I taught you everything you know. But I didn't teach you everything I know.

I think that most of us, anyway, read these stories that we know are not "true" because we're hungry for another kind of truth: the mythic truth about human nature in general, the particular truth about those life-communities that define our own identity, and the most specific truth of all: our own self-story. Fiction, because it is not about someone who lived in the real world, always has the possibility of being about oneself. --From the Introduction

We need a Napoleon. An Alexander. Except that Napoleon lost in the end, and Alexander flamed out and died young. We need a Julius Caesar, except that he made himself a dictator, and died for it.

Make friends. Be a leader. Kiss butts if you have to, but if the other guys despise you-you know what I mean?

He's not a killer. He just wins... Thoroughly

You're like, both like, Alexander the Great.' We can't both be Alexander.' Well sometimes I think you're two side of the same coin, and I'm the metal in between.

Ender understood more than she said. Manipulation of gravity was one thing; deception by the officers was another; but the most important message was this: the adults are the enemy, not the other armies. They do not tell us the truth.