Top 100 Ernest Cline Quotes
#1. Han will have that shield down,' " Aech quoted. " 'We've got to give him more time!'
Ernest Cline
#2. I was one of the boys who made passes at girls who wore glasses. Any girl who was smarter than me - that was a huge turn-on.
Ernest Cline
#3. Humans were still just a bunch of bipedal apes, divided into arbitrary tribes that were constantly at war over their ruined planet's dwindling natural resources.
Ernest Cline
#4. I'd spent my entire life overdosing on uncut escapism, willingly allowing fantasy to become my reality.
Ernest Cline
#5. And in addition to the credits, my avatar received an equal number of experience points for obtaining the coins.
Ernest Cline
#6. Then, on the evening of February 11, 2045, an avatar's name appeared at the top of the Scoreboard, for the whole world to see.
Ernest Cline
#7. Somebody set up us the bomb,' pal," he quoted. "Now it's time to take off every zig for great justice.
Ernest Cline
#8. I was just starting out, trying to become a screenwriter, and I became the Austin slam champion three times. For a nerdy, kind of a socially awkward guy, that did wonders for my self esteem.
Ernest Cline
#9. My Shoes. Black Chuck Taylor All Stars. They bestow their wearer with both speed and flight.
Ernest Cline
#10. You and the other Sux0rz can all go fuck a duck.
Ernest Cline
#11. I never wanted to return to the real world. Because the real world sucked. I
Ernest Cline
#12. You're evil, you know that?" I said.
She grinned and shook her head. "Chaotic Neutral, sugar.
Ernest Cline
#13. What if they're using videogames to train us to fight without us even knowing it? Like Mr. Miyagi in The Karate Kid, when he made Daniel-san paint his house, sand his deck, and wax all of his cars - he was training him and he didn't even realize it! Wax on, wax off - but on a global scale!
Ernest Cline
#14. Dagorath was a word in Sindarin, the Elvish language J. R. R. Tolkien had created for The Lord of the Rings.
Ernest Cline
#15. Since then, we'd used Street Fighter II to settle our disputes.
Ernest Cline
#16. For one quarter, Black Tiger lets me escape from my rotten existence for three glorious hours. Pretty good deal.
Ernest Cline
#18. Not only was this the first time a girl had ever given me her card, it was also, by far, the coolest contact card I had ever seen. "This is, by far, the coolest contact card I have ever seen," I said. "Thank you!" I
Ernest Cline
#19. The once-great country into which I'd been born now resembled its former self in name only. It didn't matter who was in charge. Those people were rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic and everyone knew it.
Ernest Cline
#20. Ernest Cline lives in Austin, Texas, where he devotes a large portion of his time to geeking out. This is his first novel.
Ernest Cline
#21. I was staring out the classroom window and daydreaming of adventure when I spotted the flying saucer.
Ernest Cline
#22. The Great Recession was now entering its third decade, and unemployment was still at a record high. Even the fast-food joints in my neighborhood had a two-year waiting list for job applicants.
Ernest Cline
#23. It's chick flick disguised as a sword-and-sorcery picture. The only genre film with less balls is probably ... freakin' Legend. Anyone who actually enjoys Ladyhawke is a bona fide USDA-choice pussy!
Ernest Cline
#24. Now I feel bad," Diehl said. "Like we're about to nuke Aquaman. Or the Little Mermaid. ... "
"Pretend they're Gungans," Cruz suggested. "And that we get to nuke Jar Jar.
Ernest Cline
#25. The ability to mute my peers was one of my favorite things about attending school online, and I took advantage of it almost daily. The best thing about it was that they could see that you'd muted them, and they couldn't do a damn thing about it.
Ernest Cline
#26. He died when he was only nineteen years old. I was still a baby at the time, so I didn't remember him. Growing up, I'd always told myself that was lucky. Because you can't miss someone you don't remember.
But the truth was, I did miss him.
Ernest Cline
#27. I'd designed my avatar's face and body to look, more or less, like my own. My avatar had a slightly smaller nose than me, and he was taller. And thinner. And more muscular. And he didn't have any teenage acne. But aside from these minor details, we looked more or less identical.
Ernest Cline
#28. I had spent hundreds of hours gazing out at the calm, conquered suburban landscape surrounding my school, silently yearning for the outbreak of a zombie apocalypse, a freak accident that would give me super powers, or perhaps the sudden appearance of a band of time-traveling kleptomaniac dwarves.
Ernest Cline
#29. Mr. Morrow, IOI owns this network ... " "Of course they do!" Morrow shouted gleefully. 'The own practically everything! Including you, pretty boy! I mean did they tattoo a UPC code on your ass when they hired you to sit there and spout their corporate propaganda?
Ernest Cline
#30. Og led us through the mansion's lavish front entrance. The lights were off inside, but instead of turning them on, Morrow took an honest-to-God torch off the wall and used it to illuminate our way.
Ernest Cline
#31. Anorak" was a nickname Halliday had been given by a female British exchange student at his high school.
