John Brunner: Trending quotes

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John Brunner: 294 quotes1 like

“By the door, a large red object with a mirror on the upper part of its front. Installed last fall. Japanese. On a plate at the side: Mitzuyama Corp., Osaka. Shaped like a weighing machine. Stand here and insert 25c. Do not smoke while using. Place mouth and nose to soft black flexible mask. Like an obscene animal’s kiss.
Usually he laughed at it because up here in the mountains the air was never so bad you needed to tank up on oxygen to make the next block. On the other hand some people did say it was a hell of a good cure for a hangover...”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

December “IT’S A GAS”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

“He had once, for example, put down a spokesman for the pesticide industry with a remark that people still quoted at parties: “And I presume on the eighth day God called you and said, ‘I changed my mind about insects!’ “”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

September “MINE ENEMIES ARE DELIVERED INTO MY HAND”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

“In short order they fell into the same pit as their rivals, who had for decades ignored the plain and simple fact that to a starving man “freedom” implies a full rice-bowl—or, if he has an exceptional imagination, a healthy ox to pull his plough. It has nothing to do with voting for a political delegate.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

context (8) “Isolation”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

““How does it feel to have just changed the course of history?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said the navigator. “To my way of thinking, by the time history happens I’m going to be dead.””

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

tracking with closeups (11) “The Sealed Train”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“Any society which gives lip-service to the idea of equal opportunity is going to generate jealousy of others who are better off than you are, even if the thing that’s in short supply can’t be carved up and shared without destroying it.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

continuity (13) “Multiply by a Million”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“This year we take our vacation somewhere else. Where is there where Americans aren’t likely to be stoned by a howling mob? Spain, Greece? No, got to be out of range of the stench from the Med.
Looks like we might as well stay home.”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

May “BLANKET”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

“What in God’s name is it worth to be human, if we have to be saved from ourselves by a machine?”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

continuity (42) “And Say Which Seed Will Grow“
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“You don’t have to know everything. You simply need to know where to find it when necessary.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

continuity (3) “After One Decade”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“We’ve always cared more about property rights than human rights in this country. You should know that.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

continuity (6) “Auction Block for Me”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“Faust felt like this. The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, the devil will come and Faustus must be damned … How long did he buy with the currency of his soul — ten years?”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

continuity (12) "It's Supposed To Be Automatic But Actually You Have To Press This Button"
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“Even this far from shore, the night stank. The sea moved lazily, its embryo waves aborted before cresting by the layer of oily residues surrounding the hull, impermeable as sheet plastic: a mixture of detergents, sewage, industrial chemicals and the microscopic cellulose fibers due to toilet paper and newsprint. There was no sound of fish breaking surface. There were no fish.”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

March “RIPOSTE”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

“If there is such a phenomenon as absolute evil, it consists in treating another human being as a thing.”

John Brunner The Shockwave Rider

Bk. 3, Ch. "Like They Say, It's Bounce Or Break"
The Shockwave Rider (1975)

“"But I was never put on trial, never convicted!"
"You are not entitled to a trial."
"Anybody's entitled to a trial, damn you!"
"That is absolutely true. But you see you are not anybody. You are nobody.”

John Brunner The Shockwave Rider

Bk. 1, Ch. "The Conviction of His Courage" <!-- [Italics in source] --> (His record having been erased from government computers.)
The Shockwave Rider (1975)

“First we had the legs race. Then we had the arms race. Now we're going to have the brain race. And, if we're lucky, the final stage will be the human race.”

John Brunner The Shockwave Rider

Bk. 1, Ch. "The Number You Have Reached"
The Shockwave Rider (1975)

“LOGIC The principle governing human intellection. Its nature may be deduced from examining the following propositions, both of which are held by human beings to be true and often by the same people: “I can’t so you musn’t,” and “I can but you musn’t.””

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

the happening world (15) “Equal and Opposite”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“Most rich people get rich by taking what they want without paying for it. It’s the way of the world.”

John Brunner book The Tides of Time

Source: The Tides of Time (1984), Chapter 5 (p. 83)

“LEADERSHIP A form of self-preservation exhibited by people with autodestructive imaginations in order to ensure that when it comes to the crunch it’ll be someone else’s bones which go crack and not their own.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

context (14) “Storm Centre”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

“.. that the Army is using defoliants in Honduras to create fire-free zones. This charge has been strongly denied by the Pentagon. Asked to comment just prior to leaving for Hawaii, where he will convalesce for the next two or three weeks, Prexy said, quote, Well, if you can’t see them you can’t shoot them. End quote. Support has been growing for a bill which Senator Richard Howell will introduce at the earliest opportunity, forbidding the issue of a passport to any male between sixteen and sixty not in possession of a valid discharge certificate or medical exemption. Welcoming the proposal, a Pentagon spokesman today admitted that of the last class called for the draft more than one in three failed to report. Your steaks are going to cost you more. This warning was today issued by the Department of Agriculture. The price of animal fodder has quote taken off like a rocket unquote, following the mysterious...”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

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June “IF IT MOVES, SHOOT IT”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

““A crank, like I say. Won’t let him fly. Says she wants her grandchildren to see the sun. What difference it makes if a plane flies with one seat empty, I don’t know!”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

January “SNOW JOB”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)

“What hurt him most of all, made him feel like a sick child aware of terrible wrongness and yet incapable of explaining it to anyone who might help, was that in spite of the evidence around them, in spite of what their eyes and ears reported—and sometimes their flesh, from bruises, stab wounds, racking coughs, weeping sores—these people believed their way of life was the best in the world, and were prepared to export it at the point of a gun.”

John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up

June “CRITICAL”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)