"I don't think I'm related to any apes," said the Senior Wrangler thoughtfully. "I mean, I'd know, wouldn't I? I'd get invited to their weddings and so on. My parents would have said something like, 'Don't worry about Uncle Charlie, he's supposed to smell like that,' wouldn't they?"

***

His mental approach to [management] could be visualized as a sort of business flowchart with, at the top, a circle entitled "Me, who does the telling," and connected below it by a line, a large circle entitled "Everyone else."

***

...although Ridcully was an impossible manager, the University was impossible to manage and so everything worked seamlessly.

***

Rincewind had always been happy to think of himself as a racist. The One Hundred Metres, the Mile, the Marathon -- he'd run them all.

***

Ponder: "Stay still, sir! A lot of reptiles can't see you if you don't move!"
Dean: "I can assure you, at the speed I intend nothing is going to see me..."
Ridcully: "Can't see things that don't move? You mean we just have to wait for it to walk into a tree?"

***

And he was pretty sure that there was no way you could get a cross between a human and a sheep. If there was, people would definitely have found out by now, especially in the more isolated rural districts.

***

It put the Senior Wrangler in mind of Mrs. Whitlow, although currently rocks, trees, clouds and coconuts also reminded him of Mrs. Whitlow.

***

God: "Thou Must Go From This Place Lest I Visit Thee With Boils!"
Ridcully: "Really? Most people would bring a bottle of wine."

***

Wrangler: "Mrs. Whitlow! How could we have forgotten her!"
Ridcully: "In your case, only by having a cold bath, Senior Wrangler."

***

"Can he do miracles, then?"
"I'm not sure. When we left they were talking about redesigning male babboons' behinds to make them more attractive."
"That'd be a miracle in my book, certainly."

***

"Is it true that your life passes before your eyes before you die?"
YES.
"Ghastly thought, really." Rincewind shuddered. "Oh, gods, I've just had another one. Suppose I am just about to die, and this is my whole life passing in front of my eyes?"
I THINK PERHAPS YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND. PEOPLE'S WHOLE LIVES DO PASS IN FRONT OF THEIR EYES BEFORE THEY DIE. THE PROCESS IS CALLED "LIVING."

***

Ridcully: "Are they sharks, do you think?"
Dean: "Could be tuna."
Wrangler: "How can you reliably tell the difference?"
Ponder: "You could count their teeth on the way down."

***

Ridcully flailed at a passing shark. "They won't attack you if you make a lot of noise and splash around," he said.
"I thought that's when they will attack you, sir," Ponder called out.
"Ah, an interesting practical experiment," said the Dean, craining to watch.

***

Although Rincewind had covered quite a lot of the disc in his life, most of his recollections were like that -- a blur. Not through forgetfulness, but because of speed.

***

The ability to ask questions like "Where am I and who is the 'I' that is asking?" is one of the things that distinguishes mankind from, say, cuttlefish.
[Footnote: Although of course it's not the most obvious thing and there are, in fact, some beguiling similarities, particularly the tendency to try to hide behind a big cloud of ink in difficult situations.]

***