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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

Life–evolution–the whole universe of space/time, matter/energy–existence itself–is essentially change.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Energy Evolution Existence Itself Life Matter Time Whole
Writers know words are their way towards truth and freedom, and so they use them with care, with thought, with fear, with delight.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Delight Freedom Use Way Winter 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
Those who build walls are their own prisoners. I’m going to go fulfill my proper function in the social organism. I’m going to unbuild walls.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Build Own Prison Wall
Success is somebody else’s failure.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Else Failure Somebody Success
You are in the country where you make up the rules, the laws. You are both dictator and obedient populace. It is a country nobody has ever explored before. It is up to you to make the maps, to build the cities.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Build City Country Dictator Explore Map Obedient Populace Rule
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
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
The dance is always danced above the hollow place, above the terrible abyss.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Above Abyss Always Dance Hollow Place Terrible
The creative adult is the child who has survived.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Child Creative Adult Survive
Nobody who says, ‘I told you so’ has ever been, or will ever be, a hero.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Been Ever Hero Nobody Say Told
I had forgotten how much light there is in the world, till you gave it back to me.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Back Forgotten Give Light Much World
To the lives that haven’t been lived yet. That will be my gift back to the world that gave me the life I did live, the love I loved, the breath I breathed.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Back Breathed Gift Live Love Loved Yet
Men call women faithless, changeable, and though they say it in jealousy of their own ever-threatened sexual honor, there is some truth in it.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Call Chnagebale Ever Faithless Honor Jealous Men Sexual Some Threatened Through Truth Women
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
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
What is life without incompatible realities?
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Incompatible Life Realities Without
First sentences are doors to worlds.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

First Sentence World
There are no right answers to wrong questions.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Answer Question Right Wrong
I believe that all the best faculties of a mature human being exist in the child. . . that one of the most deeply human, and humane, of these faculties is the power of imagination.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Being Believe Child Exist Faculties Human Imagination Mature Power
We read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel… is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Book Essential Feel Find Guide Imaginary Ourselves Out People Real Think Understanding
By using words well they strengthen their souls. Story-tellers and poets spend their lives learning that skill and art of using words well. And their words make the souls of their readers stronger, brighter, deeper.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Brighter Deeper Reader Skill Soul Spend Story Teller Strength Well Word
What is the use trying to describe the flowing of a river at any one moment, and then at the next moment, and then at the next, and the next, and the next? You wear out. You say: There is a great river, and it flows through this land, and we have named it History.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Describe Flow Moment Next One River Try Use
Life goes on, even if two-headed and glowing faintly in the dark.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Dark Even Fainty Glow Goes Headed Life Two
A writer is a person who cares what words mean, what they say, how they say it… By using words well they strengthen their souls.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Care Mena Say Soul Strengthen Use Well Word Writer
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
Either we will establish an ecological society or society will go under for everyone, irrespective of his or her status.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Ecological Either Establish Everone Irrespective Society Status

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.

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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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