“You know, Mouse, I envy the captain. He’s got a mission. And his obsession precludes all that wondering about what other people think of him.”

Source: Nova (1968), Chapter 6 (p. 158)

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Samuel R. Delany131

American author, professor and literary critic 1942

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“I think he who knows himself will know accurately, not the opinion of others about him, but what he is in reality… he ought to discover within himself what is right for him to do and not learn it from without…”

Julian (emperor) (331–363) Roman Emperor, philosopher and writer

As quoted in The Works of the Emperor Julian (1923) by Wilmer Cave France Wright, p. 91
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“I'm scared of him," said Piggy, "and that's why I know him. If you're scared of someone you hate him but you can't stop thinking about him. You kid yourself he's alright really, an' then when you see him again; it's like asthma an' you can't breath. I tell you what. He hates you too, Ralph —"
"Me? Why me?"
"I dunno. You got him over the fire; an' you're chief an' he isn't."
"But he's Jack Merridew!"
"I been in bed so much I done some thinking. I know about people. I know about me. And him. He can't hurt you: but if you're standing out of the way he'd hurt the next thing. And that's me."
"Piggy's right, Ralph. There's you and Jack. Go on being chief.”

William Golding book Lord of the Flies

Source: Lord of the Flies (1954), Ch. 5: Beast from Water

“Something is wrong with America. I wonder sometimes what people are thinking about or if they're thinking at all.”

Bob Dole (1923) American politician

Reported in Tom Crisp, The Book of Bob: Choice Words, Memorable Men (2007), p. 113.

“If I like chocolate it won't surprise you that I have a few chocolates in my fridge, but if you find out I've got 16 warehouses full of chocolate, you'd think I was insane. All these rich guys are insane, obsessive compulsive twits obsessed with money — money is all they think about — they're all nuts.”

John Cleese (1939) actor from England

On Fresh Air with Terry Gross, promoting Fierce Creatures, which Cleese says is a satire about Rupert Murdoch's greed. (1997)

“Despair leads to many forms of thought,” said the magus, “and many kinds of action. Despair drives some to greater sanity, towards an analysis of the world as it is and what it might be. Others it drives to deep and dangerous insanity, towards an imposition of their own desires upon reality. I sympathize with your despair, Johannes Klosterheim, because it has no solace, in the end. Your despair is the worst there is to know. And yet men often look upon the likes of you and envy you, as you doubtless envy Duke Arioch, as Duke Arioch doubtless envies his master Lucifer, whom he would betray, and perhaps as Lucifer envied God. And what does God envy, I wonder? Perhaps he envies the simple mortal who is content with his lot and envies nobody.”

Michael Moorcock (1939) English writer, editor, critic

Source: The von Bek family, The War Hound and the World's Pain (1981), Chapter 15 (p. 153)

“Fundamentally I think soldiering is pretty similar to politics. It’s not about you, it’s all about the people you serve with. It’s all about the results, it’s all about the operation, it’s all about the mission. The reason we’re here at all in politics is to serve the people.”

Tom Tugendhat (1973) British politician

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“I know the Leader of the Opposition [Tony Abbott] has an unhealthy kind of obsession with the so-called "faceless men in the Labor Party"; what he really should be obsessed about is the useless men sitting behind him.”

Julia Gillard (1961) Australian politician and lawyer, 27th Prime Minister of Australia

In Question Time, c. March 2012 <br class="br"> "Labor cleans up after aftermath" http://www.abc.net.au/insiders/content/2012/s3445116.htm, in Insiders (ABC), 4 March 2012

“Wilem snorted."That doesn't sound suspicious at all," he said. "And you wonder why people talk about you."

"I don't wonder why they talk," I said "I wonder what they say.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Wise Man's Fear

Source: The Wise Man's Fear

“I asked him what, if anything, got him down about teaching. He said he didn't think that anything about it got him exactly down, but there was one thing, he thought, that frightened him: reading the pencilled notations in the margins of books in the college library.”

Jerome David Salinger book Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963), Seymour: An Introduction (1959)

“One of the marvelous things about him is that he is strong enough to force the men who dislike him the most to stand by him. By far he is the strongest man before the people to-day except Roosevelt. I think his greatest fault is his failure to accord credit to anyone for what he may have done. This is a great weakness in any man. I think it was one of the strongest things about Roosevelt. He never tried to minimize what other people did and often exaggerated it.”

William Howard Taft (1857–1930) American politician, 27th President of the United States (in office from 1909 to 1913)

On Charles Evans Hughes, in November 1909, as quoted in Taft and Roosevelt : The intimate letters of Archie Butt (1930) by Archibald Willingham Butt, p. 224; this has sometimes been paraphrased: "Failure to accord credit to anyone for what he may have done is a great weakness in any man."

“You know, Mouse, I envy the captain. He’s got a mission. And his obsession precludes all that wondering about what other people think of him.”

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Samuel R. Delany131

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