71 Iconic Science Fiction Quotes

Science fiction has long been a canvas for exploring the boundless realms of imagination, offering us a glimpse into futuristic worlds, ethical dilemmas, and the intricacies of the human condition. Within its narratives lie powerful quotes that have transcended their fictional contexts to become iconic statements in their own right. These lines capture the essence of curiosity, caution, and wonder that define the genre. In this collection, we've gathered 71 of the most memorable and thought-provoking science fiction quotes, inviting you to journey through the words that continue to inspire dreamers and thinkers alike. Whether you're a lifelong aficionado or a newcomer eager to explore, these quotes will spark your imagination and ignite your passion for the extraordinary possibilities of science fiction.

1. “Blood makes lousy detergent.” - Lynda Williams

2. “..the happy hum of humanity.” - Arthur C. Clarke

3. “I have never listened to anyone who criticized my taste in space travel, sideshows or gorillas. When this occurs, I pack up my dinosaurs and leave the room.” - Ray Bradbury

4. “We all know interspecies romance is weird.” - Tim Burton

5. “I'll make my report as if I told a story, for I was taught as a child on my homeworld that Truth is a matter of the imagination.” - Ursula K. LeGuin

6. “Where was this written? I wondered. Where in the Talmud or the Koran or the Bible did it say, "Lo, and Satan fetcheth the coffee for the Antichrist and her minions"?” - Lyda Morehouse

7. “My doctor says that I have a malformed public-duty gland and a natural deficiency in moral fibre and that I am therefore excused from saving universes.” - Douglas Adams

8. “Resistance, however, is useless. (1939)” - A. E. Van Vogt

9. “Science fiction is the most important literature in the history of the world, because it's the history of ideas, the history of our civilization birthing itself. ...Science fiction is central to everything we've ever done, and people who make fun of science fiction writers don't know what they're talking about.” - Ray Bradbury

10. “One of the liberating effects of science fiction when I was a teenager was precisely its ability to tune me into all sorts of strange data and make me realize that I wasn’t as totally isolated in perceiving the world as being monstrous and crazy” - William Gibson

11. “Maybe none of this is about control. Maybe it really isn't about who can own whom, who can do what to whom and get away with it, even as far as death. Maybe it isn't about who can sit and who has to kneel or stand or lie down, legs spread open. Maybe it's about who can do what to whom and be forgiven for it. Never tell me it amounts to the same thing.” - Margaret Atwood

12. “Reality is shaped by the forces that destroy it.” - D. Harlan Wilson

13. “[Science fiction is] out in the mainstream now. You can tell by the way mainstream literary authors pillage SF while denying they're writing it!” - Terry Pratchett

14. “The will of God or the lunacy of man - it seemed to him that you could take your choice, if you wanted a good enough reason for most things. Or, alternatively (and he thought of it as he contemplated the small orderliness of the cabin against the window background of such frantic natural scenery), the will of man and the lunacy of God.” - James Hilton

15. “A merry little surge of electricity piped by automatic alarm from the mood organ beside his bed awakened Rick Deckard.” - Philip K. Dick

16. “Shadows and light deceived us, but sounds we followed true.” - David Bowles

17. “Those wanderers must have looked on Earth, circling safely in the narrow zone between fire and ice, and must have guessed that it was the favourite of the Sun's children.” - Arthur C. Clarke

18. “Let the Hunger Games Begin!” - Suzanne Collins

19. “The Mogadorian caught Number One in Malaysia, Number Two in England, And Number Three in Kenya. I am Number Four. I am next..." - I AM NUMBER FOUR” - Pittacus Lore

20. “Science fiction is a dialogue, a tennis match, in which the Idea is volleyed from one side of the net to the other. Ridiculous to say that someone 'stole' an idea: no, no, a thousand times no. The point is the volley, and how it's carried, and what statement is made by the answering 'statement.' In other words — if Burroughs initiates a time-gate and says it works randomly, and then Norton has time gates confounded with the Perilous Seat, the Siege Perilous of the Round Table, and locates it in a bar on a rainy night — do you see both the humor and the volley in the tennis match?” - C.J. Cherryh

21. “The sound came again. There was a whistle to it, and a moan. It was almost a hiss, and it could’ve been a strangled gasp. Above all, it was quiet, and it seemed to have no source. It whispered.” - Cherie Priest

22. “There are plenty of images of women in science fiction. There are hardly any women.” - Joanna Russ

23. “The future is unwritten. there are best case scenarios. There are worst-case scenarios. both of them are great fun to write about if you' re a science fiction novelist, but neither of them ever happens in the real world. What happens in the real world is always a sideways-case scenario. World-changing marvels to us, are only wallpaper to our children.” - Bruce Sterling

