Frasi di Jasper Fforde

“«Questo lo so» esclamò Landen «e ne sono del tutto d'accordo. Mi piacerebbe tanto capire perché ti sei tirata indietro. Dai la caccia a super criminali, all'OPS affronti rischi enormi, disubbidisci agli ordini per recuperare i tuoi compagni feriti sotto un intenso fuoco di artiglieria, eppure…»
«Ho capito. Non saprei. Probabilmente le decisioni su questioni di vita o di morte sono più facili da prendere perché sono radicali, bianco o nero. Le affronto meglio perché è più facile. Le emozioni umane, be'… sono un'infinita gradazione di grigi e io non mi trovo bene con le mezze tinte».”

“« -… sono andato nella Londra del 1610 e ho scoperto che Shakespeare era solo un attore con un secondo lavoro potenzialmente imbarazzante come ricettatore a Stratford. Nulla di strano che lo tenesse nascosto - lo farebbe chiunque.

-Chi li ha scritti allora? Bacon? Marlowe?

-No, è insorto un problemino. Vedi, nessuno ha mai sentito parlare di quelle opere, figuriamoci averle scritte.

Non capivo.

-Cosa vuoi dire? Non ci sono?

-Proprio così. Non esistono. Non sono mai state scritte. Né da lui, né da altri.

-Scusate- si intromise Landen, che ne aveva abbastanza -ma abbiamo visto il Riccardo III sei settimane fa.
-Certo- disse mio padre -Il tempo è scardinato alla grande. Naturalmente bisognava intervenire. Ho portato con me una copia delle opere complete e le ho date all'attore Shakespeare nel 1592 perché le distribuisse secondo uno schema preciso. Questo soddisfa la tua domanda? »”

“Visualizza qualcosa: un albatros, per esempio.
– Fatto.
– Okay, ora cancellalo.
– Fatto.
– Adesso cancella un altro albatros.
– Come faccio? Non ce ne sono più!
– Okay. Immagina allora che io ti abbia prestato un albatros per colmare il tuo deficit di uccelli marini. Quanti albatros hai, adesso?
– Nessuno.
– Benissimo. Adesso rilassati, e io mi riprendo il mio albatros.”

“…Negligible Senescence…”

“There's something rotten in the state of Denmark, and Hamlet says… it's payback time!”

“If the real world were a book, it would never find a publisher. Overlong, detailed to the point of distraction-and ultimately, without a major resolution.”

“Take no heed of her…. She reads a lot of books.”

“Whereas story is processed in the mind in a straightforward manner, poetry bypasses rational thought and goes straight to the limbic system and lights it up like a brushfire. It's the crack cocaine of the literary world.”

“Don't ever call me mad, Mycroft. I'm not mad. I'm just… well,, that's all.”

“Governments and fashions come and go but Jane Eyre is for all time.”

“Religion isn't the cause of wars, it's the excuse.”

“If it weren't for greed, intolerance, hate, passion and murder, you would have no works of art, no great buildings, no medical science, no Mozart, no Van Gough, no Muppets and no Louis Armstrong.”

“Books may look like nothing more than words on a page, but they are actually an infinitely complex imaginotransference technology that translates odd, inky squiggles into pictures inside your head.”

“Two minds with but a single thought, two hearts that beat as one.”

“Okay, this is the wisdom. First, time spent on reconnaissanse is never wasted. Second, almost anything can be improved with the addition of bacon. And finally, there is no problem on Earth that can't be ameliorated by a hot bath and a cup of tea.”

“Do I have to talk to insane people?"
"You're a librarian now. I'm afraid it's mandatory.”

“Sorry," [Hamlet] said, rubbing his temples. "I don't know what came over me. All of a sudden I had this overwhelming desire to talk for a very long time without actually doing anything.”

“Her majesty is one verb short of a sentence.”

“The cucumber and the tomato are both fruit; the avocado is a nut. To assist with the dietary requirements of vegetarians, on the first Tuesday of the month a chicken is officially a vegetable.”

“Dead. Never been that before. Not even once.”

“Growth purely for its own sake is the philosophy of cancer.”

“The safest course was actually the simplest-do nothing at all and hope everything turned out for the best. It wasn't a great plan, but it had the benefits of simplicity and a long tradition.”

“Mr. McGregor's a nasty piece of work, isn't he? Quite the Darth Vader of children's literature.”

“I'll tell you what love is" I said, "It is blind devotion, unquestioning self humiliation, utter submission, trust and belief against yourself and against the whole world, giving up your heart and soul to the smiter.”

“You'll like it here; everyone ismad.”

“Death doesn't care about personalities - he's more interested in meeting quotas.”

“the best lies to tell are the ones people want to believe”

“Literary detection and firearms don't really go hand in hand; pen mighter than the sword and so forth.”

“Reality TV was to me the worst form of entertainment--the modern equivalent of paying sixpence to watch lunatics howling at the wall down at the local madhouse.”

“For every expert there is an equal and opposite expert.”

“Prejudice is a product of ignorance that hides behind barriers of tradition.”

“…Tell me, has anything odd happened to you recently?
What do you mean, odd?'
Unusual. Deviating from the customary. Something outside the usual parameters of normalcy. An occurrence of unprecedented weird.”

“Fiction wouldn't be much fun without its fair share of scoundrels, and they have to live somewhere.”