Ernest Cline
#32. He often referred to Rush's three members - Neil Peart, Alex Lifeson, and Geddy Lee - as "the Holy Trinity" or "the Gods of the North.
Ernest Cline
#33. Ray seemed about to say something more when a boom shook the entire shuttle. I felt a rush of panic, thinking we'd just come under attack. Then I realized we'd just broken the sound barrier.
Ernest Cline
#34. Once the people of planet Earth are all hanging out together online in a virtual world without any borders, I think it could change social networking, entertainment and even politics.
Ernest Cline
#35. Knavery?" Art3mis said after she'd finished reading it. "Were you using a thesaurus when you wrote this?
Ernest Cline
#36. I never knew how to act or what to say, and when I did work up the courage to speak, I always seemed to say the wrong thing.
Ernest Cline
#37. Like any classic videogame, the Hunt had simply reached a new, more difficult level. A new level often required an entirely new strategy. I
Ernest Cline
#38. You'd be amazed how much research you can get done when you have no life whatsoever.
Ernest Cline
#39. I felt like a kid standing in the world's greatest video arcade without any quarters, unable to do anything but walk around and watch the other kids play.
Ernest Cline
#40. Mr. S was finally retiring this year, which was a good thing, because he appeared to have run out of shits to give sometime in the previous century.
Ernest Cline
#42. The clans began to bombard the outer force field with rockets, missiles, nukes, and harsh language.
Ernest Cline
#43. I'd programmed and dropped in a few back-to-back flicks starring Gamera, my favorite giant flying turtle.
Ernest Cline
#44. Dilettantes,' Art3mis said. 'It's their own fault for not knowing all the Schoolhouse Rock! lyrics by heart.
Ernest Cline
#45. You don't need to sell me on anything, Wade," she said. "You're my best friend. My favorite person." With
Ernest Cline
#46. Are you cocks arguing about Star Wars again?" he said, descending the steps and walking over to join the crowd around us. "That shit is so played out, yo.
Ernest Cline
#47. Nebraska," I said. "What's in Nebraska?" "A top-secret Earth Defense Alliance base.
Ernest Cline
#48. I'm incredibly nostalgic for the '80s, because I think that's when Geek Culture really kicked in to high gear.
Ernest Cline
#49. I've been invited to speak at about 20 colleges. There's always this moment when I'm having dinner with the college president: 'Ernie, where'd you go to school?'
Ernest Cline
#50. My mom once told me that my dad had given me an alliterative name, Wade Watts, because he thought it sounded like the secret identity of a superhero. Like Peter Parker or Clark Kent.
Ernest Cline
#51. About how we were all created by a super-powerful dude named God who lives up in the sky? Total bullshit. The whole God thing is actually an ancient fairy tale that people have been telling one another for thousands of years. We made it all up. Like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.
Ernest Cline
#52. Sir, the only problem is that you're a complete fucking moron," I said.
Ernest Cline
#53. I've wanted to own a DeLorean since I was 10 years old, but it always seemed like a silly daydream. Like owning the 'A-Team' van or something.
Ernest Cline
#54. Middle Earth. Vulcan. Pern. Arrakis. Magrathea. Discworld, Mid-World, Riverworld, Ringworld. Worlds upon worlds.
Ernest Cline
#55. We spread across the entire planet like an unstoppable virus.
Ernest Cline
#57. The rest of the trailer reeked of cat piss and abject poverty.
Ernest Cline
#58. realized that we already did know each other, as well as any two people could. We'd known each other for years, in the most intimate way possible. We'd connected on a purely mental level. I understood her, trusted her, and loved her as a dear friend.
Ernest Cline
#59. In the far reaches of the world, under a lost and lonely hill, lies the TOMB OF HORRORS. This labyrinthine crypt is filled with terrible traps, strange and ferocious monsters, rich and magical treasures, and somewhere within rests the evil DemiLich.
Ernest Cline
#60. 1977 - Star Wars is released on 5/25/77. Highest grossing movie in history. First wave of brainwashing in prep for invaders arrival?
Ernest Cline
#61. It's fucking lame, is what it is! The swords look like they were made out of tinfoil. And that soundtrack is epically lame. Full of synthesizers and shit. By the motherfucking Alan Parsons Project! Lame-o-rama! Beyond lame. Highlander II lame.
Ernest Cline
#62. I watched a lot of YouTube videos of cute geeky girls playing '80s cover tunes on ukuleles. Technically, this wasn't part of my research, but I had a serious cute-geeky-girls-playing-ukuleles fetish that I can neither explain nor defend.
Ernest Cline
#63. Cameron, Gilliam, Jackson, Fincher, Kubrick, Lucas, Spielberg, Del Toro, Tarantino. And, of course, Kevin Smith.
Ernest Cline
#64. I was 7 years old when the '80s began and 17 years old when they ended, so it was an incredibly formative decade for me.
Ernest Cline
#65. So I'm supposed to believe you're one of those mythical guys who only cares about a woman's personality, and not about the package it comes in?
