Octavia Butler Science Fiction Quotes & Sayings

Sometimes I'm scared of being Ozzy Osbourne. But it could have been worse. I could have been Sting. — Ozzy Osbourne

The postures are only the "skin" of yoga. Hidden behind them are the "flesh and blood" of breath control and mental techniques that are still more difficult to learn, as well as moral practices that require a lifetime of consistent application and that correspond to the skeletal structure of the body. The higher practices of concentration, meditation and unitive ecstasy(samadhi) are analogous to the circulatory and nervous system." Georg Feuerstein The Deeper Dimension of Yoga — Georg Feuerstein

Octavia Butler often described herself as an outsider, but within science fiction, she was loved as an insider, someone who was a fan first and came to S.F. writing as an enthusiastic reader. — Karen Joy Fowler

The essentials," I answered, "are to learn to shape God with forethought, care, and work; to educate and benefit their community, their families, and themselves; and to contribute to the fulfillment of the Destiny. — Octavia E. Butler

Fantasy is totally wide open; all you really have to do is follow the rules you've set. But if you're writing about science, you have to first learn what you're writing about. — Octavia E. Butler

The thing about science fiction is that it's totally wide open. But it's wide open in a conditional way. — Octavia Butler

The greatest intensification of the horrors of war is a direct result of the democratisation of the State. So long as the army was a professional unit, the specialist function of a limited number of men, war remained a relatively harmless contest for power. But once it became everyman's duty to defend his home (or his political "rights") warfare was free to range wherever that home might be, and to attack every form of life and property associated with that home. — Herbert Read

It's interesting how many science fiction writers get going when they are very young. I was on a program with Greg Bear and he mentioned that he had gotten started writing when he was eight. And I began writing when I was 10. I think we're influenced by the stuff, we find it and we love it and we're influenced by it ... I know I collected my first rejection slip when I was 13, and I went on collecting them for a long time after that. — Octavia Butler

I took classes taught by an elderly woman who wrote children's stories. She was polite about the science fiction and fantasy that I kept handing in, but she finally asked in exasperation, 'Can't you write anything normal?' — Octavia E. Butler

No one was going to stop me from writing and no one had to really guide me towards science fiction. It was natural, really, that I would take that interest. — Octavia Butler

I lost an arm on my last trip home. My left arm. — Octavia E. Butler

I have no other destiny than the destiny of humanity. — Debasish Mridha

When I began to do a little public speaking, one of the questions I heard most often was, "What good is science fiction to Black people?" I was usually asked this by a Black person ...
What good is science fiction's thinking about the present, the future, and the past? What good is its tendency to warn or to consider alternative ways of thinking and doing? What good is its examination of the possible effects of science and technology, or social organization and political direction? At its best, science fiction stimulates imagination and creativity. It gets reader and writer off the beaten track, off the narrow, narrow footpath of what "everyone" is saying, doing, thinking
whoever "everyone" happens to be this year.
And what good is all this to Black people? — Octavia E. Butler

Science fiction frees you to go anyplace and examine anything. — Octavia E. Butler

Because we were orbiting the earth faster than earth spins on its axis, we went around the earth 16 times a day, an earth day, which meant 16 periods of lightness and 16 periods of darkness in 24 hours. Every so often you'd look towards the earth, and often you could see lightness and darkness together, and dawn and sunset were spectacular. — Helen Sharman

My relative examined you, observed a few of your normal body cells, compared them with what it had learned from other humans most like you, and said that you had not only a cancer, but a talent for cancer. — Octavia E. Butler

Most of what I do is science fiction. Some of the things I do are fantasy. I don't like the labels, they're marketing tools, and I certainly don't worry about them when I'm writing. They are also inhibiting factors; you wind up not getting read by certain people, or not getting sold to certain people because they think they know what you write. You say science fiction and everybody thinks Star Wars or Star Trek. — Octavia Butler

My brother Keith begged to go with us as usual. He'll turn thirteen in a few days - August 14 - and the thought of waiting two more years until he's 15 must seem impossible to him. I understand. Waiting is terrible. Waiting to be older is worse than other kinds of waiting because there's nothing you can do to make it happen faster. — Octavia E. Butler

Science fiction, extrasensory perception, and black people are judged by the worst elements they produce. — Octavia E. Butler

So fantasy was fine early on, and when I discovered science fiction, I was very happy with it, because my first interest in science fiction came with an interest in astronomy. — Octavia Butler

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God (1 Cor 10:31). Eating and drinking are fairly common aspects of daily life, and yet even ordinary meals become significant when they draw our attention once again to glorifying and enjoying the God who provides them. — Michael S. Horton

Hollywood wants to go for the flash, because that's what a lot of them think science fiction is. — Octavia E. Butler

Cities controlled by big companies are old hat in science fiction. My grandmother left a whole bookcase of old science fiction novels. The company-city subgenre always seemed to star a hero who outsmarted, overthrew, or escaped "the company." I've never seen one where the hero fought like hell to get taken in and underpaid by the company. In real life, that's the way it will be. That's the way it always is. — Octavia E. Butler

Moment by moment throughout our lifetime, our brains hum with the work of making meaning: weaving together many thousands of threads of information into all manner of thoughts, feelings, memories, and ideas. — Daniel Tammet

Our frog lies on her back. Waiting for a prince to come and princessify her with a smooch? I stand over her with my knife. Ms. Keen's voice fades to a mosquito whine. My throat closes off. It is hard to breathe. I put out my hand to steady myself against the table. David pins her froggy hands to the dissection tray. He spreads her froggy legs and pins her froggy feet. I have to slice open her belly. She doesn't say a word. She is already dead. A scream starts in my gut - I can feel the cut, smell the dirt, leaves in my hair. I don't remember passing out. David says I hit my head on the edge of the table on my way down. The nurse calls my mom because I need stitches. The doctor stares into the back of my eyes with a bright light. Can she read the — Laurie Halse Anderson

Quite often in acting, you have to play a certain part; you cannot speak as much as you want to speak. — Sylvester Stallone

I was attracted to science fiction because it was so wide open. I was able to do anything and there were no walls to hem you in and there was no human condition that you were stopped from examining. — Octavia E. Butler

If you want to achieve your objectives, you have to be prepared for a daily dose of pain or discomfort. At first, it's unpleasant and demotivating, but in time you come to realise that it's part of the process of feeling good, and the moment arrives when, if you don't feel pain, you have a sense that the exercises aren't having the desired effect. — Paulo Coelho

After you've looked at normal women's bodies, look at yourself in the mirror. Stand there for at least three minutes, once a week, for six weeks. Every time you notice a stretch mark, a sag, a wrinkle, say to yourself, "This is what living looks like. This is what loving looks like." And you will be telling the truth. — Geneen Roth

You are ill, correct? The warmth and shivering had no other particular cause, did it?"
"Not only am I ill, I am sure I am contagious. — Madeline Hunter

I began reading science fiction before I was 12 and started writing science fiction around the same time. — Octavia Butler

And by the way, I wanted to point out that Kindred is not science fiction. You'll note there's no science in it. It's a kind of grim fantasy. — Octavia Butler

Science fiction let me do both. It let me look into science and stick my nose in everywhere. — Octavia Butler

I've had moments of thinking maybe I should go on Twitter. It's something that I've been shy about, and I've thought that maybe I should do it. — Michelle Dockery

Science fiction is not formulaic. — Octavia E. Butler

As I look around the quiet room, I see a thousand leather covers like doorways into worlds unknown. — Laura Whitcomb