A wonderful quote about Earth by the English humorist, satirist, and author of fantasy novels Terry Pratchett (28 April 1948 – 12 March 2015). Pratchett thinks life on Earth is the biggest fantasy and even he was a fantasy writer, he finds it hard to believe.
“You want fantasy? Here’s one… There’s this species that lives on a planet a few miles above molten rock and a few miles below a vacuum that’d suck the air right out of them. They live in a brief geological period between ice ages, when giant asteroids have temporarily stopped smacking into the surface. As far as they can tell, there’s nowhere else in the universe where they could stay alive for ten seconds.”
“And what do they call their fragile little slice of space and time? They call it real life.”
“In a universe where it is known that whole galaxies can explode, they think there are things like ‘natural justice’ and ‘destiny’. Some of them even believe in democracy… I am a fantasy writer, and even I find it all a bit hard to believe.”
Terry Pratchett, “Whose Fantasy Are You?”
Terry Pratchett
Sir Terence David John Pratchett OBE (28 April 1948 – 12 March 2015) was an English humorist, satirist, and author of fantasy novels. He is best known for his Discworld comic fantasy series of 41 novels.
He was the United Kingdom’s best-selling author of the 1990s with more than 85 million books sold worldwide in 37 languages. His awards and honors include:
- Pratchett was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1998.
- He won the British Science Fiction Award in 1989 for his novel Pyramids and a Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel in 2008 for Making Money.
- In 2001 he won the annual Carnegie Medal for The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, the first Discworld book marketed for children.
- His fantasy novel Night Watch won the 2003 Prometheus Award for the best libertarian novel.
- Knighted for services to literature in the 2009 New Year Honours.
- He received the NESFA Skylark Award in 2009 (The Edward E. Smith Memorial Award for Imaginative Fiction, or Skylark, annually recognizes someone for lifetime contributions to science fiction).
- He received the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 2010.
- Pratchett’s comic fantasy novel I Shall Wear Midnight won the 2010 Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy presented by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) as a part of the Nebula Award ceremony.
- In 2011, Pratchett won Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association, a lifetime honor for “significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature”.
- In 2013, Pratchett was named Humanist of the Year by the British Humanist Association for his campaign to fund research into Alzheimer’s, his contribution to the right to die public debate, and his Humanist values.
- An asteroid (127005 Pratchett) is named after him.
Related: 10 Best Earth Quotes
Sources
- Terry Pratchett on Wikipedia
