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Scientists have calculated that the chances of something so patently absurd actually existing are millions to one. But magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten.

Terry Pratchett

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Terry Pratchett
Age: 66 †
Born: 1948
Born: April 28
Died: 2015
Died: March 12
Author
Journalist
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
Beaconsfield
Buckinghamshire
Terence David John Terry Pratchett
Terence David John Pratchett
Sir Terry Pratchett
Sir Terence David John Pratchett
Million
Existing
Magic
Chances
Millions
Scientists
Patently
Chance
Absurd
Magicians
Actually
Nine
Crop
Times
Ten
Calculated
Science
Scientist
Crops
Something
Luck
Magician

More quotes by Terry Pratchett

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It's an old magical principle - it's even filtered down into RPG systems - that magic, while taking a lot of effort, can be 'stored' - in a staff, for example. No doubt a wizard spends a little time each day charging up his staff, although you go blind if you do it too much, of course.
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Have a bit more patience with newbies. Of course some of them act dumb - they're often students, for heaven's sake.
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Look, that's why there's rules, understand? So that you think before you break 'em.
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It doesn't matter if dragons are flying overhead or whatever - a lot of Victoriana is still cut in the frame of fantasy.
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You have reached the end of cake
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The trouble with thinking was that, once you started, you went on doing it.
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Experience has taught me that you feel better on a flight if you avoid chicken fat in plastic sauce.
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I have a suspicion - I have to be careful what I say - that you might actually find the best comics actually written by people who are comics writers and who aren't setting out to do graphic novels.
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His parents called him Youngster. They did this in the subconcious hope that he might take the hint. Wensleydale gave the impression of having been born with a mental age of 47.
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Don't you understand? snarled Rincewind. We are going over the Edge, godsdammit! Can't we do anything about it? No! Then I can't see the sense in panicking, said Twoflower calmly.
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Demons were like genies or philosophy professors - if you didn't word things exactly right, they delighted in giving you absolutely accurate and completely misleading answers.
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The most important thing was that time had passed, pouring thousands of soothing seconds across the island. People need time to deal with the now before it runs away and becomes the then.
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Contrary to popular belief and hope, people don't usually come running when they hear a scream. That's not how humans work. Humans look at other humans and say, 'Did you hear a scream?' because the first scream might have been you screaming inside your head, or a horse backfiring.
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She'd become a governess. It was one of the few jobs a known lady could do. And she'd taken to it well. She'd sworn that if she did indeed ever find herself dancing on rooftops with chimney sweeps she'd beat herself to death with her own umbrella.
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Knowing that you are going to die is, I suspect, the beginning of wisdom.
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Of course, Ankh-Morpork's citizens had always claimed that the river water was incredibly pure. Any water that had passed through so many kidneys, they reasoned, had to be very pure indeed.
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I once absent-mindedly ordered Three Mile Island dressing in a restaurant and, with great presence of mind, they brought Thousand Island Dressing and a bottle of chili sauce.
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Magic is just a way of saying 'I don't know.'
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Oh, well...up until now it had been a good day, in a horrible kind of way.
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Things like crowns had a troublesome effect on clever folk it was best to leave all the reigning to the kind of people whose eyebrows met in the middle when they tried to think. In a funny sort of way, they were much better at it.
Terry Pratchett