Ernest Cline
#66. I've never really collected anything other than old Atari cartridges. I only had, like, 12 Atari games as a kid, so at some point in my 20s I decided I was going to own all of them.
Ernest Cline
#67. At the end of the day, I was still a virgin, all alone in a dark room, humping a lubed-up robot.
Ernest Cline
#68. My characters are all kind of geek archetypes of people I've encountered at gaming and comic book conventions.
Ernest Cline
#69. If there was a bright center to the universe, I was on the planet it was farthest from.
Ernest Cline
#70. I was watching a collection of vintage '80s cereal commercials when I paused to wonder why cereal manufacturers no longer included toy prizes inside every box. It was a tragedy, in my opinion. Another sign that civilization was going straight down the tubes.
Ernest Cline
#71. That's how you know you've mastered a videogame - when a bunch of butt-hurt crybabies start to accuse you of cheating in an effort to cope with the beatdown they've just suffered at your hands.
Ernest Cline
#72. I could barely believe myself. IOI had actually tried to kill me. To prevent me from winning a videogame contest. It was insane.
Ernest Cline
#73. no self-respecting extraterrestrial would ever pick my hometown of Beaverton, Oregon - aka Yawnsville, USA - as their point of first contact.
Ernest Cline
#74. The bastard even refused to watch E.T.! Who doesn't love E.T., I ask you?
Ernest Cline
#75. So now the polar ice caps are melting, sea levels are rising,
and the weather is all messed up. Plants and animals are dying off in record
numbers, and lots of people are starving and homeless. And we're still
fighting wars with each other, mostly over the few resources we have left.
Ernest Cline
#76. Lights, I said softly. This had become my favorite word over the past week. In my mind, it had become synonymous with freedom.
Ernest Cline
#77. Anyone smart enough to accomplish what they have should know better than to risk everything by talking to the vultures in the media.
Ernest Cline
#78. No weapons designer or engineer would build something with such an arbitrary weakness," he said. "The Disrupter is more like something a videogame developer would come up with, to create a big challenge at the end of a level - a boss that requires a huge sacrifice to destroy.
Ernest Cline
#79. It is on!" Aech shouted into his comlink. "it is on like Red Dawn!
Ernest Cline
#80. No one in the world gets what they want and that is beautiful.
Ernest Cline
#81. I didn't think anyone would anticipate this move, because it was so clearly insane.
Ernest Cline
#82. I was obsessed. I wouldn't quit. My grades suffered. I didn't care.
Ernest Cline
#83. Land of the Lost, Thundarr the Barbarian, He-Man, Schoolhouse Rock!, G.I. Joe - I knew them all. Because knowing is half the battle.
Ernest Cline
#84. The Europans were building an armada, just like the Sobrukai. But much closer to Earth. They had Foundry Ships orbiting their moon, cranking out fighters and drones - just like those I'd spotted above Sobrukai last night.
Ernest Cline
#85. I burned through all of my extra lives in a matter of minutes, and my two least-favorite words appeared on the screen: GAME OVER.
Ernest Cline
#86. This human understands enough to know when he's being messed with.
Ernest Cline
#87. I think it's a bit silly to brand the Internet as the 'downfall of youth.'
Ernest Cline
#88. For me, growing up as a human being on the planet Earth in the twenty-first century was a real kick in the teeth. Existentially speaking.
Ernest Cline
#89. If there were other civilizations out there, why would they ever want to make contact with humanity? If this was how we treated each other, how much kindness could we possibly show to some race of bug-eyed beings from beyond?
Ernest Cline
#90. I'd come to see my rig for what it was: an elaborate contraption for deceiving my senses, to allow me to live in a world that didn't exist. Each component of my rig was a bar in the cell where I had willingly imprisoned myself.
Ernest Cline
#91. I know that the future is scary at times. But there's just no escaping it.
Ernest Cline
#93. We lived in the Portland Avenue Stacks, a sprawling hive of discolored tin shoeboxes rusting on the shores of I-40, just west of Oklahoma City's decaying skyscraper core.
Ernest Cline
#94. The apple had fallen right next to the crazy tree.
Ernest Cline
#95. We told each other what movies we were currently watching and what books we were reading.
Ernest Cline
#96. Students weren't allowed to use their avatar names while they were at school. This was to prevent teachers from having to say ridiculous things like "Pimp_Grease, please pay attention!" or "BigWang69, would you stand up and give us your book report?
Ernest Cline
#97. All the intervening layers slipped away, and I lost myself in the game within the game.
Ernest Cline
#98. I dropped my backpack, shrugged off my coat, and hopped on the exercise bike. Charging the batteries was usually the only physical exercise I got each day.
Ernest Cline
#99. The OASIS lets you be whoever you want to be. That's why everyone is addicted to it.
Ernest Cline
#100. You're probably wondering what's going to happen to you. That's easy. The same thing is going to happen to you that has happened to every other human being who has ever lived. You're going to die. We all die. That's just how it is.
Ernest Cline
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