Thud!/Quotes

On this day in 1802, the painter Methodia Rascal woke up in the night because the sounds of warfare were coming from a drawer in his bedside table.
Again.

'All right. Who's going to be the first to tell me a huge whopper?'

You could barely understand the man, he was that posh. It was not so much speech as modulated yawning.

It was the dumb way the pawns went off and slaughtered their fellow pawns while the kings lounged about doing nothing that always got to him; if only the pawns united, maybe talked the rooks round, the whole board could've been a republic in a dozen moves.

—Why Vimes doesn't play chess

Only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have invented the 13-inch foot and a triangle with three right angles in it. Only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have twisted common matter through dimensions it was not supposed to enter. And only Bloody Stupid Johnson could have done all this by accident.

Sally: 'Hold it! There's something we'd better sort before this goes any further!'
Angua: 'Yeah?'
Sally: 'Yes. We're both wearing nothing, we're standing in what, you may have noticed, is increasingly turning into mud, and we're squaring up to fight. Okay. But there's something missing, yes?'
Angua: 'And that is ?'
Sally: 'A paying audience? We could make a fortune.'

Colon: 'I don't believe there's a dancer called Broccolee!'
Nobby: 'Well, she did use to be called Candi, sarge, but then she heard that broccoli is better for you-'

Vetinari: I'm sorry? Mr A. E. Pessimal attacked a troll?'
Vimes: 'Yessir.'
Vetinari: 'A. E. Pessimal?'
Vimes: 'That's the man, sir.'
Vetinari: 'A whole troll?'
Vimes: 'Yessir. With his teeth, sir.'
Vetinari: 'Mr A. E. Pessimal? You are sure? Small man? Very clean shoes?'
Vimes: 'Yessir.'
Vetinari: 'You wish me to believe, that Mr A. E. Pessimal single-handedly attacked a troll?'
Vimes: 'Both hands, sir. And feet, too. And tried to bite it, we think.'

'Sam Vimes once arrested me for treason. And Sam Vimes once arrested a dragon. Sam Vimes stopped a war between nations by arresting two high commands. He's an arresting fellow, Sam Vimes. Sam Vimes killed a werewolf with his bare hands, and carries law with him like a lamp. Watchmen across half the continent will say that Sam Vimes is as straight as an arrow, can't be corrupted, won't be turned, never took a bribe.'

Vetinari: 'Given, then, a contest between an invisible and very powerful quasi-demonic thing of pure vengeance on the one hand, and the commander on the other, where would you wager, say... one dollar?'
Drumknott: 'I wouldn't, sir. That looks like one that would go to the judges.'

There appeared to be hundreds of them. They all seemed to have names like Bunny or Bubbles, they kept in touch meticulously, they'd all married influential or powerful men, they all hugged one another when they met and went on about the good old days in Form 3b or whatever, and if they acted together, they could probably run the world or, it occurred to Vimes, might already be doing so.

They were Ladies Who Organize.

—On the alumni of the Quirm College for Young Ladies

Vimes: 'Is this it? This time I die?'
death: could be.
Vimes: 'Could be? What sort of answer is that?'
death: a very accurate one. you see, you are having a near death experience, which inescapably means that i must undergo a near vimes experience. don't mind me. carry on with whatever you were doing. i have a book.

That! Is!! Not!!! My!!!! Cow!!!!!

'He created me. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Who watches the watchmen? Me. I watch him. Always. You will not force him to murder for you.'
'What kind of human creates his own policeman?'
'One who fears the dark.'
'And so he should.'
'Indeed. But I think you misunderstand. I am not here to keep darkness out. I'm here to keep it in. Call me the Guarding Dark. Imagine how strong I must be.'

Nobby's face was an open book, albeit the kind that got banned in some countries.

Back to Thud!