Seth Grahame-Smith quotes:

But if you read Jane Austen, you know that she had a wicked sense of humor. Not only was she funny, but her early writing was very dark and had a gothic tone to it.

I think zombies have always been an easy metaphor for hard times. Because they're this big, faceless, brainless group of evil things that will work tirelessly to destroy you and think of nothing else.

Abraham Lincoln comes from nothing, has no education, no money, lives in the middle of nowhere on the frontier. And despite the fact that he suffers one tragedy and one setback after another, through sheer force of will, he becomes something extraordinary: not only the president but the person who almost single-handedly united the country.

I always say that the characters in Jane Austen's original books are rather like zombies because they live in this bubble of immense wealth and privilege and no matter what's going on around them they have a singular purpose to maintain their rank and to impress others.

So I grew up in a very book-friendly environment and my education as a writer was reading. I think that's the best education. Reading, and taking from the people I admired.

Some novels present a story form many points of view. Most movies tell only one person's side of the story. Sometime it's easy to use the strongest point of view, or find the character with the most dramatic experience. It depends on which themes the scriptwriter wants to explore.

It's absurd to think of 'Pride and Prejudice,' this classic, beloved book, beset with a zombie uprising. The goal is to make you suspend your disbelief enough to allow you to get lost in the story and believe what you're reading for a while.

Sometimes we see the Civil War in movies and imagine these neatly aligned rows of men with muskets, walking in line to shoot each other. In reality the things that fascinated me were how absolutely ruthless and violent so many engagements were, how much suffering and how men were not prepared.

Contrary to his infallibly "honest" image, Abe wasn't above lying so long as it served a noble purpose.

Most men have no purpose but to exist, Abraham; to pass quietly through history as minor characters upon a stage they cannot even see

My job on 'Dark Shadows' was to make it fun and funny, first and foremost. It can still be dark and it can still even be gory and gothic at times, but it also needed to be fun and it needed to be an experience that people would enjoy having.

I wrote one terrible manuscript after another for a decade and I guess they gradually got a little less terrible. But there were many, many unpublished short stories, abandoned screenplays and novels... a Library of Congress worth of awful literature.

I want to be judged harshly because that forces me to really sit down and focus.

If you're Stephen King and you have a massive body of huge-selling well-respected work, you can pivot and do whatever you want. I don't have that body of work, I don't have that audience that's comfortable with me enough yet to follow my bliss with me.

I've been a lifelong horror fan, but at the same time, I would say 90 percent of my reading is biographies and nonfiction history.

I've always enjoyed reading history, particularly presidential biographies.

If you write really good material, the rest just falls into place. There's really no trick to it.

There are so many stories to tell in the worlds of science fiction, the worlds of fantasy and horror that to confine yourself to even doing historical revisionist fiction, whatever you want to call it - mash-ups, gimmick lit, absurdist fiction - I don't know if I want to do that anymore.

The bottom half of the page had descended into a doodle of a tiny man giving the middle finger to a giant, angry eagle with razor-sharp talons. Beneath it, the caption: To Mock a Killing Bird.

If a novelist has created vivid characters, interesting relationships, settings the reader can easily imagine, and intriguing stories, a screenwriter has loads to work with. The challenge comes with deciding what to cut and what to keep.

I know of nobody that is coming, I am sure, unless Charlotte Lucas should happen to call in- and I am sure my dinners are good enough for her, since she is an unmarried woman of seven-and-twenty, and as such should expect little more than a crust of bread washed down with a cup of loneliness.

This is a most unfortunate affair, and will probably be much talked of. But we must stem the tide of idle chatter, and pour into our wounded bosoms the soothing balm of vengeance.

He begged to know to which of his fair cousins the excellency of its cookery was owing. Briefly forgetting her manners, Mary grabbed her fork and leapt from her chair onto the table. Lydia, who was seated nearest her, grabbed her ankle before she could dive at Mr. Collins and, presumably, stab him about the head and neck for such an insult.

Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins, and I will never see you again if you do; for I shall not have my best warrior resigned to the service of a man who is fatter than Buddha and duller than the edge of a learning sword.

Living men are bound by time... Thus, their lives have an urgency. This gives them ambition. Makes them choose those things that are most important, cling more tightly to that which they hold dear. Their lives have seasons, and rites of passage, and consequences. And ultimately, an end. But what of a life with no urgency? What then of ambition? What then of love?

Let us pray now for the future dead. Though we do not yet know their names, we know that there shall be far too many of them.

I have read of the great wars of ages past, and men slaughtered by the tens of thousands. And we give but fleeting consideration to their deaths, for it is our nature to banish such thoughts.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.

What an excellent father you have, girls!' said she, when the door was shut. 'Such joys are scarce since the good Lord saw fit to close the gates of Hell and doom the dead to walk amongst us.

These fools who haven't the slightest idea how to live the morals they espouse. These fools who proclaim themselves men of God, yet show not the slightest reverance to His word...Is it any different from a drunkard preaching temperance? A whore preaching modesty?

Of all the weapons she had commanded, Elizabeth knew the least of love; and of all the weapons in the world, love was the most dangerous.

An accomplished woman is one who has a thorough knowledge of music, singing, drawing, dancing and the modern languages; she must be well trained in the fighting styles of the Kyoto masters and the modern tactics and weaponry of Europe.

'Pride and Prejudice' - perhaps more than any other Jane Austen book - is engrained in our literary consciousness.

I'm a big, bombastic novelist and thrill-ride guy. I'm never going to win the National Book Award.

