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#pratchett often returns to this theme of ''what do you do when your god(s) fail you?''
andromeda3116 · 7 months
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"One day when I was a young boy on holiday in Uberwald, I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs. A very endearing sight, I'm sure you will agree, and even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half-submerged log. As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen: mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that's when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior."
--Lord Vetinari, Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett
#discworld#gnu terry pratchett#lord vetinari#havelock vetinari#discworld quotes#i love that philosophy and feel it in my gut and bones:#''if there is a higher power then it's our prerogative to be better than it''#like that quote from nation about the gods letting you down and how kneeling to them would be bowing to murderers and bullies#or the whole theme of small gods where the higher power needs to learn to care about the people he demands worship from#pratchett often returns to this theme of ''what do you do when your god(s) fail you?''#and having once felt like my god absolutely failed me - although i didn't have the words to see it like that at the time - that resonates#i've said before that that was such a revelation: those were the words of my last unanswered prayer#i have many intellectual reasons now to be an atheist but at the core it's...#if the universe is chaos then it cannot be cruel. there is no one who could have saved you but didn't for their own opaque reasons#if there is no god then no god failed me or left me drowning in despair for a whole year#small gods helped me conceptualize that in ways that defy words and literally changed my life and perspective for the better#anyway. this quote is magnificent. ''mother and child feasting upon mother and child''#and it makes so much of vetinari's character make so much sense#he looked at the world through cynical and bitter eyes but instead of becoming a nihilist who manipulated the cruel world for his own gain#he said ''we can and must be better than this''#(this is why i feel like kaz brekker - under inej's influence - should grow up to be like havelock vetinari)#(the one who clenches his fist and fucking *fixes* this goddamned place)
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