Terry Pratchett Quotes

As any old Taoist walking out of the woods can tell you, simple-minded does not necessarily mean stupid.

Things are NEVER what they seem, Pa, I thought. I used to think they were, but I was wrong or stupid or blind or something. Old folks are forever complaining about their failing eyesight, but I think your vision gets better as you get older. Mine surely was.

But clever people all make one mistake. They all think everyone else is stupid. And everyone isn't stupid. They just take a bit more time, that's all.

In most cases, people, even wicked people, are far more naive and simple-hearted than one generally assumes. And so are we.

The biggest misconception people have about me is that I'm stupid.

Everything is more complicated than it looks to most people.

There are people who say, 'Oh this guy is quite thick.' I think the reason is that, increasingly, I don't mind being simple in terms of literary expression. Others say, 'No, no, no. He went to Cambridge. He got a good degree. He must be Einstein.'

It would be a terrible mistake to go through life thinking that people are the sum total of what you see.

None of the people are what you think when you first meet them, who you think they are, and they turn out to be maybe something a little different.

It's funny how you can think you know someone pretty well, and then something happens or they do something that makes you understand that you didn't really know them at all.

I don't know if you've ever noticed this, but first impressions are often entirely wrong.

Misunderstanding is my cornerstone. It's everyone's, come to think of it. Illusions mistaken for truth are the pavement under our feet.

I don't want people running around saying Gwen Brooks's work is intellectual. That makes people think instantly about obscurity. It shouldn't have to mean that, but it often seems to.

I don't mind people thinking I'm stupid, but I don't want to give them any proof.

Assume nothing. Inside every dumb blond there may be a very smart brunette.

No, I don't think you understand just how stupid goblins are. Let me give you an example. One of the B'wa Kell generals, and this is their top fairy, was caught caught trying to pass off forged credit slips by signing his own name.

[He] may talk like an idiot, and look like an idiot, but don't let that fool you: he really is an idiot.

Don't assume I'm dumb because I wear a suit and tie.

You think you know someone. But mostly you just know what you want to know.

You think the shadow is the substance.

What a moron I was to think you were sweet and innocent, when it turns out you were actually college-educated the whole time!

If you aren't the woman I think you are, then this isn't the world I thought it was.

The world isn't what you think it is.

I think that, like anything, people take their image and what they want somebody else to be and then people just run with it. And when you really know the person and really love the person, you recognize that that person is nothing like that.

Modesty may make a fool seem a man of sense.