There is always a choice." "You mean I could choose certain death?" "A choice nevertheless, or perhaps an alternative. You see I believe in freedom. Not many people do, although they will of course protest otherwise. And no practical definition of freedom would be complete without the freedom to take the consequences. Indeed, it is the freedom upon which all the others are based.

That's the Ankh-Morpork instinct, Vimes thought. Run away, and then stop and see if anything interesting is going to happen to other people.

I've never really liked the Yanks. ... You can't trust people who pick up the ball all the time when they play football.

Look, he said to his imagination, if this is how you're going to behave, I shan't bring you again.

Seeing, contrary to popular wisdom, isn't believing. It's where belief stops, because it isn't needed any more.

First draft: let it run. Turn all the knobs up to 11. Second draft: hell. Cut it down and cut it into shape. Third draft: comb its nose and blow its hair. I usually find that most of the book will have handed itself to me on that first draft.

I don't think I've drunk enough beer to understand that.