Arthur Dent Quotes

Marvin trudged on down the corridor, still moaning. " ... and then of course I've got this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left hand side ... "
"No?" said Arthur grimly as he walked along beside him. "Really?"
"Oh yes," said Marvin, "I mean I've asked for them to be replaced but no one ever listens."
"I can imagine. ~ Douglas Adams

At that moment the dull sound of a rumbling crash from outside filtered through the low murmur of the pub, through the sound of the jukebox, through the sound of the man next to Ford hiccuping over the whiskey Ford had eventually bought him.
Arthur choked on his beer, leaped to his feet.
"What's that?" he yelped.
"Don't worry," said Ford, "they haven't started yet."
"Thank God for that," said Arthur, and relaxed.
"It's probably just your house being knocked down," said Ford, downing his last pint.
"What?" shouted Arthur. Suddenly Ford's spell was broken. Arthur looked wildly around him and ran to the window.
"My God, they are! They're knocking my house down. What the hell am I doing in the pub, Ford?"
"It hardly makes any difference at this stage," said Ford, "let them have their fun. ~ Douglas Adams

The mere thought hadn't even begun to speculate about the merest possibility of crossing my mind. ~ Douglas Adams

Time is not currently one of my problems. - Arthur Dent ~ Douglas Adams

It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see..."
"You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?"
"No," said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, "nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."
"Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."
"I did," said Ford. "It is."
"So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't people get rid of the lizards?"
"It honestly doesn't occur to them," said Ford. "They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates to the government they want."
"You mean they actually vote for the lizards?"
"Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course."
"But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"
"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard," said Ford, "the wrong lizard might get in. Got any gin?"
"What?"
"I said," said Ford, with an increasing air of urgency creeping into his voice, "have you got any gin?"
"I'll look. Tell me about the lizards."
Ford shrugged again.
"Some people say that the lizards are the best thing that ever happenned to them," he said. "They're completely wrong of course, completely and utterly wrong, but someone's got to ~ Douglas Adams

You know," said Arthur, "it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young."
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen. ~ Douglas Adams

And at the end they traveled again. There was a time when Arthur Dent would not. He said that the Bistromathic Drive had revealed to him that time and distance were one, that mind and Universe were one, that perception and reality were one, and that the more one traveled the more one stayed in one place, and that what with one thing and another he would rather just stay put for a while and sort it all out in his mind, which was now at one with the Universe so it shouldn't take too long and he could get a good rest afterward, put in a little flying practice and learn to cook, which he had always meant to do. ~ Douglas Adams

The regular early morning yell of horror was the sound of Arthur Dent waking up and suddenly remembering where he was ~ Douglas Adams

This Arthur Dent," comes the cry from the furthest reaches of the galaxy, and has even now been found inscribed on a mysterious deep space probe thought to originate from an alien galaxy at a distance too hideous to contemplate, "what is he, man or mouse? Is he interested in nothing more than tea and the wider issues of life? Has he no spirit? has he no passion? Does he not, to put it in a nutshell, fuck? ~ Douglas Adams

Ford!" he said, "there's an infinite number of monkeys outside who want to talk to us about this script for Hamlet they've worked out. ~ Douglas Adams

I wonder who this ship belongs to anyway," said Arthur.
"Me," said Zaphod.
"No. Who it really belongs to."
"Really me," insisted Zaphod. "Look, property is theft, right? Therefore theft is property. Therefore this ship is mine, okay? ~ Douglas Adams

The only person for whom the house was in any way special was Arthur Dent, and that was only because it happened to be the one he lived in. ~ Douglas Adams

He actually caught himself saying things like "Yippee," as he pranced ridiculously round the house. ~ Douglas Adams

Time is the worst place, so to speak, to get lost in, as Arthur Dent could testify, having been lost in both time and space a good deal. At least being lost in space kept you busy. ~ Douglas Adams

I like the cover," he said. "Don't Panic. It's the first helpful or intelligible thing anybody's said to me all day. ~ Douglas Adams

I don't want to die now!" he yelled. "I've still got a headache! I don't want to go to heaven with a headache, I'd be all cross and wouldn't enjoy it! ~ Douglas Adams

With a keen eye for details, on truth prevails. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

No country can allow its safety to be wholly dependent on faithful observance by other states of rules to which they are obliged. ~ Arthur Balfour

Christmas is more that a time of festivities, family, and friends; it is a season of generosity, gladness, and gratitude. ~ William Arthur Ward

Heiraten heißt das Mögliche t(h)un, einander zum Ekel zu werden.