24. “RIDE A WHITE SWAN""Ride it on out like a bird in the skyway,Ride it on out like you were a bird,Fly it all out like an eagle in a sunbeam,Ride it all out like you were a bird.Wear a tall hat like the druid in the old daysWear a tall hat and a Tattooed gownRide a white swan like the people of the Beltane,Wear your hair long,babe,you can't go wrong.Catch a bright star and place it on your forehead,Say a few spells and baby,there you go,Take a black cat and sit it on your shoulder,And in the morning you'll know all you know.Wear a tall hat like the druid in the old daysWear a tall hat and a Tattooed gownRide a white swan like the people of the Beltane,Wear your hair long, babe ,you can't go wrong.Da di di da, da di di da” - Marc Bolan

25. “No, look, there's a blue box. It's bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. It can go anywhere in time and space and sometimes even where it's meant to go. And when it turns up, there's a bloke in it called The Doctor and there will be stuff wrong and he will do his best to sort it out and he will probably succeed 'cause he's awesome. Now sit down, shut up, and watch 'Blink'.” - Neil Gaiman

26. “...science fiction is something that could happen - but usually you wouldn't want it to. Fantasy is something that couldn't happen - though often you only wish that it could.” - Arthur C. Clarke

27. “I simply regard romantic comedies as a subgenre of sci-fi, in which the world created therein has different rules than my regular human world.” - Mindy Kaling

28. “Science fiction is the fiction of ideas. Ideas excite me, and as soon as I get excited, the adrenaline gets going and the next thing I know I’m borrowing energy from the ideas themselves. Science fiction is any idea that occurs in the head and doesn’t exist yet, but soon will, and will change everything for everybody, and nothing will ever be the same again. As soon as you have an idea that changes some small part of the world you are writing science fiction. It is always the art of the possible, never the impossible.” - Ray Bradbury

29. “My brother Keith begged to go with us as usual. He'll turn thirteen in a few days - August 14 - and the thought of waiting two more years until he's 15 must seem impossible to him. I understand. Waiting is terrible. Waiting to be older is worse than other kinds of waiting because there's nothing you can do to make it happen faster.” - Octavia Butler

30. “Hey, Wrobik; cheer up, yeah? You're going to shoot down a fucking starship. It'll be an experience.” - Iain M. Banks

31. “...They are merely scars, not mortal wounds and you must use them to propel you forward.” - Peter David

32. “A year here and he still dreamed of cyberspace, hope fading nightly. All the speed he took, all the turns he'd taken and the corners he cut in Night City, and he'd still see the matrix in his dreams, bright lattices of logic unfolding across that colourless void... The Sprawl was a long, strange way home now over the Pacific, and he was no Console Man, no cyberspace cowboy. Just another hustler, trying to make it through. But the dreams came on in the Japanese night like livewire voodoo, and he'd cry for it, cry in his sleep, and wake alone in the dark, curled in his capsule in some coffin hotel, hands clawed into the bedslab, temper foam bunched between his fingers, trying to reach the console that wasn't there.” - William Gibson

33. “Thomas jabbed a thumb over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows."You met our new friend?" Miho responded, a smirk flashing across his face. "Real piece of work, this guy. I gotta get me one of those shuck suits. Fancy stuff.""Am I awake?" Thomas asked."You're awake. Now eat—you look horrible. Almost as bad as Rat Man over there, reading his book.” - James Dashner

34. “Vibrations caused by powerful turbines stirred Kathy from a dream centered around a funeral. Her eyes flicked open, face dry, and she had no idea where she was. In her dream, she saw crystalline silver spiders again, weaving their way through the graveyard, leaving trails of silver webs over corpses, binding them for some unknown purpose in the cold dark earth.” - Michael Offutt

35. “Not all the magic of earth is benevolent.” - Alden Bell

36. “Eric, you need to look at the whole picture," the PM said. "You look at the jobless as a huge pile of scrap and you're looking for what can be recycled. That's good. That's your job. But what you don't realise is that this pile of scrap itself serves a purpose. I need my zeros, Eric. They put fear in people; fear of crime and terrorism. They are a stark reminder to the stakeholders that what they despise today, they may end up joining tomorrow. It keeps them obedient. Remember that!” - Mark Cantrell

37. “That’s when I notice Cheryl and Mickey cuddled up on the couch. She’s leaning on his shoulder, his arm around her, her leg across his lap. Cheryl throws glances at Kerry that say, “Look at me!” while Kerry shoots a “You go, girl!” smirk right back. I think of CK, how he and I often sat like that. Not because we were seconds from making out or wanted to look like a couple, but just out of a deep, platonic connection. My heart hits a higher notch on the ache-o-meter, my teeth sear into my bottom lip, and then something inside me snaps as cleanly as a crayon.” - Kea Alwang

38. “And so Discovery drove on toward Saturn, as often as not pulsating with the cool music of the harpsichord, the frozen thoughts of a brain that had been dust for twice a hundred years.” - Arthur C. Clarke

