Earthlings went on being friendly, when they should have been thinking instead.

If facts weren't funny, or scary, or couldn't make you rich, the heck with them.

Socialism is, in fact, a form of Christianity, people wishing to imitate Christ.

There's only one rule that I know of, babies—God damn it, you've got to be kind.

Because of the movies nobody will believe that it was babies who fought the war.

If people insist on living as if there's no tomorrow, there really won't be one.

What's the point of being alive," she said, "if you're not going to communicate?

In the era of big brains, life stories could end up any which way. Look at mine.

Every sentence must do one of two things-reveal character or advance the action.

As a matter of social class Ku Klux Klan would have been regarded as white trash.

Their imaginations were flywheels on the ramshackle machinery of the awful truth.

Roses are red, And ready for plucking, You're sixteen, And ready for high school.

I have this disease late at night sometimes, involving alcohol and the telephone.

And a step backward, after making a wrong turn, is a step in the right direction.

I go on many thrilling adventures and wondrous, profound escapades through books.

People would be surprised if they knew how much in this world was due to prayers.

Live by the harmless untruths that make you brave and kind and healthy and happy.

The best jokes are dangerous, and dangerous because they are in some way truthful.

The biggest laughs are based on the biggest disappointments and the biggest fears.

Laughter or crying is what a human being does when there's nothing else he can do.

Our government's got a war on drugs. That's certainly better than no drugs at all.

My God, the religious right will not acknowledge what a merciful person Jesus was.

Don't worry about your father. He's a perfectly contented, self-sufficient zombie.

People don't come to church for preachments, of course, but to daydream about God.

I can think of no more stirring symbol of man's humanity to man than a fire engine.

The death of a library, any library, suggests that the community has lost its soul.

Before you kill somebody, make absolutely sure he isn't well connected. So it goes.

The person who writes the bank's commercials is not the person who makes the loans.

You know, the Emancipation Proclamation was like giving freedom to domestic animals.

I've got at least one tiny corner of the universe I can make just the way I want it.

Music makes practically everybody fonder of life than he or she would be without it.

It is almost always a mistake to mention Abraham Lincoln. He always steals the show.

Younger scientists are extremely sensitive to the moral implications of all they do.

The function of the artist is to make people like life better than they have before.

What you can become is the miracle you were born to be through the work that you do.

Any scientist who can't explain to an eight-year-old what he is doing is a charlatan.

I couldn't survive my own pessimism if I didn't have some kind of sunny little dream.

The gun made a ripping sound like the opening of a zipper on the fly of God Almighty.

Don't put anything into a story that does not reveal character or advance the action.

Terry Southern is the illegitimate son of Mack Sennett and Edna Saint Vincent Millay.

I had made her so unhappy that she had developed a sense of humor. [-Rabo Karabekian]

I hope to build a reputation as a science-fiction writer. That's the pitch. We'll see.

It was headquartered in Michigan City, a long way off. I never saw Ku Klux Klan march.

We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.

I was clasified as a 'Science Fiction' writer simply because I wrote about Schenectady.

Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.

This is a nation tragedy, of course - that we've changed from a society to an audience.

Science never cheered up anyone. The truth about the human situation is just too awful.

There is no shortage of wonderful writers. What we lack is a dependable mass of readers.

If you can't write clearly, you probably don't think nearly as well as you think you do.

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