(Marrying means doing whatever possible to become repulsed of each other.) ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

In endless space countless luminous spheres, round each of which some dozen smaller illuminated ones revolve, hot at the core and covered over with a hard cold crust; on this crust a mouldy film has produced living and knowing beings: this is empirical truth, the real, the world. Yet for a being who thinks, it is a precarious position to stand on one of those numberless spheres freely floating in boundless space, without knowing whence or whither, and to be only one of innumerable similar beings that throng, press, and toil, restlessly and rapidly arising and passing away in beginningless and endless time. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

For the purpose of acquiring gain, everything else is pushed aside or thrown overboard, for example, as is philosophy by the professors of philosophy. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

We have not merely stumbled on truth in spite of error and illusion, which is odd, but because of error and illusion, which is even odder. ~ Arthur Balfour

The toil of all that be Helps not the primal fault; It rains into the sea, And still the sea is salt. A. E. HOUSMAN MORE POEMS ~ Arthur C. Clarke

We were tolerated. and that is unforgivable. If you cannot accept a man wholeheartedly, then you should have the fortitude to repudiate him.
Kwame in The two hearts of Kwasi Boachi ~ Arthur Japin

The wisest man I have ever known once said to me: 'Nine out of every ten people improve on acquaintance,' and I have found his words true. ~ Frank Arthur Swinnerton

LAURENE POWELL. Savvy and good-humored Penn graduate, went to Goldman Sachs and then Stanford Business School, married Steve Jobs in 1991. GEORGE RILEY. Jobs's Memphis-born friend and lawyer. ARTHUR ROCK. Legendary tech investor, early Apple board member, Jobs's father figure. JONATHAN "RUBY" RUBINSTEIN. Worked ~ Walter Isaacson

Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won. ~ Arthur Wellesley

To the logician all things should be seen exactly as they are, and to underestimate one's self is as much a departure from truth as to exagerate one's own powers. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

The problem with Germans is that they look in the clouds for what lies at their feet. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Life is rich, always changing, always challenging, and we architects have the task of transmitting into wood, concrete, glass and steel, of transforming human aspirations into habitable and meaningful space. ~ Arthur Erickson

The only certain rule is the one that Aristotle already gave: do not dispute with anyone and everyone, but only with those people you know who are intelligent enough to avoid saying things that are so stupid as to expose themselves to humiliation, who appreciate the truth, and who gladly listen to good reasons, even when the opponent claims them, and who are balanced enough to bear a defeat when the truth is on the other side. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Perhaps when a man has special knowledge and special powers like my own, it rather encourages him to seek a complex explanation when a simpler one is at hand. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

The real church is comprised of a long list of "formers" who collectively work together for world reform. ~ Johnnie Dent Jr.

King is delighted. He ask one old woman walking by if she wasn't too old for this, ask her if her feet not tired. My feet is tired she say, but my soul is rested. ~ Arthur Flowers

As a reliable compass for orientating yourself in life nothing is more useful than to accustom yourself to regarding this world as a place of atonement, a sort of penal colony. When you have done this you will order your expectations of life according to the nature of things and no longer regard the calamities, sufferings, torments and miseries of life as something irregular and not to be expected but will find them entirely in order, well knowing that each of us is here being punished for his existence and each in his own particular way. This outlook will enable us to view the so-called imperfections of the majority of men, i.e., their moral and intellectual shortcomings and the facial appearance resulting therefrom, without surprise and certainly without indignation: for we shall always bear in mind where we are and consequently regard every man first and foremost as a being who exists only as a consequence of his culpability and whose life is an expiation of the crime of being born. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Sometimes it's good to do something that you've never done before, so yesterday, I went out to buy Elton John's new album. ~ Arthur Smith

To forgive and forget means to throw away dearly bought experience. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Brain-washing starts in the cradle. ~ Arthur Koestler

Start listening to what you say. Are your comments and ideas negative? You aren't going become positive if you always say negative things. Do you hear yourself say"I could never do that","I never have any luck","I never get things right". Wow - that's negative self-talk! Try saying"I am going to do that","I am so lucky""I always try to get things right". Can you hear how much better that sounds? ~ James Arthur

Could he throw no light? ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

Because most people ain't people. ~ Arthur Miller

For Drake is no longer in his hammock, children, nor is Arthur somewhere sleeping, and you may not lie idly expecting the second coming of anybody now, because the world is yours and it is up to you. ~ Susan Cooper

