“Oh, Hank," Susan whispered, "their wings are furry." "Oh, James," Harriet whispered, "their hands are kind.” — Ursula K. Le Guin Copy Share Image
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
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
Fantasy is probably the oldest literary device for talking about reality. — 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
“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
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
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
“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
“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
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
“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
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
“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
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
“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
“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
“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
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
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
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 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
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
“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
“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
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
“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
“...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 Image
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 Image
“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 Image
“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 Image
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 Image
“. . . 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 Image
“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 Image
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 Image
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 Image
“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 Image
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 Image
