John Thomas Sladek Quotes

• The future, according to some scientists, will be exactly like the past, only more expensive.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Future, Science, Past

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• An artist's life is supposed to lead toward his masterpiece, not away from it.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Art, Artist, Life Is

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• Anything can happen in SF. And the fact that nothing ever does happen in SF is only due to the poverty of our imaginations, we who write it or edit it or read it. But SF can in principle deal with anything.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Writing, Imagination, Principles

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• Whatever I'm reading at the moment seems to influence whatever I'm writing.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Reading, Writing, Influence

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• We didn't have a phone when I was a kid, and I was too shy to smash any public phones, and our town didn't have a pool hall either, so I had to hang out at the public library - and anyway, I told myself stories.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Kids, Phones, Library

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• The problem and privilege we all have is being alive in this century and able to read this language. It makes any list meaningless except the list of an illiterate.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Alive, Able, Lists

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• See, I have no journalism in my background, so I wasn't practised at research or writing non-fiction, nor at handling the truth in a journalistic way. Journalists know when to call a halt and write something, but I kept on looking for answers.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Writing, Fiction, Research

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• People have laughed at all great inventors and discoverers.

  John Thomas Sladek

  People, Inventor, Great Inventors

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• Most publishers seem very reluctant to publish short story collections at all; they bring them out in paperback, often disguised as novels.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Stories, Novel, Short Story

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• In most conventional novels, God is not allowed to be nuts. Nor are nuts allowed to be God.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Nuts, Novel, Conventional

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• I have a kind of standard explanation why, which goes like this: Science fiction is one way of making sense out of a senseless world.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Science, Fiction, World

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• This is mainly because I spend a lot of time writing and so don't have much time to read; I hate to waste that time reading what may turn out to be junk food for the mind, when there's so much real writing to be read.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Hate, Real, Reading

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• I found some time ago that I have to be careful, while working on a novel, what I read.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Found, Be Careful, Novel

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• I started writing, or rather, thinking, stories as a child, and at that time the reason was very clear.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Children, Writing, Thinking

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• I usually like whatever I've recently finished best.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Finished

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• Today's robots are very primitive, capable of understanding only a few simple instructions such as 'go left', 'go right', and 'build car'.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Simple, Car, Understanding

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• I think these days an SF connection would be a boost to other books; I'm sure more people have read my two little detective puzzles because of the SF connection.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Book, Thinking, Two

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• R-4 got stuck on the First Law. "Can anyone really protect a human being from all harm whatever?" it thought. "No. It is inevitable that all humans must be injured, contract illnesses and ultimately die. The future can only be averted for humans who are already dead. Ergo..." It took a dozen cops to subdue R-4, after his blood orgy in a department store (83 dead, none injured).

  John Thomas Sladek

  Blood, Law, Dozen

  4 Copy quote

• SF has at least the advantage of not depending on preconceptions.

  John Thomas Sladek

  Advantage, Preconceptions

  7 Copy quote

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