Thomas M. Disch Quotes & Sayings

In any case, muffins that are only imaginary aren't liable to get stuck. — Thomas M. Disch

America is a nation of liars, and for that reason science fiction has a special claim to be our national literature, as the art form best adapted to telling the lies we like to hear and to pretend we believe. — Thomas M. Disch

All children ... feel a demonic sympathy with those things that cause disorder in the grown-up world. — Thomas M. Disch

So, without saying anything to the others, it made its way to the farthest corner of the meadow and began to toast an imaginary muffin. That was always the best way to unwind when things got to be too much for it. — Thomas M. Disch

Creativity is the ability to see relationships where none exist. — Thomas M. Disch

But the toaster was quite satisfied with itself, thank you. Though it knew from magazines that there were toasters who could toast four slices at a time, it didn't think that the master, who lived alone and seemed to have few friends, would have wanted a toaster of such institutional proportions. With toast, it's quality that matters, not quantity. — Thomas M. Disch

The gods, after all, are only human, and once their rage has been placated they are perfectly capable of acts of mercy and grace. — Thomas M. Disch

For a lot of people, poetry tends to be dull. It's not read much. It takes a special kind of training and a lot of practice to read poetry with pleasure. It's like learning to like asparagus. — Thomas M. Disch

Laughter is just a slowed down scream of terror. — Thomas M. Disch

Science Fiction is a branch of children's literature. — Thomas M. Disch

The end of the world. Let me tell you about the end of the world. It happened fifty years ago. Maybe a hundred. And since then it's been lovely. I mean it. Nobody tries to bother you. You can relax. You know what? I like the end of the world. — Thomas M. Disch

Genius is an infinite capacity for pain. — Thomas M. Disch

Creativeness is finding patterns where none exist. — Thomas M. Disch

The problem is that we've got a sense of humor and (Republicans have) got guns. Will we die laughing? — Thomas M. Disch

In short, Daniel was once again a member of a family. Viewed from without they were a strange enough family: a rattling, hunchbacked old woman, a spoiled senile cocker spaniel, and a eunuch with a punctured career (for though Rey didn't live with them, his off-stage presence was as abiding and palpable as that of any paterfamilias away every day at the office). And Daniel himself. But better to be strange together than strange apart. He was glad to have found such a haven at last, and he hoped that most familial and doomed of hopes, that nothing would change. — Thomas M. Disch

Though opposition is a hopeless task, acquiescence would be worse. — Thomas M. Disch

Here was a flower (the daisy reflected) strangely like itself and yet utterly unlike itself too. Such a paradox has often been the basis for the most impassioned love. — Thomas M. Disch

But before any of the small appliances who may be listening to this tale should begin to think that they might do the same thing, let them be warned: ELECTRICITY IS VERY DANGEROUS. Never play with old batteries! Never put your plug in a strange socket! And if you are in any doubt about the voltage of the current where you are living, ask a major appliance. — Thomas M. Disch

Gene Wolfe has produced a work of art that can satisfy adult appetites and in which even the most fantastical elements register as poetry rather than as penny-whistle whimsy. — Thomas M. Disch

When one is experiencing failure, it is hard to resist the comfort of paranoia. — Thomas M. Disch

The distances between the stars seem brief by contrast to the distances between each of us and his fellows. — Thomas M. Disch

It considered trying to explain their error to them, but what would be the use? They would only go away with hurt feelings. You can't always expect people, or squirrels, to be rational. — Thomas M. Disch

The toaster (lacking real bread) would pretend to make two crispy slices of toast. Or, if the day seemed special in some way, it would toast an imaginary English muffin. — Thomas M. Disch

Sameness is what marketers want us to want. — Thomas M. Disch

Poets are regarded as handicapped writers whose work must be treated with a tender condescension, such as one accords the athletic achievements of basketball players confined to wheelchairs. — Thomas M. Disch

Knowledge is devalued when it becomes too generally known — Thomas M. Disch

I have turned into a pumpkin I am poor
The ball is over and I did not dance
My heart stops beating I am sad
Nothing can ever be so beautiful again
Nothing can

This is my usual corner I'm at home
Here are the pots and spoons and darkness
I did not dance and now I am alone
My death drops down the chimney
My heart stops — Thomas M. Disch

(Shoddiness is) the nature of human life. It takes an exertion to be indifferent to these things, but it's an exertion worth making. Also, it allows you luxuries like scorn and flippancy. — Thomas M. Disch

A predilection for genre fiction is symptomatic of a kind of arrested development. — Thomas M. Disch

Writers tend to consider distinction and originality as virtues, but they are anathema to publishers. — Thomas M. Disch

What to Accept
The fact of mountains. The actuality
Of any stone - by kicking, if necessary.
The need to ignore stupid people,
While restraining one's natural impulse
To murder them. The change from your dollar,
Be it no more than a penny,
For without a pretense of universal penury
There can be no honor between rich and poor.
Love, unconditionally, or until proven false.
The inevitability of cancer and/or
Heart disease. The dialogue as written,
Once you've taken the role. Failure,
Gracefully. Any hospitality
You're willing to return. The air
Each city offers you to breathe.
The latest hit. Assistance.
All accidents. The end. — Thomas M. Disch

This is my journal. I can be candid here. Candidly, I could not be more miserable. — Thomas M. Disch

Thought is a disease of the brain. The mind defends itself against the degenerative process of creativity; it begins to jell; notions solidify into inalterable systems. — Thomas M. Disch

The forest stretched on seemingly forever with the most monotonous predictability, each tree just like the next - trunk, branches, leaves; trunk, branches, leaves. Of course a tree would have taken a different view of the matter. We all tend to see the way others are alike and how we differ, and it's probably just as well we do, since that prevents a great deal of confusion. But perhaps we should remind ourselves from time to time that ours is a very partial view, and that the world is full of a great deal more variety than we ever manage to take in. — Thomas M. Disch

Much that is terrible we do not know. Much that is beautiful we shall still discover. Let's sail till we come to the edge. — Thomas M. Disch

But there you put your finger on what it is that separates the sheep from the goats, and vice versa: imagination. Those who possess it have an afterlife; those who don't possess it, or in whom it has greatly atrophied, are reborn as plants or animals. It's as simple, and unfair, as that. You could almost say that heaven is no more than a fantasm generated by the excess energies of the pooled imaginations of the blessed. — Thomas M. Disch

Gender and the complications it gives rise to simply aren't relevant to the lives appliances lead. — Thomas M. Disch