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50,000 Monkeys at 50,000 Typewriters Can't Be Wrong

Quote of the day

  • Books

"Some books contain the machinery required to create and sustain universes."
–Tycho, at Penny Arcade

Yeah, let that roll around in your head for a little bit. It’s really as simple and beautiful as that, isn’t it?

I see a bookshelf, filled with different books from different authors, all acting as portals to different worlds and different times. The author may give them birth, but it’s the readers who keep them alive.

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6 March, 2008 Wil

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Wil says . . . → ← in a galaxy far, far away

20 thoughts on “Quote of the day”

  1. camias designs says:
    6 March, 2008 at 2:14 pm

    And that, in itself, what you wrote, is just as deep as the quote. See, Wil…you gots the tools, man.
    And I’m a poet and didn’t know it.

  2. lindsay says:
    6 March, 2008 at 3:03 pm

    Hmm… Postnasal Philosophising!!
    Should be more of it.
    The mind and the imagination of the mind is an amazing universe in itself.

  3. Wes F in Cincinnati says:
    6 March, 2008 at 3:38 pm

    The author may give them birth, but it’s the readers who keep them alive.
    I like that. And if you really think like that (a good way to think), you’d enjoy the Thursday Next series of books by Jasper Fforde. Trust me on this one.
    WF

  4. LameLefty says:
    6 March, 2008 at 3:56 pm

    That’s the entire premise of Heilein’s Number of the Beast.

  5. head.fairy says:
    6 March, 2008 at 4:06 pm

    Dude.

  6. merindab says:
    6 March, 2008 at 4:59 pm

    Beautiful. This is going into my “inspiration” bookmarks.

  7. Celtic Mama says:
    6 March, 2008 at 5:27 pm

    So true! There are some books that I read over and over again just to go back into the universe it created. JRRT and Marion Zimmer Bradley gave me some awesome universes to explore.

  8. jdifran says:
    6 March, 2008 at 5:51 pm

    And the most important of these is called the Dungeon Master’s Guide.

  9. SnowBear says:
    6 March, 2008 at 7:04 pm

    I believe Atrus called them Linking Books on Myst . . . 😉

  10. Loopdilou says:
    6 March, 2008 at 9:26 pm

    Oh! Your children are older, but I have two girls ages (almost 6) and 7 who are big fans of The Magic Treehouse series by Mary Pope Osborne which is all about books which are literal portals to other worlds! The funnest twist is who made the books (hint: think Arthurian legends – but not the obvious guess).
    Ok, so maybe *I* like them more than my kids do.. but I’m a sucker for childrens’ fantasy stories.
    Anyway, I can’t recommend them highly enough to other people with early readers. If nothing else, it’s a great way to teach about thematic metaphor 🙂

  11. eleventeen says:
    6 March, 2008 at 9:30 pm

    I read that earlier on PA and it rang a deep chord of truth somewhere deep.

  12. FABIAN says:
    6 March, 2008 at 9:30 pm

    Wil,
    So many great books and not enough time to read them all. So many great movies and not enough time to enjoy them all. So many great songs and not enough time to hear them all. I could go on and on. From a geological point of view we just do not live long enough.
    FG

  13. Mconley says:
    6 March, 2008 at 11:33 pm

    Sorry to go OT here but I have to ask Wil, if you got my email regarding my purchase of HDouL where paypal chose the wrong delivery address for me? It would be a shame if you sent the book to the wrong guy 😉

  14. Celtic Mama says:
    7 March, 2008 at 5:54 am

    Loopdilou, my kids LOVE those books. In fact, their school requires Afternoon on the Amazon for summer reading going in to 3rd grade. My 1st grader is in a reading group at lunch with her teacher and they are reading the whole series. I’m a sucker for Arthurian legends, so the Morgan Le Fay angle really made me get my kids into them. My 11 year old loved them when he was younger. Especially the ones with Merlin.

  15. gbina says:
    7 March, 2008 at 7:29 am

    Did you see xkcd today? Pretty good. 🙂

  16. Cinexploits says:
    7 March, 2008 at 8:26 am

    And some of those books with their machinery and story engines…
    Start the engines in other authors.

  17. Alicia says:
    7 March, 2008 at 8:38 am

    Right on, Wil. My hubby is a very intelligent man, but just doesn’t like reading. I’ll never understand that… I love losing myself in a good book, as does my sister. Celtic Mama- JRRT for sure! 🙂 Haven’t read these in a while, but I also loved the series by Madeleine L’Engle that begins with A Wrinkle In Time. Anybody else? They made a TV movie about it a few years ago- it was *horrible*. If you saw that, but didn’t read the book, forget what you saw and go read.
    -Alicia
    [email protected]
    http://www.thewagband.com

  18. Glenn Curry says:
    7 March, 2008 at 9:49 am

    To Wil,
    Off topic, but important.
    I finally am going to Creaion Vegas con. I know its a con you regulalrly show up at. PLEASE say you’re returning this year.

  19. housecat4ever says:
    7 March, 2008 at 10:34 pm

    have you ever read Derrida or deMan? We’re going through poststructuralism/ deconstruction, and that is a very poststructuralist quote. What’s really fun is to apply that stuff to law– por ejemplo, constitutional interpretation.

  20. scionofgrace says:
    12 March, 2008 at 6:59 pm

    You’re right, that’s a truth beautifully put.
    Have you read Tolkien’s essay “On Fairy Stories”?

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