39. “La società di adesso non permette l'interpretazione della Verità ma fornisce la Verità” - antonio lo presti

40. “I’m going to see you now Papa… you better run...” - A.J. Vega

41. “For so long considered a second-rate category to other writing genres, Science Fiction should be allotted its true place in literature. The reason Science Fiction is so important is because SF authors create the future. They bring through ideas, technology, and new thought, put it all down in written and spoken word, and then send it out into mass consciousness. When enough people (a critical mass) think about and truly consider the plausibility of a concept, it becomes reality. Think William Gibson, who in 1982's "Burning Chrome" coined "cyberspace". Few grasped the concept at the time, but as the internet took hold in the 1990's, we not only had a word to describe our experience, we had a definition and an understanding, as well. Coincidence?” - Joseph Duda

42. “The revolution lasted six minutes and covered one hundred an twelve meters.” - Cordwainer Smith

43. “I was attracted to science fiction because it was so wide open. I was able to do anything and there were no walls to hem you in and there was no human condition that you were stopped from examining.” - Octavia E. Butler

44. “Fantasy is totally wide open; all you really have to do is follow the rules you've set. But if you're writing about science, you have to first learn what you're writing about.” - Octavia E. Butler

45. “It's a good day to do great things!” - Randy Lipnitzky

46. “Science fiction [is] the kind of writing that prepares us for the necessary mutations brought about in society from an ever changing technological world and as a result. The mainstream hasn’t excluded SF; the mainstream has excluded itself. No one told Jules Verne he was a science fiction writer, but he invented the 20th century.” - Walter Mosley

47. “This director could say many things about duty, and self-respect, and dignity, but she knew none of these meant much in the post-modern world.” - B. Barmanbek

48. “As one climbs up the ladders in society, one starts feeling more and more like an owner, less like a member of it.” - B. Barmanbek

49. “Books are keys that open many doors.” - James Rollins

50. “Rachel Henson stood facing him, immaculate in her uniform and ready for duty as always. She looked as though she had spent her whole life preparing for this very moment - she always did.” - Peter James West

51. “Reality is highly overrated.” - Roxanne Bland

52. “When you got captured, I didn't know..." He trailed off, had to chug whiskey before he could continue. "If it'd be like...""What?""Like it was with Clotile.""Oh, Jackson, no. I was okay. I'm unharmed.""Didn't know if I'd get there too late," he said with a shudder. Then he crossed over to me, until we stood toe-to-toe. "Evie, if you ever get taken from me again, you better know that I'll be coming for you." He cupped my face with a bloodstained hand. "So you stay the hell alive! You don't do like Clotile, you doan take that way out. You and me can get through anything, just give me a chance."--his voice broke lower "just give me a chance to get to you." He buried his face in my hair, inhaling deeply. "There is nothing that can happen to you that we can't get past."..."When you say we...?"He pulled back, gazing down at me, his eyes blazing. "I'm goan to lay it all out there for you. Laugh in my face--I don't care. But I'm goan to get this off my chest.""I won't laugh. I'm listening.""Evie, I've wanted you from the first time I saw you. Even when I hated you, I wanted you." He raked his fingers through his hair. "I got it bad, me." My heart felt like it'd stopped--so that I could hear him better."For as long as you've been looking down your nose at me, I've been craving you, an envie like I've never known.""I don't look down at you! I'm too busy looking up to you."..."The corners of his lips curled for an instant before he grew serious again. "You asked me if I had that phone with your pictures, if I'd looked at it. Damn right, I did! I saw you playing with a dog at the beach, and doing a crazy-ass flip off a high dive, and making faces for the camera. I learned about you"- his voice grew hoarse -"and I wanted more of you. To see you every day." With a humourless laugh, he admitted, "After the Flash, I was constantly sourcing ways to charge a goddamned phone--that would never make a call."I murmured, "I didn't know...I couldn't be sure.""It's you for me, peekon.” - Kresley Cole

53. “The Snow White the midnight the moon tales of the mechanics” - Marissa Meyer

54. “[Telzey] took out a pocket edition law library and sat down at the table. She clicked on the library's viewscreen, tapped the clearing and index buttons. Behind the screen, one of the multiple rows of pinhead tapes shifted slightly as the index was flicked into reading position.” - James H. Schmitz

55. “Well, don't stand about like that, man; if you're no use you're certainly no ornament. Bring that in and tell me what it says.” - Stephen Baxter

56. “Either I’ve got a wart on my nose they find curious, or I’ve grown a tail, Albie Merani muttered to himself. Just then he thought. I’d better get a move on, got work to do. He hurried across to some stairs, heading down deeper into station, then followed the signs to the pod station.” - Rw Rivers

