A philosopher/mathematician named Bertrand Russell who lived and died in the same century as Gass once wrote: Language serves not only to express thought but to make possible thoughts which could not...
—Can we stop them? Kassad was panting, pouring sweat, and literally quivering from excitement. —
Tourists smelling of UV lotion and cannabis.
That winter was colder’n a crib full of witch’s tits,
Any allegiance to a deity or concept or universal principle which put obedience above decent behavior toward an innocent human being was evil. —
To be a is to become God.I tried to explain this to my friends on Heaven's Gate. 'Piss, shit,' I said. 'Asshole motherfucker, goddamn shit goddamn. Cunt. Pee-pee cunt. Goddamn!'They shook their heads...
This is poetry. You’re writing about Heaven’s Gate and the Caribou Herd, but what comes across is loneliness, displacement, angst, and a cynical look at humanity.
This is every writer's nightmare--the sudden breakdown of meaning in the language that sustains and supports us...
The essence of honor lay in the moment of combat between equals.
The Ice Master was too injured and too exhausted to crawl any farther. Let whatever was going to happen to him happen now and may a Sailor's God fuck to Hell this fucking thing that was going to eat h...
The Hegemony had known how to treat cancer, but most of the gene-tailoring knowledge and technology had been lost after the Fall.
The Hegemony and its relationship with the Ousters aren’t my worry now. I sincerely wish a plague on both their houses.To the extent that humanity suffers?I don’t know humanity, said the Consul in an...
Spenser Reynolds was a bit shorter than Web average, but far handsomer. His hair was curled but cropped short, his skin appeared bronzed by a benevolent sun and slightly gilded with subtle body paint,...
Space battles in movies and holies had always bored me, but watching the real thing held a certain fascination: rather like seeing live coverage of a series of traffic accidents. Actually, the product...
Sometimes there is no hope, whispered Das. There's always some hope, Mr. Das. No, Mr. Luczak, there is not. Sometimes there is only pain. And acquiescence to pain. And, perhaps, defiance at the world...
Sometimes there is a thin line separating orthodox zeal from apostasy,' said Father Lenar Hoyt
Sol! Take your daughter, your only daughter Rachel, Whom you love, and go to the world called Hyperion and offer her there as a burnt offering at one of the places of which I shall tell you. Sol hesit...
Sol remembered the dream, remembered his daughter’s hug, and realized that in the end—when all else is dust—loyalty to those we love is all we can carry with us to the grave. Faith—true faith—was trus...
Religion and ethics were not always—or even frequently—mutually compatible. The demands of religious absolutism or fundamentalism or rampaging relativism often reflected the worst aspects of contempor...
PAHA SAPA PULLS HIS HAND BACK SHARPLY BUT NOT BEFORE HE feels the rattlesnake-strike shock of the dying Wasicun’s ghost leaping into his fingers and flowing up his arm and into his chest. The boy lurc...