242 Quotes by Yevgeny Zamyatin

The moon climbed out of the ravine, blue, skinny, as if it had been fed on nothing but skimmed milk. It climbed out, and quickly slithered up and up along the finest thread-away from trouble, and on the very top it huddled, crouching on thin legs. ("The Protectress Of Sinners")

The moon hangs alien, heavy, like a lock on a door; the door is tightly shut. ("The North")

We have long become overgrown with calluses; we no longer hear people being killed. ("X")

I looked silently at her lips. All women are lips, all lips. Some are pink and firmly round: a ring, a tender guardrail from the whole world. And then there are these ones: a second ago they weren’t here, and just now — like a knife-slit — they are here, still dripping sweet blood.

The government (or humanity) would not permit capital punishment for one man, but they permitted the murder of millions a little at a time.

Our gods are here, below, with us---in the office, the kitchen, the workshop, the toilet; the gods have become like us. Ergo, we have become as gods.

Don't forget that we lawyers, we're a higher breed of intellect, and so it's our privilege to lie. It's as clear as day. Animals can't even imagine lying: if you were to find yourself among some wild islanders, they too would only speak the truth until they learned about European culture.

Cruel', O'Kelly laughed, 'it's cruel to tell children the truth. If anything convinces me of God's mercy, then it's his gift of making us unable to lie.

If human foolishness had been as carefully nurtured and cultivated as intelligence has been for centuries, perhaps it would have turned into something extremely precious.