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Orson Scott Card Quotes

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Famous Orson Scott Card Quotes

“I think that most of us, anyway, read these stories that we know are not "true" because we're hungry for another kind of truth: the mythic truth about human nature in general, the particular truth about those life-communities that define our own identity, and the most specific truth of all: our own self-story. Fiction, because it is not about someone who lived in the real world, always has the possibility of being about oneself. --From the Introduction”

ThinkingKnowsWorldHumansKindRealSelfStoriesCommunityFictionHuman NatureIdentityPossibilityParticularOneselfHungryReal WorldIntroduction
Book:Ender's Game
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“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 disaster, no invasion could ever threaten the human race with annihilation. "The most noble title any child can have," Demosthenes wrote, "is Third.”

PeopleWorldShouldHumansChildrenLawNightRaceMankindThirdsPopulationSpreadNobleDisasterLimitationTitlesHuman RaceGalaxyInvasionOther WorldsAnnihilationSurplus
Book:Ender's Game Boxed Set: Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow
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“Miro, I'm so sorry. I always felt such pity for you humans because you could only think of one thing at a time and your memories were so imperfect and . . . now I realize that just getting through the day without killing somebody can be an achievement." It gets to be a habit. Most of us manage to keep our body count quite low. It's the neighborly way to live.”

ThinkingWayHumansBodyFeltRealizingMemoriesOne ThingHabitAchievementLowsKillingSorryPityManageImperfectWay To LiveOne Thing At A TimeI'm So Sorry
Author:Orson Scott Card
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“As a species, we have evolved to survive. And the way we do it is by straining and straining and, at last, every few generaitons, giving brith to genius. The one who invents the wheel. And light. And flight. The one who builds a city, a nation, an empire...I'll put it bluntly. Human beings are free excpet when humanity needs them. Maybe humanity needs you. To do something. Maybe humanity needs me - to find out what you're good for.”

WayNeedsGivingHumansLightLastsHumanityNationsHuman BeingsCitiesGeniusSpeciesFlightWheelsEmpiresNeed You
Author:Orson Scott Card
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“It is easy to say that you can adopt the whole human race as your children, but it is not the same as living in a home with a child and shaping all you do to help him learn to be happy and whole and good. Don't live your life without ever holding a child in your arms, on your lap, in your home, and feeling a child's arms around you and hearing his voice in your ear and seeing his smile, given to you because you put it into your heart.”

HumansHeartChildrenWholeHelpingFeelingsHomeGivenEasyVoiceRaceSeeingArmsEarsHearingYour ChildrenHuman RaceLive Your LifeLapHis Smile
Book:Ender in Exile
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“If human beings are all monsters, why should I sacrifice anything for them?" "Because they are beautiful monsters..., And when they live in a network of peace and hope, when they trust the world and their deepest hungers are fulfilled, then within that system, that delicate web, there is joy. That is what we live for, to bind the monsters together, to murder their fear and give birth to their beauty.”

IfsWorldGivingShouldHumansTogetherBeautifulJoyHuman BeingsSacrificeBirthMurderHungerMonstersDelicateShould IFulfilled
Book:Wyrms
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“The tribe is whatever we believe it is. If we say the tribe is all the Little Ones in the forest, and all the trees, then that is what the tribe is. Even though some of the oldest trees here came from warriors of two different tribes, fallen in battle. We become one tribe because we say we're one tribe." Ender marveled at his mind, this small raman [member of another sentient species]. How few humans were able to grasp this idea, or let it extend beyond the narrow confines of their tribe, their family, their nation.”

IfsMindBelieveHumansLittlesTwoIdeasDifferentAbleNationsTreeBattleMembersSpeciesForestsWarriorFallenTribesEnder
Book:The Ender Quintet
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“So from then on, he looked at all his choices and said, What would a good person do, and then did it. But he has now learned something very important about human nature. If you spend your whole life pretending to be good, then you are indistinguishable from a good person. Relentless hypocrisy eventually becomes the truth.”

IfsHumansPersonsSaidImportantWholeChoicesHuman NatureBe GoodWhole LifeHypocrisyPretendingGood PeopleGood PersonRelentless
Author:Orson Scott Card
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“That was interesting, to find that it wasn't hunger that caused children to become bullies on the street. The bulliness was already in the child, and whatever the stakes were, they would find a way to act as they needed to act. … Intelligence and education, which all these children had, apparently didn't make any important difference in human nature.”

WayHumansChildrenImportantDifferencesInterestingStreetsHuman NatureNeededHungerStakesBullyIntelligence And Education
Book:Ender's Shadow
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“Humans invent an imaginary lover and put that mask over the face of the body in their bed. That is the tragedy of language my friend. Those who know each other only through symbolic representations are forced to imagine each other. And because their imagination is imperfect, they are often wrong.”

KnowsHumansBodyFacesLanguageImaginationImagineLoversBedMy FriendsTragedyMaskImperfectImaginaryRepresentationSymbolic
Book:Xenocide: Volume Three of the Ender Quintet
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“What a laugh, though. To think that one human being could ever really know another. You could get used to each other, get so habituated that you could speak their words right along with them, but you never know why other people said what they said or did what they did, because they never even know themselves. Nobody understands anybody.”

PeopleThinkingKnowsHumansSaidUsedSpeakHuman BeingsLaughingOneselfThey Said
Book:The Shadow Saga Omnibus
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“The Buggers have finally, finally learned that we humans value each and every individual human life. But they've learned this lesson just in time for it to be hopelessly wrong — for we humans do, when the cause is sufficient, spend our own lives. We throw ourselves onto the grenade to save our buddies in the foxhole. We rise out of the trenches and charge the entrenched enemy and die like maggots under a blowtorch. We strap bombs on our bodies and blow ourselves up in the midst of our enemies. We are, when the cause is sufficient, insane.”

HumansBodyValuesDiesIndividualCausesEnemyLessonsBlowInsaneHuman LifeSufficientBombsMidstBuddyTrenchesGrenadeMaggotsFoxholes
Author:Orson Scott Card
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“Surely you're not saying that God had to choose between long life and intelligence for human beings! It's there in your own Bible, Carlotta. Two trees - knowledge and life. You eat of the tree of knowledge and you will surely die. You eat of the tree of life and you remain a child in the garden forever, undying.”

HumansChildrenLongTwoReligionDiesHuman BeingsForeverTreeGardenLong LifeTree Of LifeTree Of KnowledgeTwo Trees
Book:Ender's Shadow
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“There was no name for the disease; his body had gone insane, forgotten the blueprint by which human beings were built. Even now the disease still lives on in his children. Not in our bodies, but in our souls. We exist where normal human children are expected to be; we're even shaped the same. But each of us in our own way has been replaced by an imitation child, shaped out of a twisted, fetid, lipidous goiter that grew out of Father's soul.”

WayHumansChildrenHas BeensStillsSoulBodyFatherNamesHuman BeingsGoneGrewDiseaseNormalBuiltForgottenExpectedInsaneReplacedImitationTwistedBlueprintsStill Life
Book:Speaker for the Dead
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