Home > Work > The Day of the Triffids
21 " The simple rely on a bolstering mass of maxim and precept, so do the timid, so do the mentally lazy – and so do all of us, more than we imagine. "
― John Wyndham , The Day of the Triffids
22 " There is an inability to sustain the tragic mood, a phoenix quality of the mind. It may be helpful or harmful, it is just a part of the will to survive—yet, also, it has made it possible for us to engage in one weakening war after another. But it is a necessary part of our mechanism that we should be able to cry only for a time over even an ocean of spilt milk—the spectacular must soon become the commonplace if life is to be supportable. Under a wide blue sky where a few clouds sailed like celestial icebergs the cities became a less oppressive memory, and the sense of living freshened us again like a clean wind. It does not, perhaps, excuse, but it does at least explain why from time to time I was surprised to find myself singing as I drove. "
23 " In temperate countries, where man had succeeded in putting most forms of nature save his own under a reasonable degree of restraint, the status of the triffid was thus made quite clear. But in the tropics, particularly in the dense forest areas, they quickly became a scourge. "
24 " It’s humiliating to be dependent, anyway, but it’s a still poorer pass to have no one to depend on. "
25 " And so the one in our garden continued its growth peacefully, as did thousands like it in neglected spots all over the world. It was some little time later that the first one picked up its roots and walked. "
26 " To deprive a gregarious creature of companionship is to maim it, to outrage its nature. The prisoner and the cenobite are aware that the herd exists beyond their exile; they are an aspect of it. But when the herd no longer exists, there is, for the herd creature, no longer entity. He is a part of no whole, a freak without a place. If he cannot hold onto his reason, then he is lost indeed: most utterly and most fearfully lost, so that he becomes no more than the twitch in the limb of a corpse. It "
27 " There is an inability to sustain the tragic mood, a phoenix quality of the mind. It may be helpful or harmful, it is just a part of the will to survive – yet, also, it has made it possible for us to engage in one weakening war after another. But it is a necessary part of our mechanism that we should be able to cry only for a time over even an ocean of spilt milk – the spectacular must soon become the commonplace if life is to be supportable. "
28 " There’s a whole lot of people don’t seem to understand that you have to talk to a man in his own language before he’ll take you seriously. If you talk tough and quote Shelley they think you’re cute, like a performing monkey or something, but they don’t pay any attention to what you say. You have to talk the kind of lingo they’re accustomed to taking seriously. And it works the other way too. Half the political intelligentsia who talk to a working audience don’t get the value of their stuff across—not so much because they’re over their audience’s heads, as because half the chaps are listening to the voice and not to the words, so they knock a big discount off what they do hear because it’s all a bit fancy, and not like ordinary, normal talk. "
29 " every day it was tomorrow that I’d be able to do it, and each day it became more difficult. "
30 " novelty is a wonderfully short-lived thing. "
31 " appreciating a private room. In a public ward the messy proceeding would have taken place a whole unnecessary hour "
32 " There were some cigarettes still in the case. I lit one, and started to get into the state of mind where, though everything was still undeniably queer, I could no longer understand why I had been quite so near panic. It "
33 " The leader does the planning, but he’s wise enough not to say so. As the changes become necessary, he slips them in as a concession – temporary, of course – to circumstances, but if he’s good, he’s slipping in the right bits for the ultimate shape. "
34 " All the old problems, the stale ones, both personal and general, had been solved by one mighty slash. "
35 " You know, one of the most shocking things about it is to realize how easily we have lost a world that seemed so safe and certain. "
36 " There they sit, with everyone thinking no more of them than they might of a pretty odd lot of cabbages, yet half the time they’re pattering and clattering away at one another. Why? What is it they patter about? That’s what I want to know.’ I "
37 " Only so few years ago,’ Josella said reflectively, ‘people were wailing about the way those bungalows were destroying the countryside. Now look at them.’ ‘The countryside is having its revenge, all right,’ I said. "
38 " There’s a whole lot of people don’t seem to understand that you have to talk to a man in his own language before he’ll take you seriously. "
39 " The thinking has to be done largely by people who are not directly productive—by people who appear to be living almost entirely on the work of others, but are, in fact, a long-term investment. Learning grew up in the cities, and in great institutions—it was the labor of the countryside that supported them. "
40 " You’d expect her to see reason,’ he muttered. ‘I don’t see why. Most of us don’t – we see habit. She’ll oppose any modification, reasonable or not, that conflicts with her previously trained feelings of what is right and polite – and be quite honestly convinced that she’s showing steadfast strength of character. "