Hartman Quotes & Sayings

A farmer's work is more like that of a horse trainer than a mechanic, more like that of a healer than a computer repairperson. It is not really accurate to say that farmers grow food or raise animals. Farmers alter environmental conditions in such a way as to maximize a plant's or an animal's innate ability to do its own growing -- in the same way that the best horse trainers seek to draw out abilities already within their horses or in the way the best healers know when to stand back and let their patients' bodies do the work. There is mystery in farming. — Ben Hartman

I think if you could go back in time in one dimension, you could go back in another. That would make more sense. Well, said Nickelo, I guess it's unfortunate the Creator didn't discuss things with you first before he set the laws of the universe. That's a pity. Not funny, Richard said. — Rodney W. Hartman

I was drawn to his aloofness, the way cats gravitate toward people who'd rather avoid them. — Rachel Hartman

Peaches and Cheese:
The vagabond sun winks down through the trees,
While lilacs, like memories, waft on the breeze,
My friend, I was born for days such as these,
To inhale perfume,
And cut through the gloom,
And feast like a king upon peaches and cheese!
I'll travel this wide world and go where I please,
Can't stop my wand'ring, it's like a disease.
My only regret as I cross the high seas:
What I leave behind,
Though I hope to find,
My own golden city of peaches and cheese! — Rachel Hartman

Sometimes everyone does their best and things still go wrong. — Rachel Hartman

I was 36, and I had decided to quit acting because it was so disappointing. — Phil Hartman

Love is not a disease. — Rachel Hartman

It's such a relief after all these years to learn that you recovered from your fright," he said in a low voice, giving my hand a squeeze, "and that you grew up so pretty!"
"Were you worried?" I asked, touched.
"Yes. What were you, eleven? Twelve? At that age we're all gawky, and the outcome is always in doubt. — Rachel Hartman

I heard you, sought you, and have found you. I have reached for you, across space and sense and the laws of nature. I do not know how. — Rachel Hartman

The truth may not be told. Here is an acceptable lie. — Rachel Hartman

Bend like a willow. You made it sound so simple."
"It was simple."
"Indeed. I bent and changed everything. This is going to have consequences. — Rachel Hartman

Marines die, that's what we're here for. But the Marine Corps lives forever. And that means YOU live forever. — Phil Hartman

The one thing I could do was voices and impersonations and weird characters, and there was really no call for that, except on Saturday Night Live. — Phil Hartman

I took a break, stretched, tried again, failed, kicked over the music stand (I am not proud of that), and wonder whether I had reached the limits of my musical ability. Maybe I'd never had any. Surely someone with a modicum of talent wouldn't have to work this hard. — Rachel Hartman

But do not make the mistake, Seraphina, of supposing that suffering ennobles anyone. — Rachel Hartman

Have you read Belondweg?"
"I coudn't call myself much of a scholar if I hadn't," he said.
He was adorable and he made me smile, but I couldn't let him see. — Rachel Hartman

He looked up at the reddening sky and said with a self-deprecating laugh, "You put me to shame, Seraphina. Your bravery always has."
"It's not bravery; it's bullheaded bumbling."
He shook his head, staring off into the middle distance. "I know courage when I see it, and when I lack it. — Rachel Hartman

The twin gods, Necessity and Chance, walked among the stars. What needed to be, was; what might be, sometimes was. — Rachel Hartman

He didn't wear his heart on his sleeve, exactly, but he did keep it in a place where I could see it. — Rachel Hartman

I'm awestruck that you had warm cabbages sitting around. — Rachel Hartman

Pvt. Joker is silly and he's ignorant but he's got guts and guts is what counts!"
Gunnery Sergeant Hartman USMC
— Matthew Modine

We must show them we're superior and put them in their place. Dominate or be dominated. — Rachel Hartman

...The Kiggs-Phina way... — Rachel Hartman

You twist logic to your own purposes." "It's a lawyer's duty," sniffed Phloxia, — Rachel Hartman

Playing flute was the one thing I knew could make people see a human, not a monster. — Rachel Hartman

No one will ever be as good as Phil Hartman. He was such an amazing genius, and may be the best sketch performer of all time. — Nick Swardson

I could do John Wayne, Jack Benny, Jack Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and entertain my friends. But I never seriously considered it as a career choice. — Phil Hartman