He was thinking of the book, and what Dahlia had said about sleepwalking, and a strange thought came to him: had Arthur seen that Clark was sleepwalking? Would this be in the letters to V.? Because he had been sleepwalking, Clark realized, moving half-asleep through the motions of his life for a while now, years; not specifically unhappy, but when had he last found real joy in his work? When was the last time he'd truly been moved by anything? When had he last felt awe or inspiration? He wished he could somehow go back and find the iPhone people whom he'd jostled on the sidewalk earlier, apologize to them--I'm sorry, I've realized that I'm just as minimally present in this world as your are, I had no right to judge--and also he wanted of every 360° report and apologize to them too, because it's an awful thing to appear in someone else's report, he saw that now, it's an awful thing to be a target. ~ Emily St. John Mandel

The best antidote against evils of all kinds, against the evil thoughts that haunt the soul, against the needless perplexities which distract the conscience, is to keep hold of the good we have. Impure thoughts will not stand against pure words and prayers and deeds. Little doubts will not avail against great certainties. Fix your affections on things above, and then you will less and less be troubled by the cares, the temptations, the troubles of things on earth. ~ Arthur Penrhyn Stanley

I've never been in love like that."
Samuel swallowed hard. "Like what?"
"Like everything I was before is destroyed when the person I loved is gone. ~ A.M. Arthur

Life itself is a sea full of reefs and maelstroms that a human being takes the greatest care and caution to avoid; he uses all his efforts and ingenuity to wend his way through, while knowing that even if he is successful, every step brings him closer to the greatest, the total, the inescapable and irreparable shipwreck, and in fact steers him right up to it, - to death: this is the final goal of the miserable journey and worse for him that all the reefs he managed to avoid. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Even though universal metanarratives are largely absent, personal "I" narratives are everywhere. The popular imagination is saturated with self-obsessive stories in film, television, advertising, music, MySpace, and YouTube - but this is the equivalent of bingeing on junk food while dying for want of substance. ~ Sarah Arthur

If your project doesn't work, look for the part that you didn't think was important. ~ Arthur Bloch

A great ruler, a great court, a great kingdom, these texts suggest never exist unto themselves, as stable, fully actualized entities, and, therefore, are never experienced in their plenitude in the present. Instead, they are always remembered as something that occured in the past or anticipated as something will reoccur in the future. Insofar as they are experienced in the current time, it is only for a brief and evanescent moment, overshadowed by the knowledge that it will soon vanish.
For a realist, the fact that the excellence of a person, a place, or a time is not appreciated in its own time proves that it was never actually as excellent as it seemed.
For a Romantic, however, there exist a people, places, and times whose excellence can only be appreciated Arthur always has to be - to quote the Alliterative Morte Arthure (ca.1400) - "the once and future king ~ Karen Sullivan

This place where she worked certainly didn't make it look as if she continued to believe her calling was to change the course of American history. The building's rusted fire escape would just come down, just come loose from its moorings and crash onto the street, if anyone stepped on it - a fire escape whose function was not to save lives in the event of a fire but to uselessly hang there testifying to the immense loneliness inherent to living. For him it was stripped of any other meaning - no meaning could make better use of that building. Yes, alone we are, deeply alone, and always, in store for us, a layer of loneliness even deeper. There is nothing we can do to dispose of that. No, loneliness shouldn't surprise us, as astonishing to experience it as it may be. You can try turning yourself inside out, but all you are then is inside out and lonely instead of inside in and lonely. My stupid, stupid Merry dear, stupider even than your stupid father, not even blowing up buildings helps. It's lonely if there are buildings and it's lonely if there are no buildings. There is no protest to be lodged against loneliness - not all the bombing campaigns in history have made a dent in it. The most lethat of manmade explosives can't touch it. Stand in awe not of Communism, my idiot child, but of ordinary, everyday loneliness. On May Day go out and march with your friends to its greater glory, the superpower of superpowers, the force that overwhelms all. Put your money on it, bet on it, ~ Philip Roth

Go ahead, kill me! But live with this: All those people die!

For the rest of your life, somewhere behind the feeds, that human part of you hiding down deep will always wonder how much pain you could have prevented if you hadn't been so weak! ~ Rick Remender

But even the longest day wears to sunset. ~ Marion Zimmer Bradley