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As men have done to women, and class has done to class, and nation has done to nation – you may hate it or deify it; but in either case you have denied its spiritual equality and its human reality.

Ursula K. Le Guin

If it were proven that there is no God there would be no religion. …But also if it were proven that there is a God, there would be no religion.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

God No Proven Religion
To have a choice at all is to be privileged.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Choose Privilege
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
as a writer you are free. You are about the freest person that ever was. Your freedom is what you have bought with your solitude, your loneliness.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Bought Free Freedom Fresh Loneliness Solitude Writer
We controlled neither appetite nor violence; we did not adapt. We destroyed ourselves. But we destroyed the world first.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Adapt Appetite Control Destroy Fast Ourselves Violence World
I think hard times are coming. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries, the realists of a larger reality.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Come Hard Large Poet Realistic Reality Think Time Visionaries Writer
It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

End Good Journey Matters Towards
Only in silence the word, only in dark the light, only in dying life: bright the hawk’s flight on the empty sky.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Bright Die Empty Hawk Light Only Silence Sky Word
It doesn’t have to be plugged in, activated, or performed by a machine; all it needs is light, a human eye, and a human mind. It is not one of a kind, and it is not ephemeral. It lasts. It is reliable.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Activate Eye Human Last Light Machine Need One Perform Plug Reliable
Those who build walls are their own prisoners.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Build Own Prisoner Wall
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

Came Done Forgot Have Once Remember Saw Sunset Western Wind
The light is the left hand of darkness.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Darkness Hanf Left Light
The misogyny that shapes every aspect of our civilization is the institutionalized form of male fear and hatred of what they have denied and therefore cannot know, cannot share: that wild country, the being of women.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Aspect Civilization Denied Fear Form Institutionalize Know Male Misogyny Shape
No darkness lasts forever. And even there, there are stars.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Darkness Forever Last Star
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
While we read a novel, we are insane-bonkers. We believe in the existence of people who aren’t there, we hear their voices… Sanity returns (in most cases) when the book is closed.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Banker Believe Existence Hear Insane Novel People Raed Voice
The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp. The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Balck Mark Pulp Story Unread Word
Freedom is a heavy load, a great and strange burden for the spirit to undertake. It is not easy. It is not a gift given, but a choice made, and the choice may be a hard one.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Burden Choice Easy Freedom Gift Great Strange Hard heavy Load Made Spirit Undertake
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
A writer is a person who cares what words mean, what they say, how they say it.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Care Mean Person Say Winter Word
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
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
We can change our life, our being; no matter what our will is, we are changed. As the moon changes yet is one, so we are virgin, wife, mother, grandmother.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Change Grandmother Matter Moon Mother Virgin Wife
The worst walls are never the ones you find in your way. The worst walls are the ones you put there .
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Find never One Put Wall Way Wost
The book itself is a curious artifact, not showy in its technology but complex and extremely efficient: a really neat little device, compact, often very pleasant to look at and handle, that can last decades, even centuries.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Book Compact Complex Crucial Device Efficiency Extremely Itself Little Look Often Pleasant Shown Technology
We cannot demand that anyone try to attain justice and freedom who has not had a chance to imagine them as attainable.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Anyone Attain Attainable Chance Demand Freedom Imagine Justice
The dance is always danced above the hollow place, above the terrible abyss.
URSULA K. LE GUIN

Above Abyss Always Dance Hollow Place Terrible

As men have done to women, and class has done to class, and nation has done to nation – you may hate it or deify it; but in either case you have denied its spiritual equality and its human reality.

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As men have done to women, and class has done to class, and nation has done to nation – you may hate it or deify it; but in either case you have denied its spiritual equality and its human reality.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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