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For all their restlessness, men are who they are; once they put on the man’s toga they will not change again; so they make a virtue of that rigidity and resist whatever might soften it and set them free.

Ursula K. Le Guin

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
What is the other text, the original? I have no answer. I suppose it is the source, the deep sea where ideas swim, and one catches them in nets of words and swings them shining into the boat… where in this metaphor they die and get canned and eaten in sandwiches.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Answer Canned Catch Eaten Metaphor Original Source Suppose Swing Word
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
But where I can get prickly and combative is, if I’m just called a sci-fi writer. I’m not. I’m a novelist and poet. Don’t shove me into your damn pigeonhole, where I don’t fit, because I’m all over.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Call Damm Novelist Over Pigeon Poet Prickly Writer
Capitalism’s grow-or-die imperative stands radically at odds with ecology’s imperative of interdependence and limit.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Capitalism Die Growth Imperative Interdependence Limit Odd Radical Stand
Safety lies in catering to the in-group. We are not all brave. All I would ask of writers who find it hard to question the universal validity of their personal opinions and affiliations is that they consider this:
URSULA K. LE GUIN

All Ask Brave Catering Group Lie Opinion Personal Question Safety Validity Writer
We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries-the realists of a larger reality.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Freedom Large Need Poet Realist Reality Remember Visionary Writer
Light is the left hand of darkness and darkness the right hand of light. Two are one, life and death, lying together like lovers in kemmer, like hands joined together, like the end and the way.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Darkness Death Hand Join Left Life Light Lover Lying Right Together Two
I don’t know if our life has a purpose and I don’t see that it matters. What does matter is that we’re a part. Like a thread in a cloth or a grass-blade in a field. It is and we are. What we do is like wind blowing on the grass.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Blow Field Grass Know Like Master Part Purpose Thread
First sentences are doors to worlds.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

First Sentence World
The mountains clench their great hands full of hidden fire. There are sharks in the sea, and there is cruelty in men’s eyes.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Clench Cruelty Dull Eye Fire Great Hand Hidden Men Mountain Sea Shark
Hardly anybody ever writes anything nice about introverts. Extroverts rule. This is rather odd when you realise that about nineteen writers out of twenty are introverts.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Anybody Anything Hardly Introvert Rule Write
The question is always the same with a dragon: will he talk with you or will he eat you?
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Always Dragon Eat Question Same Talk Will
What is life without incompatible realities?
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Incompatible Life Realities Without
Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art – the art of words.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Art Being Often Resistance Change Word
There’s a point, around the age of twenty, when you have to choose whether to be like everybody else the rest of your life, or to make a virtue of your peculiarities.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Age Around Choose Else Everybody Joint Life Make Rest Virtue Whether

For all their restlessness, men are who they are; once they put on the man’s toga they will not change again; so they make a virtue of that rigidity and resist whatever might soften it and set them free.

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For all their restlessness, men are who they are; once they put on the man’s toga they will not change again; so they make a virtue of that rigidity and resist whatever might soften it and set them free.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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