ride into hell on his tongue...
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words
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Terry Pratchett |
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c82dec9
|
But too much reading had taken its toll. William found that he now thought of prayer as a sophisticated way of pleading with thunderstorms.
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terry-pratchett
the-truth
william-de-worde
pratchett
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Terry Pratchett |
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766e7b6
|
Miss Dearheart gave him a very brief look, and shook her head. There was movement under the table, a small fleshy kind of noise and the drunk suddenly bent forward, colour draining from his face. Probably only he and Moist heard Miss Dearheart purr: 'What is sticking in your foot is a Mitzy "Pretty Lucretia" four-inch heel, the most dangerous footwear in the world. Considered as pounds per square inch, it's like being trodden on by a very p..
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feminism
humor
high-heels
drunkenness
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Terry Pratchett |
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1d70fe6
|
Words are the litmus paper of the minds. If you find yourself in the power of someone who will use the word "commence" in cold blood, go somewhere else very quickly. But if they say "Enter", don't stop to pack."
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Terry Pratchett |
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fbd9a44
|
She wore so much thick white makeup in order to conceal her naturally rosy complexion that if she turned around suddenly her face would probably end up on the back of her head.
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humorous
humor
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Terry Pratchett |
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3c10892
|
Gods?" said Xeno. "We don't bother with gods. Huh. Relics of an outmoded belief system, gods." There was a rumble of thunder from the clear evening sky. "Except for Blind Io the Thunder God," Xeno went on, his tone hardly changing."
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Terry Pratchett |
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f9d2552
|
Against one perfect moment, the centuries beat in vain.
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Terry Pratchett |
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c44282c
|
Particles of raw inspiration sleet through the universe all the time. Every once in a while one of them hits a receptive mind, which then invents DNA or the flute sonata form or a way of making light bulbs wear out in half the time. But most of them miss. Most people go through their lives without being hit by even one.
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Terry Pratchett |
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3d5337b
|
Vimes shook some lather off the blade. "Hah! I bet they have. Tell me, Willikins, did you fight much when you were a kid? Were you in a gang or anything?" "I was privileged to belong to the Shamlegger Street Rude Boys, sir," said the butler. "Really?" said Vimes, genuinely impressed. "They were pretty tough nuts, as I recall." "Thank you, sir," said Willikins smoothly. "I pride myself I used to give somewhat more than I got if we needed to ..
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humourous
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Terry Pratchett |
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7f81539
|
I mean, it's a good job we've got a last desperate million-to-one chance to rely on, or we'd really be in trouble!
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humour
last-stand
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Terry Pratchett |
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b3f68e2
|
A month went by quickly. It didn't want to hang around.
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Terry Pratchett |
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31126aa
|
Hah!" said Granny Weatherwax. "I should just say it is a folk song! I knows all about folk songs. Hah! You think you're listenin' to a nice song about...cuckoos and fiddlers and nightingales and whatnot, and then it turns out to be about...something else entirely," she added darkly."
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Terry Pratchett |
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5d3a6f0
|
Upstairs, in what had been until then the cash office, Young Sam slept peacefully in a makeshift bed. One day, Vimes hoped, he would be able to tell him that on one special night he'd been guarded by four troll watchmen. They'd been off duty but volunteered to come in for this, and were just for some dwarfs to try anything. Sam hoped the boy would be impressed; the most other kids could hope for was angels.
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humourous
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Terry Pratchett |
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2f67789
|
they were in every colour sweets can be, such as Not-Really-Raspberry Red, Fake-Lemon Yellow, Curiously-Chemical Orange, Some-Kind-of-Acidy Green and Who-Knows-What Blue.
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Terry Pratchett |
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050ce62
|
Igor?' said Moist. 'You have an Igor?' Oh, yes,' said Hubert. 'That's how I get this wonderful light. They know the secret of storing lightning in jars! But don't let that worry you, Mr Lipspick. Just because I'm employing an Igor and working in a cellar doesn't mean I'm some sort of madman, ha ha ha!' Ha ha,' agreed Moist. Ha hah hah!,' said Hubert. 'Hahahahahaha!! Ahahahahahahhhhh!!!!!-' Bent slapped him on the back. Hubert coughed. Sorry..
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humour
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Terry Pratchett |
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d1e6ebc
|
Take it from me, whenever you see a bunch of buggers puttering around talking about truth and beauty and the best way of attacking Ethics, you can bet your sandals it's all because dozens of other poor buggers are doing all the real work around the place.
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work
philosophy
|
Terry Pratchett |
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bd0f2e6
|
Jaime had never realised that trees made a sound when they grew, and no-one else had realised it either, because the sound is made over hundreds of years in waves of twenty-four hours from peak to peak. Speed it up, and the sound a tree makes is .
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unknown-phenomena
trees
|
Terry Pratchett |
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384d85a
|
I nearly committed a terrible sin," said Brutha. "I nearly ate fruit on a fruitless day." "That's a terrible thing, a terrible thing," said Om. "Now cut the melon."
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Terry Pratchett |
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d332183
|
She had a tall bearing and a tall voice and a tall manner, and was tall in every respect except height. Amazingly, she'd apparently been able to keep this a secret from people.
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Terry Pratchett |
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351ca7d
|
Well, the traveling teachers do come through every few months," said the Baron. "Yes, sir, I know, sir, and they're useless, sir. They teach facts, not understanding. It's like teaching people about forests by showing them a saw. I want a proper school, sir, to teach reading and writing, and most of all thinking, sir, so people can find what they're good at, because someone doing what they really like is always an asset to any country, and ..
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Terry Pratchett |