The trouble with advice is that it's usually something you don't want to hear. Charles de Lint More Quotes by Charles de Lint More Quotes From Charles de Lint Sculptors, poets, painters, musicians-they're the traditional purveyors of Beauty. But it can as easily be created by a gardener, a farmer, a plumber, a careworker. Charles de Lint musicianpoetbeautiful She hoped he was running to his red deer woman, and that when he tapped on the door of her heart, she'd open it wide and let him in. Charles de Lint heartrunningdoors As the new work fills my notebooks, I've come to realize that the characters in my stories were so real because I really did want to get close to people, I really did want to know them. It was just easier to do it on paper, one step removed. Charles de Lint notebookrealcharacter One expected growth, change; without it, the world was less, the well of inspiration dried up, the muses fled. Charles de Lint growthinspirationworld I envy the music lovers hear. I see them walking hand in hand, standing close to each other in a queue at a theater or subway station, heads touching while they sit on a park bench, and I ache to hear the song that plays between them: The stirring chords of romance's first bloom, the stately airs that whisper between a couple long in love. You can see it in the way they look at each other... you can almost hear it. Almost, but not quite, because the music belongs to them and all you can have of it is a vague echo that rises up from the bittersweet murmur and shuffle of your own memories. Charles de Lint couplesongmemories Let me give you some advice: Try to approach things without preconceived ideas, without supposing you already know everything there is to know about them. Get that trick down and you'll be surprised at what's really all around you. Charles de Lint advicegivingideas There's more to life than just surviving . . . but . . . sometimes just surviving is all you get Charles de Lint survivingmore-to-lifesometimes An now the silences come in a single lifetime, in a single year... when species die, leaving a silent space in the world song that can never be filled. Charles de Lint spacesongyears "... he had understood, better than anyone ... the beauty that grew out of the simple knowledge that everything, no matter how small or large it might be, was a perfect example of what it was." Charles de Lint naturesimpleperfect In the dark attics of our minds, all times mingle. Charles de Lint minddarktime The moon likes secrets," Meran said. "And secret things. She lets mysteries bleed into her shadows and leaves us to ask whether they originated from otherworlds, or from our own imaginations. Charles de Lint moonimaginationsecret I'm not as trusting as people think I am. Sure, I see the best in people, but that doesn't mean it's really there. Charles de Lint meanpeoplethinking What I want to do is travel deep and deeper into the dreamlands, to find that place that I know is waiting for me here. My home. Charles de Lint waitingdreamhome I don't actually talk about my books much, because I find if I talk about them I don't want to write them anymore. I write to find out what happens. You know how you read a book? That's what I'm doing except I'm just doing it a lot slower because it takes a lot longer to do. Charles de Lint wantwritingbook My theory about writing is that one should write books you'd like to read, but no one else has written yet. So, as long as I stick with that, I'm entertaining myself, and then hopefully my readers as well. I hope to god I realize that I'm repeating myself, if I ever do. But if I don't, I'm sure my readers will let me know. Charles de Lint writinglongbook Often the magical elements in my books are standing in for elements of the real world, the small and magical-in-their-own-right sorts of things that we take for granted and no longer pay attention to, like the bonds of friendship that entwine our own lives with those of other people and places. Charles de Lint realbookpeople I've always believed the lies we use to make our fictions reveal the truth with far more honesty than any history or herstory or life story. Charles de Lint honestylyingfiction We're all made of stories. When they finally put us underground, the stories are what will go on. Not forever, perhaps, but for a time. It's a kind of immortality, I suppose, bounded by limits, it's true, but then so's everything. Charles de Lint goes-onstoriesforever I write on a computer, but I've run the complete gambit. When I was very young, I wrote with a ballpoint pen in school notebooks. Then I got pretentious and started writing with a dip pen on parchment (I wrote at least a novel-length poem that way). Moved on to a fountain pen. Then a typewriter, then an electric self-correct. Then someone gave me a word processor and I was amazed at being able to fit ten pages on one of those floppy discs. Charles de Lint notebookwritingrunning Fortune-telling doesn't reveal the future; it mirrors the present. It resonates against what your subconscious already knows and hauls it up out of the darkness so you can get a good look at it. Charles de Lint mirrorsdarknesslooks
