192 Quotes by Thomas Ligotti

Of course, the situation is hopeless for those who wish an alteration in affairs that by their very nature are fixed and define the world in which we are all chained.

As long as we deny a person or group the claim to be as right and as real as we are, so long may we hold this dreamlike claim for ourselves alone. And it is the duty of everyone to inculcate a sense of nothingness, an ache of being empty of substance and value, in those who are not emulations of them.

It all seemed so enticing, but like every other attraction along the world’s midway the greatest part of its appeal lay in those moments of anticipation. And after it was all over, the particular attraction which had once promised so much would send you on your way unrewarded, purged of your curiosity and the poorer for being so.

What Ascrobius sought,' the doctor explained, 'was not a remedy for his physical disease, not a cure in any usual sense of the word. What he sought was an absolute annulment, not only of his disease but of his entire existence. On rare occasions he even spoke to me', the doctor said, 'about the uncreation of his whole life.

He ceased to be a person so that he could remain a successful organism.

There is nothing like fear to complicate one's consciousness, inducing previously unknown levels of reflection

One by one all the regular staff stopped appearing for work, and their desks came to be occupied by new persons who always looked like fugitives from the great tribe of derelicts living in the Golden City, a shadow population that moved day and night through that yellowish haze.[...] Of course this manner of fiscal growth could not continue much longer and other measures would need to be taken if the company was truly to become a dominant force in the marketplace of this world or any other.

How can the disease be cured of itself?' you asked them. 'My body — a tumor that was once delivered from the body of another tumor, a lump of disease that is always boiling with its own disease. And my mind — another disease, the disease of a disease. Everywhere my mind sees the disease of other minds and other bodies, these other organisms that are only other diseases, an absolute nightmare of the organism.

No more worlds like this / No more days like that