It was this weird confrontation of these two delicious flavors that got me consciously or subconsciously combining Lincoln and vampires as an observational in-joke with myself.

Movie characters rarely get to think out loud or talk very much about their emotions. Instead they have to, very briefly, show their feelings through their action or through dialog.

"Abe didn't say a word. He made straight for his journal and wrote down a single sentence. One that would radically alter the course of his life, and bring a fledgeling nation to the brink of collapse."¨I hereby resolve to kill every vampire in America.

Abraham," he said. "I'm pleased to see you alive, old friend." "And I to see you dead.

All I ask is that my final months be happy ones, and that I be permitted a husband who will see to my proper Christian beheading and burial.

America is thataway, Mr. Lincoln," laughed Davis, pointing north. "You're in Mississippi now.

And I like a mouse who has taken a cat for its tutor.

Any man who has seen the face of death knows better than to seek him out a second time.

But I am happy. And happiness, I have decided, is a noble ambition.

But there are others of my kind...those who see themselves as lions among sheep. As kings--superior to man in every way. Why, then, should they be confined to darkness? Why should they fear man?

Elizabeth lifted her skirt, disregarding modesty, and delivered a swift kick to the creature's head.

Elizabeth sheathed her sword, knelt behind him, and strangled him to death with his own large bowel.

Elizabeth, having rather expected to affront him, was amazed at his gallantry; and Darcy had never been so bewitched by any woman as he was by her. He really believed, that were it not for the inferiority of her connections, he should be in some danger of falling in love, and were it not for his considerable skill in the deadly arts, that he should be in danger of being bested by hers--for never had he seen a lady more gifted in the ways of vanquishing the undead.

Father may have been wanting in some things, but here he was masterful. Night upon night, I marveled at his power to hold listeners in rapt attention. He could tell a story with such detail, such flourish, that afterwards a man could swear it had been his own memory, and not a tale at all.

Her only fault is that she lacks sense enough to avoid falling in love with such a fool as I!

However, it has long been said that "my enemy's enemy is my friend.

Hug your children...Kiss your mothers and fathers, your brothers and sisters. Tell them how much you love them, every day. Because every day is the last day. Every light casts a shadow. And only the gods know when the darkness will find us.

I dare say she means to keep you from his attentions. Your honour demands she be slain.

I decided that it was more important to laugh than to eat.

I fear that a life of death has made me numb to both.

I feel like the luckiest guy on the planet. But, I literally work all day, every day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, and that's not an exaggeration.

I feel rather like a rabbit that has taken a fox for its pupil.

I hereby resolve to kill every vampire in America.

I leave you, hoping that the lamp of liberty will burn in your bosoms until there shall no longer be a doubt that all mean are created free and equal.

I like my zombies slow and I like my zombies stupid.

I nearly broke out laughing when the wrteched soothsayer warned Caesar: "Beware the Ides of April." I thought it a miracle (and a relief) that no one in the udience had snickered or yelled out a correction. How could such an error be made by an actor? Had my ears deceived me?

I think any period in history can be adapted into interesting fiction, as long as you approach the actual history with respect.

I would much prefer their minds to be engaged in the deadly arts than clouded with dreams of marriage and fortune, as your own so clearly is!

I wouldn't back away from what's right just because it's hard.

If a movie has more characters than an audience can keep track of, the audience will get confused and lose interest in the story.

It was a really strange and unique sort of process for me to adapt my own book.

Miss Bennet, I am quite aware of your superior talent for cutting down the Lord's forsaken flock. I merely mean to spare your gown.' Thank you,' said Elizabeth, composing herself, 'but I should rather my gown be soiled than my honor.

My day job is making TV shows.

My sisters and I cannot spend any substantial time searching for Wickham, as we are each commanded by His Majesty to defend Hertfordshire from all enemies until such time as we are dead, rendered lame, or married.

No ninjas! How was that possible? Five daughters brought up at home without any ninjas! I never heard of such a thing. Your mother must have been quite a slave to your safety.

Of all the weapons in the world, love is the most dangerous.

On the contrary, there is something pleasing about his mouth when he speaks. And there is something of dignity in the way his trousers cling to those most English parts of him.

Pride and Prejudice' - perhaps more than any other Jane Austen book - is engrained in our literary consciousness.

put the car in "d" set the compass to "n" and get the "f"out of there

Real power comes not from hate, but from truth.

So I suggest you stick close, pay attention, and avoid breaking the Terrorverse's only commandment: Thou shall not be stupid.

So long as this country is cursed with slavery, so too will it be cursed with vampires.

Some people say "if we split up,we can cover more ground"-with blood

Surely life has taught you that a thing can be both beautiful and vile.

Thank you, sir, but I am perfectly content being the bride of death.

The business of Mr. Bennett's life was to keep his daughters alive. The business of Mrs. Bennett's was to get them married.

The day Henry made a choice... that some men are just too interesting to die.

The more precious His gift, the more anxious God for its return.

The true roll in determing to embrace or reject anything is not whether it have any evil in it but whether it have more of evil than of good. There are few things wholly evil or wholly good.

There are but two types of men who desire war: those who haven't the slightest intention of fighting it themselves, and those who haven't the slightest idea what it is. " Any man who has seen the face of death knows better than to seek him out a second time.

We may all deserve hell, but some of us deserve it sooner than others.

We pore through libraries, dissecting the classics" Henry Sturges- vampire

What makes a good book and what makes a good movie are totally different things.

Without death,' he answered, 'life is meaningless. It is a story that can never be told. A song that can never be sung. For how would one finish it?

Your quarrel is with God. I merely wish to offer Him the opportunity to judge you.