"There really wasn’t much in a man’s life that mattered. But those few things mattered terribly."

Poul Anderson Literature See all quotes by Poul Anderson →

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More by Poul Anderson

“Life isn’t a fairy tale; the knight who kills the dragon doesn’t necessarily get the princess. So what? Who’d want to live in a cosmos less rich and various than the real one?”

“On our Earth, we’ve perforce learned all the knavery there is to know.”

“Men, whose span is cruelly short, rush nonetheless to death in their youth as to a maiden’s arms.”

“It was lonely, not even knowing yourself.”

“Heim ignored the mob scene on the 3V, rested his eyes on the cold serenity of the Milky Way and thought that this, at least, would endure.”

“What’s the point of our living all these centuries if we haven’t grown up even a little?”

Resonant Thoughts

"Whether it is in the slums of New Delhi or in the affluence of Las Vegas, it simply isn't fair that there should be any losers. Life is unfair — there is nothing fair about one man being born blind an…"

— Milton Friedman

Economics1903–2006

#justice

"Great joys, why do they bring us sadness? Because there remains from these excesses only a feeling of irrevocable loss and desertion which reaches a high degree of negative intensity. At such moments,…"

— Emil Cioran

Philosophy1911–1995

#life

"Three days later we went after him again, and this time we got him. Not a mark on him. We got him. We brought him back into our base there and we had a Sea Land container set up to hold prisoners in, …"

— William G. Boykin

Politics1948

#time

"The construction of churches or synagogues in the Mussulman territory is unlawful, this being forbidden in the traditions:—but if places of worship originally belonging to Jews or Christians be destro…"

— Burhan al-Din al-Marghinani

1135–1197

#religion