Jack Vance

“Someone who conceals his curiosity, is overwhelmed with information.”

— Jack Vance

As I mentioned, I was a carpenter for a time.

— Jack Vance

“Am I known as Cugel the Clever for nothing?”

— Jack Vance

Of all questions, why? is the least pertinent. It begs the question; it assumes the larger part of its own response; to…

— Jack Vance

The less a writer discusses his work and himself the better. The master chef slaughters no chickens in the dining room; the…

— Jack Vance

Freedom, privileges, options, must constantly be exercised, even at the risk of inconvenience.

— Jack Vance

Beauty compelled admiration and erotic yearning; such was its organic function. But never by itself could it command love.

— Jack Vance

Human interactions, stimulated as they are by disequilibrium, never achieve balance. In even the most favorable transaction, one party whether he realizes…

— Jack Vance

There are no absolute certainties in this universe. A man must try to whip order into a yelping pack of probabilities, and…

— Jack Vance

Why make plans? The sun might well go out tomorrow.

— Jack Vance

But I've sure worked at jobs where I have been under inspection.

— Jack Vance

“The symbologist made a cryptic sign. "That remains to be seen, as the cat said who voided into the sugar bowl.”

— Jack Vance

I must cite an intrinsic condition of the universe. We set forth in any direction which seems convenient; each leads to the…

— Jack Vance

An inch of foreknowledge is worth ten miles of after-thought.

— Jack Vance

In the end, death came uniformly to all, and all extracted as much satisfaction from their dying as this essentially graceless process…

— Jack Vance

“Where cowards never venture, heroes find splendor. So”

— Jack Vance

I'd never been published when I was young.

— Jack Vance

Then there was Clark Ashton Smith, who wrote for Weird Tales and who had a wild imagination. He wasn't a very talented…

— Jack Vance

Well, I think everything I've ever read contributes to the background from which I write.

— Jack Vance

I suspect that the word (art) was invented by second-rate intelligences to describe the incomprehensible activities of their betters.

— Jack Vance

“Only the fact of my broken limbs prevents me from leaping at your throat.”

— Jack Vance

It is useless, after all, to complain against inexorable reality.

— Jack Vance

You used the word "civilization", which means a set of abstractions, symbols, conventions. Experience tends to be vicarious; emotions are predigested and…

— Jack Vance

“Excellent; all is well. The 'everlasting tedium' exactly countervenes the 'immediate onset of death' and I am left only with the 'canker'…

— Jack Vance

“What great minds lie in the dust,” said Guyal in a low voice. “What gorgeous souls have vanished into the buried ages;…

— Jack Vance