{"author":"Orson Scott Card","author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card","total_quotes":332,"quotes":[{"text":"Issib wasn't thrilled to see him. I'm busy and don't need interruptions.' 'This is the household library,' said Nafai. 'This is where we always come to do research.' 'See? You're interrupting already.' 'Look, I didn't say anything, I just came in here, and you started picking at me the second I walked in the door.' 'I was hoping you'd walk back out.' 'I can't. Mother sent me here.' Nafai walked over behind Issib, who was floating comfortably in the air in front of his computer display. It was layered thirty pages deep, but each page had only a few words on it, so he could see almost everything at once. Like a game of solitaire, in which Issib was simply moving fragments from place to place. The fragments were all words in weird languages. The ones Nafai recognized were very old. 'What language is that?' Nafai asked pointing, to one. Issib signed. 'I'm so glad you're not interrupting me.' 'What is it, some ancient form of Vijati?' 'Very good. It's Slucajan, which came from Obilazati, the original form of Vijati. It's dead now.' 'I read Vijati, you know.' 'I don't.' 'Oh, so you're specializing in ancient, obscure languages that nobody speaks anymore, including you?' 'I'm not learning these languages, I'm researching lost words.' 'If the whole language is dead, then all the words are lost.' 'Words that used to have meanings, but that died out or survived only in idiomatic expressions. Like 'dancing bear.' What's a bear, do you know?' 'I don't know. I always thought it was some kind of graceful bird.' 'Wrong. It's an ancient mammal. Known only on Earth, I think, and not brought here. Or it died out soon. It was bigger than a man, very powerful. A predator.' 'And it danced?' 'The expression used to mean something absurdly clumsy. Like a dog walking on its hind legs.' 'And now it means the opposite. That's weird. How could it change?' 'Because there aren't any bears. THe meaning used to be obvious, because everybody knew a bear and how clumsy it would look, dancing. But when the bears were gone, the meaning could go anywhere. Now we use it for a person who's extremely deft in getting out of an embarrassing social situation. It's the only case that we use the word bear anymore. And you see a lot of people misspelling it, too.' 'Great stuff. You doing a linguistics project?' 'No.' 'What's this for, then?' 'Me.' 'Just collection old idioms?' 'Lost words.' 'Like bear? The word isn't lost, Issya. It's the bears that are gone.' 'Very good, Nyef. You get full credit for the assignment. Go away now.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["amusing","book-clip","sci-fi"],"id":750,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"My father always said that government is like watching another man piss in your boot. Someone feels better but it certainly isn't you.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["fantasy","government","humor"],"id":1370,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"Nights were so real that days began to seem dreamlike to him.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["dreams","ender","genius","life"],"id":2971,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"What a laugh, though. To think that one human being could ever really know another. You could get used to each other, get so habituated that you could speak their words right along with them, but you never know why other people said what they said or did what they did, because they never even know themselves. Nobody understands anybody.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["truth","understanding-oneself-and-others","understanding-others"],"id":5474,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"By deciding that they would study only that which could be verified under controlled conditions, they had merely limited their field of endeavor. Most truth lay outside the neat confines of science....","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["science","truth"],"id":7026,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"I would follow such beauty, said something inside Ender. I would see as those eyes see.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["inspiration","leader","leadership"],"id":7033,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"Eko brushed a tear from her eye, and Immo jeered at her, but father held up a hand. 'Never mock a tender heart,' he said.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["aphorism","mockery","sentiment"],"id":7174,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"As god is my witness, it was never my intent to throw out the constitution. I thought it was hanging by a thread, and I could save it... You don't save it by cutting that thread. - President Nielson.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["politics"],"id":10855,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"And were you punished? No. Why? Because you were rich.'Money and talent aren't the same thing.'That’s because you can inherit money that was earned by your ancestors,' said Sister Carlotta. 'And everybody recognizes the value of money, while only select groups recognize the value of talent.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["2000","bean","money","privilege","sister-carlotta","talent"],"id":12809,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"},{"text":"When you hear a true story, there is a part of you that responds to it regardless of art, regardless of evidence. Let it be the most obvious fabrication and you will still believe whatever truth is in it, because you can not deny truth no matter how shabbily it is dressed.","author":"Orson Scott Card","tags":["belief","stories","truth"],"id":14039,"author_id":"Orson+Scott+Card"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":332,"pages":34,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}