These human eyes seemed weak to me at first," said Eskar, still staring away from me, scratching her short black hair. "They detect fewer colors and have terrible resolution, but they see things dragon eyes cannot. They can see beyond surfaces. I don't understand how that's possible, but it happened incrementally as I traveled with Orma: I began to see the inside of him. His questioning and gentle nature. His conviction. I'd glimpse it in something as incongruous as his hand holding a teacup, or his eyes when he spoke of you. — Rachel Hartman

I found the writing arena to be much less competitive. — Phil Hartman

Metaphor is awkward, but emotion, by its nature, leaves you no more scalable approach. — Rachel Hartman

I experienced every wing beat as a terrifying drop followed by a stomach-lurching heave. I was sick over a glacier. Brisi watched with interest and screeched, A thousand years from now, that will still be there, frozen in the ice. Unless a quig eats it. — Rachel Hartman

So if the Infernum is an empy interior, what's Heaven in their conception?" I asked, nudging him.
"A second inside-out house, inside, or rather 'outside' the first," he said. "If you cross its threshold, you realize our world, for all its wonder, has been but a shdow, another kind of empitness. Heaven is more than this. — Rachel Hartman

This is my mind's garden, I tend it; I order it. I have nothing to fear. — Rachel Hartman

The thing about reason is that there's a geometry to it. It travels in a straight line, so that slightly different beginnings can lead you to wildly divergent endpoints. — Rachel Hartman

Orma had given me a timepiece that emitted blasphemy-inducing chirps at whatever early hour I specified. — Rachel Hartman

A thousand regrets I've had in love,
A thousand times I've longed to change the past.
I know, my love, there is no going back.
No undoing of our thousand burdens.
We must go on despite our heavy hearts.
A thousand regrets I've had in love, but I shall never regret you. — Rachel Hartman

He sighed. "So I've gone and revealed how much I admire your work for nothing. Now you'll feel free to laze about self-importantly, I suppose!"
"Viridius, no," I said, stepping toward him and impulsively kissing his balding head. "I'm well aware that that's your job."
"Damned right," he grumpily. "And I've earned it, too. — Rachel Hartman

If slavery persists as an issue in the political life of black America, it is not because of an antiquarian obsession with bygone days or the burden of a too-long memory, but because black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery--skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment. — Saidiya V. Hartman

Let the ones who seek justice be just. — Rachel Hartman

All the important parts, yes," I said firmly. "Maybe not all the eccentric details. Ask, and I will answer. What do you want to know?"
"Everything." He had been leaning on his elbows, but he pushed back now and gripped the balustrade with both hands. "It's always this way with me: if it can be known, I want to know it. — Rachel Hartman

He was impugning my virtue. I ought to have been offended, but for some reason the idea tickled me. That could be my next career: instrument of torture! Seducing prisoners, and then revealing my dragon scales! They would confess out of sheer horror. — Rachel Hartman

You're not a villain, I said. Or else we were two villains in a pod. — Rachel Hartman

Always I hev my fists and my war pipes! — Rachel Hartman

It's fun coming in as the second or third lead. If the movie or TV show bombs, you aren't to blame. — Phil Hartman

The resolve written in his eyes said no, but I could see exactly where I would have to push, and how hard, to break that resolve. It would be shockingly easy, but I found I did not wish it ... Some part of him would break, along with his resolve, and I did not see a way to make it whole again. The jagged edge of it would stab at him all his life. — Rachel Hartman

Art is a conversation we are all invited to and are all worthy to participate in. Yes, great works can be intimidating, but no one else in the world has what you have - your voice, your eyes, your feeling and perspective. Other people have written great books, but no one else will ever write YOUR book. It's worth writing. That is the belief that carries me through. — Rachel Hartman

There was a great brightness and, um ... Imagine what it would look like if you could see music, or thought. — Rachel Hartman

We were all monsters and bastards, and we were all beautiful. — Rachel Hartman

I smiled into the darkness. There was nothing "just" about metaphors, I was beginning to think; they followed me everywhere, illuminating and failing and illuminating again. — Rachel Hartman

I scrupulously hide every legitimate reason for people to hate me, and it turns out they don't need legitimate reasons. Heaven has fashioned a knife of irony to stab me with. — Rachel Hartman

I didn't want this dance to end, or Kiggs to let go of my hand. I didn't want him to turn his eyes away, or live any other moment than this one. — Rachel Hartman

I was feverish; I couldn't keep down food. Orma stayed by me the entire time, and I suffered the illusion that behind his skin - behind everyone's - was a hollow nothingness, an inky black void. He rolled up my sleeve to look at my arm, and I shrieked, believing he would peel back my skin and see the emptiness beneath it. — Rachel Hartman

