I was a very keen reader of science fiction, and during the time I was going to libraries, it was good, written by people who knew their science.
Interpretation
The quote reflects a deep appreciation for science fiction literature and its authors' knowledge of science.
In this quote, Terry Pratchett emphasizes the value of reading science fiction, noting how it was enriched by authors who possessed a strong understanding of scientific principles. This highlights the genre's potential to engage and educate readers by merging imaginative storytelling with factual knowledge.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of literature in education, one could quote Terry Pratchett to highlight the educational value of science fiction.
And then Jack chopped down what was the world's last beanstalk, adding murder and ecological terrorism to the theft, enticement, and trespass charges already mentioned, and all the giant's children didn't have a daddy anymore. But he got away with it and lived happily ever after, without so much as a guilty twinge about what he had done...which proves that you can be excused for just about anything if you are a hero, because no one asks inconvenient questions.
They've got something they do it with, I think it's called a mocracy, and it means everyone in the whole country can say who the new Tyrant is. One man ... one vet. ... Everyone has ... the vet. Except for women, of course. And children. And criminals. And slaves. And stupid people. And people of foreign extraction. And people disapproved of for, er, various reasons. And lots of other people. But everyone apart from them. It's a very enlightened civilization.
Geography is just physics slowed down, with a couple of trees stuck in it.
You can't trample infidels when you're a tortoise. I mean, all you could do is give them a meaningful look.
Any fool could be a witch with a runic knife, but it took skill to be one with an apple corer.
People look down on stuff like geography and meteorology, and not only because they're standing on one and being soaked by the other. They don't look quite like real science. But geography is only physics slowed down and with a few trees stuck on it, and meteorology is full of excitingly fashionable chaos and complexity. And summer isn't a time. It's a place as well. Summer is a moving creature and likes to go south for the winter.
August Wilson is the one writer that writes about men like my father, who had a fifth grade education, who was a janitor at McDonald's.
No one is born with skill. It is developed through exercise, through repetition, through a blend of learning and reflection that's both painstaking and rewarding. And it takes time.
He who opens a school door, closes a prison.
To learn anything other than the stuff you find in books, you need to be able to experiment, to make mistakes, to accept feedback, and to try again. It doesn't matter whether you are learning to ride a bike or starting a new career, the cycle of experiment, feedback, and new experiment is always there.
Reading is an exercise in empathy; an exercise in walking in someone else's shoes for a while.
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