57. “Everything was so much sharper without the Link fogging me--sights, sounds, smells. It was exhilarating and shocking and terrifying. I knew my emotions had grown too strong. They were dangerous to the Community. They were dangerous to me.But still, I wanted color. I wanted to soar with happiness even if it meant dealing with the weight of fear and guilt, too. I wanted to live. And that meant that I couldn't give the glitching up. At least not yet. Just a little bit longer.” - Heather Anastasiu

58. “Beyond the queues, the vacancy screens listed jobs in a multitude of languages. Invariably, they were low-paid and short-term dead-ends. Nearby, people in headphones sat at a bank of machines: the blind and the illiterate force-fed with ‘opportunities’ by soothing machine voices. On the far wall, in large print, a poster declared: BEGGARS CANNOT BE CHOOSERS.” - Mark Cantrell

59. “May the scribes record it.” - Wayne Gerard Trotman

60. “I tell you it's deadly when you start thinking your wife might be right.” - Isaac Asimov

61. “I couldn’t help but notice how hot he looked tonight with his strong build lining his t-shirt. He should never cover his beauty with clothes and such things. - Ariel” - Victoria H. Smith

62. “It's Halloween, you can tell everyone you're going as your favorite Steampunck character.""I don't even know what that is!""Because your generation has no taste in speculative science fiction.” - Girl vs Monster

63. “The art of fiction has not changed much since prehistoric times. The formula for telling a powerful story has remained the same: create a strong character, a person of great strengths, capable of deep emotions and decisive action. Give him a weakness. Set him in conflict with another powerful character -- or perhaps with nature. Let his exterior conflict be the mirror of the protagonist's own interior conflict, the clash of his desires, his own strength against his own weakness. And there you have a story. Whether it's Abraham offering his only son to God, or Paris bringing ruin to Troy over a woman, or Hamlet and Claudius playing their deadly game, Faust seeking the world's knowledge and power -- the stories that stand out in the minds of the reader are those whose characters are unforgettable.To show other worlds, to describe possible future societies and the problems lurking ahead, is not enough. The writer of science fiction must show how these worlds and these futures affect human beings. And something much more important: he must show how human beings can and do literally create these future worlds. For our future is largely in our own hands. It doesn't come blindly rolling out of the heavens; it is the joint product of the actions of billions of human beings. This is a point that's easily forgotten in the rush of headlines and the hectic badgering of everyday life. But it's a point that science fiction makes constantly: the future belongs to us -- whatever it is. We make it, our actions shape tomorrow. We have the brains and guts to build paradise (or at least try). Tragedy is when we fail, and the greatest crime of all is when we fail even to try.Thus science fiction stands as a bridge between science and art, between the engineers of technology and the poets of humanity.” - Ben Bova

64. “Will these millions of children, for generations upon future generations, know that some of their atoms cycled through this woman? [...] Will they feel what she felt in her life, will their memories have flickering strokes of her memories, will they recall that moment long ago when she stood by the window, guilt ridden and confused, and watched as the tadr bird circled the cistern? No, it is not possible. [...] But I will let them have their own brief glimpse of the Void, just at that moment they pass from living to dead, from animate to inanimate, from consciousness to that which has no consciousness. For a moment, they will understand infinity.” - Alan Lightman

65. “We do not stop. You all took the oath to come here. Hard work lies before us in breeding our new community. - Adrian” - Donna Galanti

66. “The finest SF comes to grips with life's mysteries, with our resentments against our own natures and our limited societies. It does so by asking basic questions in the artful, liberating way that is unique to this form of writing. Echoes of it are found in other forms of fiction - in the novel of ideas, in the historical novel, in the writings of the great philosophers and scientists; but the best SF does this all more searchingly, by taking what is in most people only a moment of wonder and rebellion against the arbitrariness of existence and making of it an art enriched by knowledge and possibility, expressing our deepest human longing to penetrate into the dark heart of the unknown.” - George Zebrowski

67. “It was the storm that would forever change the course of human destiny.” - Jeff W. Horton

68. “The obsession with correct political belief and expression in art is stultifying the genre as it is necessarily exclusive. We are losing our voice in artificial, forced homogeny posing as tolerance. Propaganda-disguised-as-story drives readers away as agenda takes the place of wonder, excitement, character. and conflict.” - Scott M. Roberts

69. “Since the war, we're the only intelligent species left in the universe, therefore we think everything in this universe has to conform to our paradigm of what makes sense. Do you have any idea how arrogant that view is and on how little of this universe we base it?” - Robert Buettner

70. “How typical of a machine to think it knows better.” - Vasileios Kalampakas

71. “Now our world is at the present time firmly in the grip of a mechanical monster, whose head - if you want to call it that - is the World Engineer's Complex. That monster is opposed to us and can keep all too good a tab on us through every purchase we make with our credit numbers, every time we use the public transportation or eat a meal or rent a place to live.” - Gordon R. Dickson