Your very presence makes other people feel awkward. You stand out when in fact you'd rather not. — Rachel Hartman

You, of all people, understand the burden of having to prove that you are good enough to exist, that you are worth all the grief your mother caused everyone. Bastard equals monster in our hearts' respective lexicons; that's why you always had such insight into it. — Rachel Hartman

A farmer's work in many ways is like setting a stage. In theater, stage managers lay out furniture and props, set up lights, and clean to get a set ready for actors to take over and create a show. Farmers plow, fertilize, set up irrigation systems and fences, and otherwise prep the stage of their farms for the real actors -- the sun and the life within the seeds and animals -- to create the show. — Ben Hartman

When you saw Jon Lovitz or Dana Carvey or Phil Hartman doing something, they were acting. It was real acting. Like, they were acting like that person. They weren't like - it wasn't even like they were really trying to go for a laugh, especially in Phil Hartman's case. — Bill Hader

Please, Orma, I've already gotten you in so much trouble - "
"That I can't possibly get into more. Take it." He wouldn't stop glaring at me until I'd put the earring back on its cord. "You are all that's left of Linn. Her own people won't even say her name. I - I value your continued existence."
I could not speak; he had pierced me to my very heart. — Rachel Hartman

Oh, you humans may prefer empathy and mercy, but that's like intuiting the answer to an equation: you still have to go back and work the problem to be certain you were right. We can come to genuinely moral conclusions by our own paths. — Rachel Hartman

I understood something about myself as well, even if I didn't have the will to examine it just then. — Rachel Hartman

Mortality is, in reality, a very, very short period. It is literally a snap of the fingers compared to an eternity. It is so short that we can do it. We can prevail. Why, you can stand your foot in a vise for a while if you know it's going to be released soon. Yes, earthly probation is short compared to eternity, but so very much is riding on how we handle the trials and temptations of the flesh. — Hartman Rector Jr.

Invest in places that make sense so you can afford to live in places that don't make sense. — Jason Hartman

I also tend to blame myself first," said Camba. Her head was still shaved for mourning, though she'd rehung her golden earrings. "The world is seldom so simple that it hinges on us alone. Pende played his own part. He told you your mind was bound and that it was problem, but did he make even the slightest attempt to help you?"
"He doesn't deserve this," I said, unsure where her argument was leading.
"Of course not," said Camba. "And neither do you deserve all the blame. Sometimes everyone does their best and things still end up wrong. — Rachel Hartman

How did you merit so much devotion so quickly?' I asked, making no attempt to keep the sarcasm from my voice.
'I show them Heaven', said she, without a trace of irony. 'People are so desperate for light'. — Rachel Hartman

I'm attracting small children," Orma muttered, twisting his hat in his hands. "Shoo it away, will you? — Rachel Hartman

Who will kiss you? Who will rock you to sleep?" His voice was slow, drowsy.
"You never did," I said, trying to tease him. "You were more father to me than my father, but you never did that."
"Someone should. Someone should love you. I will bite him if he will not. — Rachel Hartman

I saw the void beneath the surface of the world; it threatened to pull me under. — Rachel Hartman

He chuckled into my hair, enjoying this. I loved him terribly just then, how he puzzled through obscure scholarship and reveled in ideas, never mind that he'd called my mind hell. — Rachel Hartman

Of love. Yes, that was it: he thought I meant to proposition — Rachel Hartman

Ah, I could last a long time on those smiles. I would sow and reap them like wheat. — Rachel Hartman

Listen, Mollie, I need to get home and let my parents know I'm alive. Then I am coming back for you. If my home is still standing, I'll provide a place for you and Frank as long as you need." "Why would you do that?" She looked a little taken aback, which surprised him. Because he loved her. Because they had just experienced the worst two days imaginable, and the bond that had been forged between them was not something to be tossed away. If Louis Hartman didn't like it, he would quit. The fire had just taught Zack what was most important in this world, and she was looking straight at him. — Elizabeth Camden

And I realized a wondrous truth: that knowledge could be our treasure, that there were things humankind knew that we did not, that our conquest need not comprise taking and killing, but could consist of our mutual conquest of ignorance and distrust. — Rachel Hartman

'Blasto' is a new game for Sony Playstation. It's an awesome three-dimensional game, and I play the character Blasto who's sort of a Flash Gordon barrel-chested superhero who goes to Uranus and shoots these little green alien Fascist guys. He rescues babes; he goes on wild rides. — Phil Hartman

I'd had more than my share of beautiful today. Tomorrow I'd give some back, restore and replenish the world. — Rachel Hartman

How did you stand lying about yourself for years? You must have felt cut off from the whole world."
I fought down the lump in my throat. "I did indeed. And then I met this prince who seemed able to see through me, to the truth behind the lies. He was terrifying and fascinating, but to my amazement, it was an immeasurable relief to be seen. — Rachel Hartman

The Lord requires sacrifice, meaning something above and beyond the minimum. The Master spoke of the "second mile" and told us to go there. Why? Because he wants to bless us, and he put all the blessings in the second mile. — Hartman Rector Jr.

