Samuel R. Delany

Quotes

1. to wound the autumnal city.

   So howled out for the world to give him a name.

   The in-dark answered with wind.

   p. 1

2. 

   Bear in mind that the novel—no matter how intimate, psychological, or subjective—is always a historical projection of its own time.

   p. 116

3. 

   “I was born,” the Mouse said. “I must die. I am suffering. Help me. There, I just wrote your book for you.”

   p. 156

4. 

   Whoever heard of La-ing or Lo-ing somebody you’re herding goats with, or laughing with, or making love with.

5. 

   "The parts I like, well..." He shook his head, with pursed lips. "They just don't have anything to do with me: somebody else wrote them, it seems, about things I may have thought about once. The parts I don't like--well, I can remember writing those, oh yeah, word by word by word."

   p. 357

6. 

   “The beginning of the end, the beginning of the end,” muttered Lo Hawk. “We must preserve something.”

   “The end of the beginning,” sighed La Dire. “Everything must change.”

7. 

   There are three types of actions: purposeful, habitual, and gratuitous. Characters, to be immediate and apprehensible, must be presented by all three.

   p. 166

8. 

   I must remember my own origins. Once I was as ignorant as you; I swear, though, I can’t remember when.

9. 

   The inevitable is that unprepared for.

   p. 204

10. 

    I want to know but I can't see are you up there. I don't have a lot of strength now. The sky is stripped. I am too weak to write much. But I still hear them walking in the trees; not speaking. Waiting here, away from the terrifying weaponry, out of the halls of vapor and light, beyond holland and into the hills, I have come to

    p. 801

11. 

    The rich are always enamored of the ancient.

    p. 169

12. 

    If you're going to do something stupid—and we all do—it might as well be a brave and foolish thing.