Iain M. Banks Quotes

“The right place; that was what he was looking for. The right place. Place was all important, place meant everything. Take this rock…"Take you, rock," he said. He squinted at it.Ah yes, here we have the nasty big flat rock, sitting doing nothing, just amoral and dull, and it sits like an island in the polluted pool. The pool is a tiny lake on the little island, and the island is in a drowned crater. The crater is a volcanic crater, the volcano forms part of an island in a big inland sea. The inland sea is like a giant lake on a continent and the continent is like an island sitting in the seas of the planet. The planet is like an island on the sea of space within its system, and the system floats within the cluster, which is like an island in the sea of the galaxy, which is like an island in the archipelago of of its local group, which is an island within the universe; the universe is like an island floating in a sea of space in the Continua, and they float like islands in the Reality, and…But down through the Continua, the Universe, the Local Group, the Galaxy, the Cluster, the System, the Planet, the Continent, the Island, the Lake, the Island… the rock remained. AND THAT MEANT THE ROCK, THE CRAPPY AWFUL ROCK HERE WAS THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE, THE CONTINUA, THE WHOLE REALITY!”

“Thirty-five craters on the moon are named for Jesuit scientists and mathematicians. ”

“Judge Crater - please call your office.”

“The moon understands what it means to be human. Uncertain. Alone. Cratered by imperfections.”

“She wouldn't climb out of the bed for her sister, but she had climbed into a crater. She wouldn't cross a room, but she had crossed a continent.”

“I am planting a tree in this bomb crater to remind us that in the midst of death, there is life... and hope.”

“The truth of the matter was that I made myself disappear. I never liked being a Judge, so I just decided to start over. Sorry to inconvenience anyone.”

“For me at age 11, I had a pair of binoculars and looked up to the moon, and the moon wasn't just bigger, it was better. There were mountains and valleys and craters and shadows. And it came alive.”

“Son of a—Rora?” Blake slid out of the crater he’d just made in the wall. “Crap. What are you doing here?” He saw my wrist. “Handcuffs? I definitely want that story.”

“Lava oozed up from the centre of the crater like blood from a wound. As the flaming lava touched the water it hissed and groaned. She feared she would be boiled alive.”