Orson Scott Card

“I wonder sometimes if the motivation for writers ought to be contempt, not admiration.”

“Since we are not yet fully comfortable with the idea that people from the next village are as human as ourselves, it is presumptuous in the extreme to suppose we could ever look at sociable, tool-making creatures who arose from other evolutionary paths and see not beasts but brothers, not rivals by fellow pilgrims journeying to the shrine of intelligence. Yet that is what I see, or yearn to see. The difference between raman and varelse is not in the creature judged but in the creature judging, and when we declare an alien species to be raman, it does not mean that they have passed a threshold of moral maturity. It means that we have.”

“But in the meantime I became accustomed to the writing life and it would be hard to change now - partly because of the salary cut if I went to my other love, teaching; and partly because I still have stories to tell, even though it isn't all that fun doing the work anymore.”

“Sometimes happiness consists of finding the right balance of misery.”

“Everything we do means something.”

“I thought speakers didn't believe in sin," said a sullen boy.Andrew smiled. "You believe in sin, Styrka, and you do things because of that belief. So sin is real in you, and knowing you, this speaker must believe in sin.”

“Home was merely a dull ache in the back of his memory. A tiredness in his eyes.”

“He had so much damn respect he wanted to scream.”

“We have to go. I'm almost happy here.”

“In my view, suicide is not really a wish for life to end.'What is it then?'It is the only way a powerless person can find to make everybody else look away from his shame. The wish is not to die, but to hide.”

“When you really know somebody you can’t hate them. Or maybe it’s just that you can’t really know them until you stop hating them.”

“Another oral exam, huh?' Peter said.'Shut up, Peter,' said Valentine.'You should relax and enjoy it,' said Peter. 'It could be worse.''I don't know how.''It could be an anal exam.”

“Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender. The best you can do is choose to fill the roles given you by good people, by people who love you.”

“In all my study of history, I have never found a time or place I would rather have lived than now.”

“The essence of training is to allow error without consequence.”

“I cut the wood however I like, but it's the grain that decides the strength and shape of it. You can add and subtract memories from people, but it isn't just your memory that makes you who you are. There's something in the grain of the mind.”

“He spent the afternoon alone in the streets.”

“You're a monster.Thanks. Does this mean I get a raise?No, just a medal. The budget isn't inexhaustable.”

“Hive Queen: So many of your people are becoming Christians. Believing in the god these humans brought with them.Human: You don’t believe in God?Hive Queen: The question never came up. We have always remembered how we began.Human: You evolved. We were created.Hive Queen: By a virus.Human: By a virus that God created in order to create us.Hive Queen: So you, too, are a believer.Human: I understand belief.Hive Queen: No—you desire belief.Human: I desire it enough to act as if I believed. Maybe that’s what faith is.Hive Queen: Or deliberate insanity.”

“Anything can become a children's book if you give it to a child...Children are actually the best (and worst) audience for literature because they have no patience with pretence.”