Your personal brand is a promise to your clients ... a promise of quality, consistency, competency, and reliability. — Jason Hartman

But are you finding monastic history a very compelling reason to live?"
"I'm not human," he said. "I don't require a reason to live. Living is my default condition."
I couldn't help it; I laughed, and teas weleld in my eyes. That answer was quintessentially Orma, distilled to his elemental Orma-ness. — Rachel Hartman

It is permissible to be the god of your own metaphors. — Rachel Hartman

He was exactly my height, which surprised me; my awe of him had made him seem taller. — Rachel Hartman

Crisis first, love later. — Rachel Hartman

He's got the place to himself. Once the other invalids learned there was a dragon coming, they miraculously got well! The lame could walk and the blind decided they didn't really need to see. He's a panacea. — Rachel Hartman

As an actor, I felt I couldn't compete. I wasn't as cute as the leading man; I wasn't as brilliant as Robin Williams. — Phil Hartman

Keeping my smile raised like a shield between us, I curtsied and quit the room. — Rachel Hartman

A single action could derive from many motivations. I should never assume. — Rachel Hartman

I don't mean to imply that they were cowards ... , Maurizio said, shrugging, clearly implying that [they] were cowards. — Rachel Hartman

The beauty of the place moved me; I loved how the clean air felt in my lungs, how far I was from everything I had ever known. People I'd hurt, people I'd failed, people who thought me a monster. Here there was no monster greater than the ragged mountains. — Rachel Hartman

More insomniacs!' cried the doctor. 'Come in, come in. — Rachel Hartman

My brothers and sisters and I spoke in a language called Egg Latin. In the early '50s in Canada, this became a fad way of talking among certain people. It's based on the concept that in every syllable before the vowel and after the preceding constant you insert the word 'egg.' So, my name Phil would be 'Pegghil.' — Phil Hartman

It looked like our gods, to me
not literally, no the way they are depicted in statues, but the vibrant space between them, where Necessity is Chance and Chance flows into Necessity. The world is as it must be, and as it happens to be, and those are the same thing, connected and right, and you understand and love all of it, because you are all of it and all of it is you. — Rachel Hartman

The world is seldom so simple that it hinges on us alone. — Rachel Hartman

Did I become court composer through masterful procrastination? Hardly! — Rachel Hartman

Their gowns and masks look lovely." "Not as lovely as yours," Jorgen said without hesitating. Her heart seemed to fly out of her chest and soar around the arched ceiling of the ballroom of Thornbeck Castle. Jorgen Hartman, rescuer of damsels in peril, might . . . perhaps . . . love her. But — Melanie Dickerson

God has arranged strange ways for some of us to find him. Sometimes He brings us on long physical journeys; sometimes He leaves us at home and makes the journey internal. Yours has been both. You have gone a long way and struggled a great deal, but I can see from your eyes that it was not for nothing. — Abigail J. Hartman

I'm a comedic actor, not to mix words, but it's something I think about. A comedic actor. I like to think that Christopher Guest, Phil Hartman, Peter Sellers and Alec Guinness are comedic actors. And Dan Aykroyd, too. Those are my heroes. — Mike Myers

I did not understand that I carried loneliness before me on a plate, and that music would be the light illuminating me from behind. — Rachel Hartman

Claude rubs the back of his neck and wrinkles his nose, about to tell me he was never sad. I believe this is called bravado and is not limited to lawyers, or even men, although that combination makes it almost unavoidable. — Rachel Hartman

Music is only work when someone else makes you do it. — Rachel Hartman

Our shadows stretched before us across the surface of the world. — Rachel Hartman

There are melodies that speak as eloquently as words, that flow logically and inevitably from a single, pure emotion. — Rachel Hartman

Was good to see a dragon's teeth. A dragon with his mouth closed was far more likely to be working up a flame. That seemed completely obvious. — Rachel Hartman