Guy Gavriel Kay Quotes

Every action we have is going to have repercussions in ways we could not anticipate.

History is often the tale of small moments—chance encounters or casual decisions or sheer coincidence—that seem of little consequence at the time, but somehow fuse with other small moments to produce something momentous, the proverbial flapping of a butterfly’s wings that triggers a hurricane.

Some of the greatest things, as I understand, they have come about by serendipity, the greatest discoveries.

You never know when you are doing something that is affecting someone.

My life is studded with a series of coincidences.

If I look back, I think most of the things I did - the films, the books, the collaborations with these magazines - were mostly by accident.

A small, seemingly inconsequential event can determine a life.

Unforeseen surprises are the rule in science, not the exception. Remember: Stuff happens.

Every step and every movement of the multitude, even in what are termed enlightened ages, are made with equal blindness to the future; and nations stumble upon establishments, which are indeed the result of human action, but not the execution of any human design.

I didn't foresee my career. Things happen.

I wouldn't change a single thing, because one change alters every moment that follows it.

There's always going to be the circumstances you can't plan for. There's always the unexpected relevance and the serendipity.

A very small cause which escapes our notice determines a considerable effect that we cannot fail to see, and then we say that the effect is due to chance.

There's no limit to how complicated things can get, on account of one thing always leading to another.

Unintended Consequences

Most of the things that have happened in my life have been pretty arbitrary. I walk into a room, and someone hits me with a two-by-four, and that changes my life. I'm not sure what I've learned from anything.

Things happen in weird, serendipitous ways.

Ramifications of small decisions can be pretty large.

He picked up the letter Q and hurled it into a distant privet bush where it hit a young rabbit. The rabbit hurtled off in terror and didn’t stop till it was set upon and eaten by a fox which choked on one of its bones and died on the bank of a stream which subsequently washed it away. During the following weeks Ford Perfect swallowed his pride and struck up a relationship with a girl who had been a personnel officer on Golgafrincham, and he was terribly upset when she suddenly passed away as a result of drinking water from a pool that had been polluted by the body of a dead fox.

If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can't know better until knowing better is useless.

The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

Actions can have unintended adverse consequences.

In world history man’s actions result in something quite different from what he purposes or intends.

The offhand decision of some commonplace mind high in office at a critical moment influences the course of events for hundreds of years.

One event makes another: what we anticipate seldom occurs; what we least expected generally happens; and time can only prove which is most for our advantage