The Librarian had seen many weird things in his time, but that had to be the 57th strangest. [footnote: he had a tidy mind]
The Arch-chancellor's most important job, as the Bursar saw it, was to sign things, preferably, from the Bursar's point of view, without reading them first.
By and large, the only skill the alchemists of Ankh-Morpork had discovered so far was the ability to turn gold into less gold.
"Students?" barked the Arch-chancellor. "Yes, Master. You know? They're the thinner ones with the pale faces? Because we're a university? They come with the whole thing, like rats --"
"Idiot I may be, but tied up I ain't."
"Did I hear things, or can that little dog speak?" said Dibbler. "He says he can't," said Victor. Dibbler hesitated. "Well," he said, "I suppose he should know."
The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it's as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it all out yourself from the clues.
In retrospect, Victor was always a little unclear about those next few minutes. That's the way it goes. The moments that change your life are the ones that happen suddenly, like the one where you die.
