Terry Pratchett

"Death: "THERE ARE BETTER THINGS IN THE WORLD THAN ALCOHOL, ALBERT."Albert: "Oh, yes, sir. But alcohol sort of compensates for not getting them."

"[Science fiction is] out in the mainstream now. You can tell by the way mainstream literary authors pillage SF while denying they're writing it!"

"It is often said that before you die your life passes before your eyes. It is in fact true. It's called living."

"This isn't life in the fast lane, it's life in the oncoming traffic."

"Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one."

"The first draft is just you telling yourself the story."

"Anyone with half a mind could see that,"said Tiffany.Miss Tick sighed. "Yes. But sometimes it's so hard to find half a mind when you need one."

"Wisdom comes from experience. Experience is often a result of lack of wisdom."

"We have been so successful in the past century at the art of living longer and staying alive that we have forgotten how to die. Too often we learn the hard way. As soon as the baby boomers pass pensionable age, their lesson will be harsher still."

"Many people could say things in a cutting way, Nanny knew. But Granny Weatherwax could listen in a cutting way. She could make something sound stupid just by hearing it."

"This isn't life in the fast lane, it's life in the oncoming traffic."

"The truth may be out there, but the lies are inside your head."

"I'd rather be a rising ape than a falling angel."

"I'll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there's evidence of any thinking going on inside it."

"I read anything that’s going to be interesting. But you don’t know what it is until you’ve read it. Somewhere in a book on the history of false teeth there’ll be the making of a novel."

"If words had weight, a single sentence from Death would have anchored a ship."

"First draft: let it run. Turn all the knobs up to 11. Second draft: hell. Cut it down and cut it into shape. Third draft: comb its nose and blow its hair. I usually find that most of the book will have handed itself to me on that first draft."

"In the first book of my Discworld series, published more than 26 years ago, I introduced Death as a character; there was nothing particularly new about this - death has featured in art and literature since medieval times, and for centuries we have had a fascination with the Grim Reaper."

"Wisdom comes from experience. Experience is often a result of lack of wisdom."

"It's not worth doing something unless someone, somewhere, would much rather you weren't doing it."