“My sense of direction would be the death of me. Metaphorically, at least.”

“Without death, life would have no boundaries and our days would not be so precious. My mother was a firm believer in the common sense of nature.”

“Metaphors have a way of holding the most truth in the least space.”

“All fiction is metaphor. Science fiction is metaphor. What sets it apartfrom older forms of fiction seems to be its use of new metaphors, drawn fromcertain great dominants of our contemporary life -- science, all the sciences,and technology, and the relativistic and the historical outlook, among them.Space travel is one of these metaphors; so is an alternative society, analternative biology; the future is another. The future, in fiction, is ametaphor.A metaphor for what?If I could have said it non-metaphorically, I would not have written all thesewords, this novel; and Genly Ai would never have sat down at my desk and usedup my ink and typewriter ribbon in informing me, and you, rather solemnly,that the truth is a matter of the imagination.”

“My instincts told me that death would somehow be…different. But my rational mind reminded me that I had probably tempted fate one too many times. At least, I thought it was my rational mind. It sure seemed like the usual voice inside my head. Thank God there was only one of them.”

“In the face of such hopelessness as our eventual, unavoidable death, there is little sense in not at least trying to accomplish all of your wildest dreams in life.”