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And though I came to forget or regret all I have ever done, yet would I remember that once I saw the dragons aloft on the wind at sunset above the western isles; and I would be content.

Ursula K. Le Guin

You have made it into a thing, to which the only possible relationship is a power relationship. And thus you have fatally impoverished your own reality.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Impronenish Made Possible Reality Relationship Thing
There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Great Societies Society Story Use Wheel
As a kitten does what all other kittens do, so a child wants to do what other children do, with a wanting that is as powerful as it is mindless. Since we human beings have to learn what we do, we have to start out that way, but human mindfulness begins where that wish to be the same leaves off.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Child Children Do Kitten Mindless Other Powerful Want
Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Artist Banality Evil Intellectual Interest Pain Refusal Terrible Treason
I never knew anybody . . . who found life simple. I think a life or a time looks simple when you leave out the details.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Evil Hard Hole Soul Take Unconsisting
You will die. You will not live forever. Nor will any man nor any thing. Nothing is immortal. But only to us is it given to know that we must die. And that is a great gift: the gift of selfhood. For we have only what we know we must lose, what we are willing to lose…
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Any Die Forever Given Immortal Live Man Nothing Thing
When the genuine myth rises into consciousness, that is always its message. You must change your life.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Always Change Consciousness Genuine Life Message Myth Rise
Listen.’ For being saved is not the point. Music saves nothing. Merciful, uncaring, it denies and breaks down all the shelters, the houses men build for themselves, that they may see the sky.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Break Build Down House Listen Nothing Point Save Sky Themselves Uncare
Take the tale in your teeth, then, and bite till the blood runs, hoping it’s not poison.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Blood Hope Poison Run Take Tale Teeth
The light is the left hand of darkness.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Darkness Hanf Left Light
I don’t think ‘science fiction’ is a very good name for it, but it’s the name that we’ve got. It is different from other kinds of writing, I suppose, so it deserves a name of its own.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Different Fiction Good Kind Name Science Think Write
Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art. Very often in our art, the art of words.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Art Being Change Human Poet Resist Word
No darkness lasts forever. And even there, there are stars.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Darkness Forever Last Star
Those who build walls are their own prisoners.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Build Own Prisoner Wall
To think that realistic fiction is by definition superior to imaginative fiction is to think imitation is superior to invention.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Fiction Frfinition Imagination Imitation Invention Realistic Superior Think
Children know perfectly well that unicorns aren’t real, but they also know that books about unicorns, if they are good books, are true books.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Book Children Good Perfectly Well Real True Unicorn

And though I came to forget or regret all I have ever done, yet would I remember that once I saw the dragons aloft on the wind at sunset above the western isles; and I would be content.

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And though I came to forget or regret all I have ever done, yet would I remember that once I saw the dragons aloft on the wind at sunset above the western isles; and I would be content.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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