I used to read widely and profusely. These days I don’t have as much time for literature as I’d like, and mostly read fluff speculative fiction. I’ve been having fun with Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series lately – it’s mostly comedic fantasy (Pratchett has a wondrous sense of humor), but buried in the humor are some deep thoughts. I found this to be an interesting, and disturbing, quote:

“The Patrician took a sip of his beer. ‘I have told this to few people, gentlemen, and I suspect never will again, but 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 on to 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 in to 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.”

Excerpt From: Pratchett, Terry. “Unseen Academicals.” HarperCollins, 2009. iBooks.
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