Part of the particular interest and beauty of science fiction and fantasy: writer and reader collaborate in world-making. — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“Oh, Hank," Susan whispered, "their wings are furry." "Oh, James," Harriet whispered, "their hands are kind.” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
The question is always the same with a dragon: will he talk with you or will he eat you? — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“In this he saw that Ogion had been right: the shadow could not draw on his power, so long as he was… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“He had been trying to measure the distance between the earth and God.” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Fantasy is probably the oldest literary device for talking about reality. — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
I think what's happening is, it's all - fantasy, science fiction, ghosts, trolls, whatever - finally being called, being admitted to be… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“She couldn’t be a hero in the hero-tale sense. Not even in a fantasy? No. Because to me, fantasy isn’t wishful thinking,… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“Fantasy is nearer to poetry, to mysticism, and to insanity than naturalistic fiction is. It is a real wilderness, and those who… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Realism is a very sophisticated form of literature, a very grown-up one. And that may be its weakness. But fantasy seems to… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“For discipline is the channel in which our acts run strong and deep; where there is no direction, the deeds of men… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Dragons are more dangerous, and a good deal commoner, than bears. Fantasy is nearer to poetry, to mysticism, and to insanity than… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“They have no gods. They work magic, and think they are gods themselves. But they are not. And when they die, they… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“So rest a while, we can talk in the cool of the evening. Or the cool of the morning. There 's seldom… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“This was a great magic. Festin had no more performed it than has any man who in exile or danger longs for… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
As you see, I bear some resentment and some scars from the years of anti-genre bigotry. My own fiction, which moves freely… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Sci-fi uses the images that sf - starting with H.G. Wells - made familiar: space travel, aliens, galactic wars and federations, time… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“A lot of people still maintain genre prejudice. I still meet matrons who tell me kindly that their children enjoyed my books… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“The part of the tradition that I knew best was mostly written (or rewritten for children) in England and northern Europe. The… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“Have you never thought how danger must surround power as shadow does light? This sorcery is not a game we play for… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Fantasy is not antirational, but pararational; not realistic but surrealistic, a heightening of reality. In Freud's terminology, it employs primary not secondary… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
There are very real differences between science fiction and realistic fiction, between horror and fantasy, between romance and mystery. Differences in writing… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Fantasy is a literature particularly useful for embodying and examining the real difference between good and evil. In an America where our… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“I know that I am going to meet a personal variation on reality; a partial view of reality. But I know also… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
Those who dislike fantasy are very often equally bored or repelled by science. They don't like either hobbits, or quasars; they don't… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“For those who seek allegory, it must be maddening. (It must be allegory! Of course Frodo is Christ! - or is Gollum… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“Critics and academics have been trying for forty years to bury the greatest work of imaginative fiction in English. They ignore it,… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“I want to say to the literature teacher who remains wilfully, even boastfully ignorant of a major element of contemporary fiction: you… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“When asked to "define the difference between fantasy and science fiction," I mouth and mumble and always end up talking about the… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
For fantasy is true, of course. It isn't factual, but it is true. Children know that. Adults know it too, and that… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
“...I wore his blood for clothing, on my legs and thighs and hands: a dry, stiff, brown garment with no warmth in it.” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
Translation is entirely mysterious. Increasingly I have felt that the art of writing is itself translating, or more like translating than it is like… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“Aeneas' mother is a star?" "No; a goddess." I said cautiously, "Venus is the power that we invoke in spring, in the garden, when… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“Meaning - this is perhaps the common note, the bane I am seeking. What is the Meaning of this book, this event in the… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
For fantasy is true, of course. It isn't factual, but it is true. Children know that. Adults know it too, and that is precisely… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“. . . chronosophy does involve ethics. Because our sense of time involves our ability to separate cause and effect, means and end. The… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“If both you and your plane are on time, the airport is merely a diffuse, short, miserable prelude to the intense, long, miserable plane… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
Between thought and spoken word is a gap where intention can enter, the symbol be twisted aside, and the lie come to be. — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
I have no control over my writing. I have lots of good intentions, but no control. There's a story that wants to be told. — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“I did a lot today. That is, I did something. The only thing I have ever done. I pressed a button. It took the… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
To me the female principle is, or at least historically has been, basically anarchic. It values order without constraint, rule by custom not by… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“Hector had no virtue?” “Of course he did. He won all his battles, till the last one.” “We all do,” Aeneas remarked.” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“I was willing to believe him that most modern writing was trash, on the evidence that so much old writing was trash; but I… — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
“Can women operate as women in a male institution without becoming imitation men?” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share
