In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him...

I need you to be clever, Bean. I need you to think of solutions to problems we haven't seen yet. I want you to try things that no one has ever tried because they're absolutely stupid.

Ender didn't like fighting. He didn't like Peter's kind, the strong against the weak, and he didn't like his own kind either, the smart against the stupid.

I think it's impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.

There are times when the world is rearranging itself, and at times like that, the right words can change the world.

Because never in my entire childhood did I feel like a child. I felt like a person all along―the same person that I am today.

If you try and lose then it isn't your fault. But if you don't try and we lose, then it's all your fault.

I taught you everything you know. But I didn't teach you everything I know.

Humanity does not ask us to be happy. It merely asks us to be brilliant on its behalf.

Perhaps it's impossible to wear an identity without becoming what you pretend to be.

Peter, you're twelve years old. I'm ten. They have a word for people our age. They call us children and they treat us like mice.

Pressure is an artist

Successful teaching rests both on a genuine and selfless concern for students and on the ability to convey to them a love of history.

God is not a cosmic bellboy for whom we can press a button to get things done.

A few alligators are naturally of the vicious type and inclined to resent it when you prod them with a stick. You can find out which ones these are by prodding them.

This life is your canvas

Why you don't wanna let him talk? You mad, you maaad, you maaaaad.

Viking women were able to rule kingdoms, divorce husbands, own land, and Vikings were very progressive in terms of the rights of women.

You can spin stories out of the ways people understand and misunderstand each other.

I'm a compulsive everything.

Each one of us has to take responsibility for reality, and present it so that kids will grow up familiar with that and say, OK. I've seen that before. I'm not afraid of it.