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 More Quotes by Ursula K. Le Guin More Quotes From Ursula K. Le Guin Grieving, like being blind, is a strange business; you have to learn how to do it. We seek company in mourning, but after the early bursts of tears, after the praises have been spoken, and the good days remembered, and the lament cried, and the grave closed, there is no company in grief. It is a burden borne alone. Ursula K. Le Guin good-daygriefgrieving To see a candle's light one must take it into a dark place. Ursula K. Le Guin lightdarkinspirational The Earth is beautiful, and bright, and kindly, but that is not all. The Earth is also terrible, and dark, and cruel. Ursula K. Le Guin earthdarkbeautiful It was easy to share when there was enough, even barely enough, to go round. But when there was not enough? Then force entered in; might making right; power, and its tool, violence, and its most devoted ally, the averted eye. Ursula K. Le Guin allieseyetools But you must not change one thing, one pebble, one grain of sand, until you know what good and evil will follow on that act. The world is in balance, in Equilibrium. A wizard's power of Changing and Summoning can shake the balance of the world. It is dangerous, that power...It must follow knowledge, and serve need. Ursula K. Le Guin balanceevilneeds The borderline between prose and poetry is one of those fog-shrouded literary minefields where the wary explorer gets blown to bits before ever seeing anything clearly. It is full of barbed wire and the stumps of dead opinions. Ursula K. Le Guin prose-and-poetrywirefog Sometimes one's very angry and preaches, but I know that to clinch a point is to close it. To leave the reader free to decide what your work means, that's the real art; it makes the work inexhaustible. Ursula K. Le Guin realmeanart To see a candle's light, one must take it into a dark place. This is the same as to see the good and be grateful, one must compare and contrast it with something worse - not better! Ursula K. Le Guin gratitudegratefuldark He had grown up in a country run by politicians who sent the pilots to man the bombers to kill the babies to make the world safer for children to grow up in. Ursula K. Le Guin runningbabycountry Part of the particular interest and beauty of science fiction and fantasy: writer and reader collaborate in world-making. Ursula K. Le Guin empathyapathyfiction True myths may serve for thousands of years as an inexhaustible source of intellectual speculation, religious joy, ethical inquiry, and artistic renewal. The real mystery is not destroyed by reason. The fake one is. You look at it and it vanishes. You look at the Blonde Hero-really look-and he turns into a gerbil. But you look at Apollo, and he looks back at you. The poet Rilke looked at a statue of Apollo about fifty years ago, and Apollo spoke to him. "You must change your life," he said. When the true myth rises into consciousness, that is always its message. You must change your life. Ursula K. Le Guin realreligiouslife If you evade suffering, you also evade the chance of joy. Ursula K. Le Guin chancesufferingjoy You are all in jail. Each alone, solitary, with a heap of what he owns. You live in prison, die in prison. It is all I can see in your eyes - the wall, the wall! Ursula K. Le Guin walljaileye Nothing said in words ever came out quite even. Things in words got twisted and ran together, instead of staying straight and fitting together. Ursula K. Le Guin twistedfittingtogether We read books to find out who we are. Ursula K. Le Guin self-understandingdiscoverybook True understanding is the spur of genius Ursula K. Le Guin mentorspursunderstanding To exhibit the perfect uselessness of knowing the answer to the wrong question. Ursula K. Le Guin left-handknowingperfect All men were alien one to another, at times, not only aliens. Ursula K. Le Guin aliensmen If you deny any affinity with another person or kind of person, if you declare it to be wholly different from yourself Ursula K. Le Guin equalitydifferentkind The thing about working with time, instead of against it, he thought, is that it is not wasted. Even pain counts. Ursula K. Le Guin pain
