“In fact, the mere act of opening the box will determine the state of thecat, although in this case there were three determinate states the catcould be in: these being Alive, Dead, and Bloody Furious.”

“Magrat wondered what it was like, spending your whole life doing something you didn’t want to do. Like being dead, she considered, only worse, the reason being, you were alive to suffer it.”

“Mere animals couldn’t possibly manage to act like this. You need to be a human being to be really stupid.”

“The mere fact you're delivering any will help, I'm sure," said Professor Pelc, smiling like a doctor telling a man not to worry, the disease is only fatal in 87 per cent of cases.”

“He was determined to discover the underlying logic behind the universe.Which was going to be hard, because there wasn't one.”

“Time and space were, from Death's point of view, merely things that he'd heard described. When it came to Death, they ticked the box marked Not Applicable. It might help to think of the universe as a rubber sheet, or perhaps not.”

“Broadly, therefore, the three even now lurching across the deserted planks of the Brass Bridge were dead drunk assassins and the men behind them were bent on inserting the significant comma.”