Ender Quotes

There's only one thing that will make them stop hating you. And that's being so good at what you do that they can't ignore you

If the other fellow can't tell you his story, you can never be sure he isn't trying to kill you.

It's the teachers, they're the enemy. They get us to fight each other, to hate each other.

Remember, the enemy's gate is down.

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

Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender.

Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender. The best you can do is choose to fill the roles given you by good people, by people who love you.

I have to win this now, and for all time, or I’ll fight it every day and it will get worse and worse.

So the whole war is because we can't talk to each other.

The world is always a democracy in times of flux, and the man with the best voice will win.

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.

Since when do you have to tell the enemy when he has won?

Human beings are free except when humanity needs them.

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.

because if you can’t kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and no one will ever save you.

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

What else should you be? Human beings didn't evolve brains in order to lie around on lakes. Killing's the first thing we learned. And a good thing we did, or we'd be dead, and the tigers would own the earth.

An enemy, Ender Wiggin," whispered the old man. "I am your enemy, the first one you've ever had who was smarter than you. There is no teacher but the enemy. No one but the enemy will tell you what the enemy is going to do. No one but the enemy will ever teach you how to destroy and conquer. Only the enemy shows you where you are weak. Only the enemy tells you where he is strong. And the rules of the game are what you can do to him and what you can stop him from doing to you. I am your enemy from now on. From now on I am your teacher.

There was no doubt now in Ender's mind. There was no help for him. Whatever he faced, now and forever, no one would save him from it. Peter might be scum, but Peter had been right, always right; the power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can't kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and no one will ever save you.

I've lived too long with pain. I won't know who I am without it

I'm one of those apocalyptics. From the start of my immigrant days, I've been fascinated by end-of-the-world stories, by outbreak narratives, and always wanted to set a world-ender on Hispaniola.

I've watched through his eyes, I've listened through his ears, and I tell you he's the one.

Ender's Game is set more than a century in the future and has nothing to do with political issues that did not exist when the book was written in 1984... It will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute.

"We've devoted our lives to learning about them!" Miro said. Ender stopped. "Not from them."

Human beings are free except when humanity needs them. Maybe humanity needs you. To do something. Maybe humanity needs me—to find out what you're good for. We might both do despicable things, Ender, but if humankind survives, then we were good tools.

Sometimes lies were more dependable than the truth.

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 think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves. And then, in that very moment when I love them.... I destroy them.

I will remember this, thought Ender, when I am defeated. To keep dignity, and give honor where it's due, so that defeat is not disgrace. And I hope I don't have to do it often.

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.

Prayer is surrender--surr ender to the will of God and cooperation with that will. If I throw out a boathook from the boat and catch hold of the shore and pull, do I pull the shore to me, or do I pull myself to the shore? Prayer is not pulling God to my will, but the aligning of my will to the will of God.

I think actors go along a continuum from Simon Callow down to kind of Ross Kemp, and I like to think of myself as the Ross Kemp of comedy. He's very good in 'East Enders' because he plays a version of himself. I think I can play a version of myself - that's about all I can do.

You want to beat Peter?" she asked "No," he answered "Beat the buggers. Then come home and see who notices Peter Wiggen anymore. Look him in the eye when all the world loves and reveres you. That'll be defeat in his eyes, Ender, thats how you win" "You don't understand" he said "Yes i do" "No you don't. I don't want to beat Peter" "Then what do you want?" "I want him to love me

He could see Bonzo's anger growing hot. Hot anger was bad. Ender's anger was cold, and he could use it. Bonzo's was hot, and so it used him.

I don't care if I pass your test, I don't care if I follow your rules. If you can cheat, so can I. I won't let you beat me unfairly - I'll beat you unfairly first. - Ender

the seed of doubt was there, and it stayed, and every now and then sent out a little root. It changed everything, to have that seed growing. It made Ender listen more carefully to what people meant, instead of what they said. It made him wise.

I don't care how much you eat, Ender, self-cannibalism won't get you out of this school.

When I was young, we thought that Oscar Wilde was a great nobleman who had thrown his life away for love. Nothing could be less true. He slept with East Enders who were procured for him by Lord Alfred Douglas. He knew them only 'in Braille' - the curtains were never drawn back in the rooms in Oxford where he met those boys. It was the most sordid life you can imagine. And he was bleating about love and dragging the fair name of Mr. Plato into the trial - after a life like that?

Ender stepped under the water and rinsed himself, took the sweat of combat and let it run down the drain. All gone, except they recycled it and we'll be drinking Bonzo's blood water in the morning. All the life gone out of it, but his blood just the same, his blood and my sweat, washed down in their stupidity or cruelty or whatever it was that made them let it happen.

New Year's Resolution: To tolerate fools more gladly, provided this does not encourage them to take up more of my time.

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

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.

nobody ever wrote to me saying"you know ender's game was a pretty good book, but you know what it really needs a n introduction!".....so be assured the novel stands on its own, and if you skip this intro and go straight to the story, i not only won't stand in your way i'll even agree with you!

Since I was a baby my goal was to be on TV because film was just impossible - you never got any Asian women in Western cinema. I grew up wanting to be in 'East-Enders' because film wasn't even a dream. The community were very much like, 'How can you want to act? It's such a low-class profession.

It's about me, or people wouldn't be so anxious to keep me from knowing about it. The absence of information is information. ~ Ender

Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.

He walked down the corridor, lined with his soldiers, who looked at him with love, with awe, with trust. Except Bean, who looked at him with anguish. Ender Wiggin was not larger than life, Bean knew. He was exactly life-sized, and so his larger-than-life burden was too much for him. And yet he was bearing it. So far.

Youth is when you're allowed to stay up late on New Year's Eve. Middle age is when you're forced to.

Ender Wiggin must believe that no matter what happens, no adult will ever, ever step in to help him in any way.

Ender understood more than she said. Manipulation of gravity was one thing; deception by the officers was another; but the most important message was this: the adults are the enemy, not the other armies. They do not tell us the truth.

Ender nodded. It was a lie, of course, that it wouldn’t hurt a bit. But since adults always said it when it was going to hurt, he could count on that statement as an accurate prediction of the future. Sometimes lies were more dependable than the truth.