Iain M. Banks

Quotes

1. “So,” he said to the monk, “you are of an Order which also despises the Great Infernal Wizard.”

   “Indeed, your gracious Majesty,” the monk said, looking down modestly at the carpet. His voice sounded respectful. “Our Belief—perhaps not so dissimilar from your own, more venerable and more widely followed creed, is that God is a Mad Scientist and we His experimental subjects, doomed forever to run the Maze of Life through apparently random and unjust punishments for meaningless and paltry rewards and no discernible good reason save His evil pleasure.”

   p. 228

2. 

   Perhaps it was simply bad luck, but despite the fact the sheer capability of the Guns ought to have ensured their owner could effectively become ruler of the entire system, the weapons had invariably been the downfall of whoever had come into possession of them.

   p. 109

3. 

   “The person concerned sounds – to be polite – eccentric.”

   “That would be polite to the point of over-generosity,” Tefwe said. “Awkward, tetchy and unreasonable might be closer to the truth.”

   p. 263

4. 

   “Well,” the voice said, seemingly oblivious, “one thing that does happen when you live a long time is that you start to realise the essential futility of so much that we do, especially when you see the same patterns of behaviour repeated by succeeding generations and across different species. You see the same dreams, the same hopes, the same ambitions and aspirations, reiterated, and the same actions, the same courses and tactics and strategies, regurgitated, to the same predictable and often lamentable effects, and you start to think, So? Does it really matter? Why really are you bothering with all this? Are these not just further doomed, asinine ways of attempting to fill your vacuous, pointless existence, wedged slivered as it is between the boundless infinitudes of dark oblivion bookending its utter triviality?”

   “Uh-huh,” she said. “Is this a rhetorical question?”

   “It is a mistaken question. Meaning is everywhere. There is always meaning. Or at least all things show a disturbing tendency to have meaning ascribed to them when intelligent creatures are present. It’s just that there’s no final Meaning, with a capital M. Though the illusion that there might be is comforting for a certain class of mind.”

   p. 210

5. 

   “I take comfort in the loyalty and faith you display towards your crew, Captain.”

   “My crew are loyal to me, Colonel; I am only loyal to the regiment and Gzilt. Also, faith is belief without reason; we operate on reason and nothing but. I have zero faith in my crew, just absolute confidence.”

   p. 249

6. 

   She felt cold and battered and tired. This combat flying lark was supposed to have been just a little exotic incident in her life, something to tell people about when she was old. It had never been meant to get this important, never been planned to be this crucial and ghastly and hopeless. It certainly wasn’t supposed to be the end of everything. It couldn’t all just end, could it?

   Yes it could, she thought. Somehow she’d never really thought about it before, but yes; of course it could. She didn’t just accept it now; she knew it now. What a time to learn that particular lesson.

   p. 219

7. 

   “Put plainly, I am not at liberty to divulge that information. There, it is said. Let us quickly move on from this unfortunate quantum of dissonance to the ground-state of accord which I trust will inform our future relationship.”

   “So you’re not going to tell me.” Sharrow nodded.

   “My dear lady,” the machine said, continuing to trundle after her. “Without saying so in so many words...correct.”

   p. 19

8. 

   “That seems obsessive.”

   “Meticulous care can seem so to those unwilling to recognise it for its true worth.”

   p. 295

9. 

   I have lived ten thousand years; I am used to it. Lovers dying, civilisations dying…one develops a certain god-like indifference to it all, intellectually.

   p. 317

10. 

    Trust me; it is rarely an encouraging sign when the more apparel is removed, the less attractive a prospective sexual partner becomes.

    p. 316

11. 

    Obsession is just what those too timorous to follow an idea through to its logical conclusion call determination.

    p. 308

12. 

    Ignorance can be interesting.

    ∞

    Also fatal.

    p. 303