Lloyd Alexander
Behind one truth there is always yet another.Collection: Behinds
Fantasy is, I believe, the great nourisher of imagination. To paraphrase Einstein on how to develop intelligence in young people: Read fairy tales. Then read more fairy tales.Collection: Believe
Thinking is a bit uncomfortable, but you'll get used to it. A matter of time and practice.Collection: Inspirational
Once you have courage to look upon evil, seeing it for what it is and naming it by its true name, it is powerless against you, and you can destroy it.Collection: Names
I think imagination is at the heart of everything we do. Scientific discoveries couldn't have happened without imagination. Art, music, and literature couldn't exist without imagination. And so anything that strengthens imagination, and reading certainly does that, can help us for the rest of our lives.Collection: Art
It is harsh enough for each man to bear his own wound. But he who leads bears the wounds of all who follow him.Collection: Men
The point is not to look back, but to look ahead to what you hope still to do.Collection: Looks
True allegiance is only given willingly.Collection: Given
If you want truth you should begin by giving it.Collection: Giving
Neither refuse to give help when it is needed,... nor refuse to accept it when it is offered.Collection: Giving
Most cats do not approach humans recklessly. The possibility of concealed weapons, clods or sticks, tend to make them reserved. Homeless cats in particular-with some justification, unfortunately-consider humans their natural enemies. Much ceremony must be observed, and a number of diplomatic feelers put out, before establishing a state of truce.Collection: Cat
I only suggest to you: Will you dwell on killing this man? You wish for revenge? If you do, he has already killed you by slow poison. So, let it go. Why waste your time? His life will see to his death.Collection: Revenge
We don't need to have just one favorite. We keep adding favorites. Our favorite book is always the book that speaks most directly to us at a particular stage in our lives. And our lives change. We have other favorites that give us what we most need at that particular time. But we never lose the old favorites. They're always with us. We just sort of accumulate them.Collection: Life Changing
Dealing with the impossible, fantasy can show us what may be really possible. If there is grief, there is the possibility of consolation; if hurt, the possibility of healing; and above all, the curative power of hope. If fantasy speaks to us as we are, it also speaks to us as we might beCollection: Hurt
Favorite books and authors while growing up - I'd need a book to list them all. For the sake of brevity: Shakespeare, Dickens, Mark Twain, Victor Hugo, world's mythology, the Arthurian legends. And the unabridged dictionary. And they're still my favorites. They get better each time I read them.Collection: Growing Up
Ever since human beings learned to talk to each other, we've been fascinated with storytelling of every kind. Blessed (or cursed) with insatiable curiosity, we have to know what happens next.Collection: Blessed
If we nourish imagination, we nourish everything else.Collection: Imagination
I came to fantasy fairly late. For some ten years, I had been happily writing fiction and non-fiction for adults. But I always loved fantasy, whether for adults or young people; and at that particular point in my life, I wanted to try it, to understand it, as part of the process of learning to be a writer. The results were beyond anything I could have foreseen. As I've said often and elsewhere, it was the most creative and liberating experience of my life.Collection: Writing
I can't single out one of my books or characters as a favorite. In the same way that I don't have a favorite kidney, my books are organically all part of myself. I might even say that put all together, the books are one ongoing, developing story - which, not coincidentally, happens to be my own lifestory.Collection: Book
Paradoxically, in fantasy for young people I was able to express my own deepest feelings and attitudes more than I had ever done in writing for adults.Collection: Attitude
There is truth in all things, if you understand them well.Collection: Wells
Two cats can live as cheaply as one, and their owner has twice as much funCollection: Fun
Most of us are called on to perform tasks far beyond what we can do. Our capabilities seldom match our aspirations, and we are often woefully unprepared. To this extent, we are all Assistant Pig-Keepers at heart.Collection: Heart
How easy it is to think well of ourselves. Until the moment is upon us, we can never be certain.Collection: Thinking
For man to be worthy of any rank, he must strive first to be a man.Collection: Men
The journey is the treasure.Collection: Journey
She had no particular breed in mind, no unusual requirements. Except the special sense of mutual recognition that tells dog and human they have both come to the right place.Collection: Dog
Is there not glory enough in living the days given to us? You should know there is adventure in simply being among those we love and the things we love, and beauty, too.Collection: Life
Hope is an essential thread in the fabric of all fantasies, an Ariadne's thread to guide us out of the labyrinth ... Human beings have always needed hope, and surely now more than ever.Collection: Labyrinth
Indeed, the more we find to love, the more we add to the measure of our hearts.Collection: Heart
I'm convinced that imagination is at the heart of everything we do - in art, science, even astrophysics and higher mathematics. Imagination leads us to ask, "What if?"Collection: Art
For the deeds of a man, not the words of a prophecy, are what shape his destiny.Collection: Destiny
Are you slow-witted? I'm so sorry for you. It's terrible to be dull and stupid.Collection: Sorry
Every man is a hero if he strives more for others than for himself alone.Collection: Hero
Any fool can tell a story. Take a few odds and ends of things that happen to you, dress them up, shuffle them about, add a dash of excitement, a little color, and there you have it.Collection: Color
We hold each other's lives in our open hands, not in clenched fists.Collection: Hands
Evil conquered?' said Gwydion. 'You have learned much, but learn this last and hardest of lessons. You have conquered only the enchantments of evil. That was the easiest of your tasks, only a beginning, not an ending. Do you believe evil itself to be so quickly overcome? Not so long as men still hate and slay each other, when greed and anger goad them. Against these even a flaming sword cannot prevail, but only that portion of good in all men's hearts whose flame can never be quenched.Collection: Hate
The art is more important than the artist. The work is more important than the person who does it. You must be prepared to sacrifice all the you could possibly have, be, or do; you must be willing to go all the way for your art. If it is a question between choosing between your life and a work of art -- any work of art -- your decision is made for you.Collection: Art
If a storyteller worried about the facts - my dear Lucian, how could he ever get at the truth?Collection: Facts
Llonio said life was a net for luck; to Hevydd the Smith life was a forge; and to Dwyvach the Weaver-Woman a loom. They spoke truly, for it is all of these. But you,' Taran said, his eyes meeting the potter's, 'you have shown me life is one thing more. It is clay to be shaped, as raw clay on a potter's wheel.Collection: Eye
If the pull of the outside world is strong, there is also a pull towards the human. The cat may disappear on its own errands, but sooner or later, it returns once again for a little while, to greet us with its own type of love.Collection: Strong
Books can truly change our lives: the lives of those who read them, the lives of those who write them. Readers and writers alike discover things they never knew about the world and about themselves.Collection: Book
A shade of sorrow passed over Taliesin's face. 'There are those,' he said gently, 'who must first learn loss, despair, and grief. Of all paths to wisdom, this is the cruelest and longest. Are you one who must follow such a way? This even I cannot know. If you are, take heart nonetheless. Those who reach the end do more than gain wisdom. As rough wool becomes cloth, and crude clay a vessel, so do they change and fashion wisdom for others, and what they give back is greater than what they won.Collection: Fashion
No matter what has happened, you're not a pig-boy; you're an Assistant Pig Keeper!Collection: Boys
Trust your luck, Taran Wanderer. But don't forget to put out your nets!Collection: Luck
What you may seek and what you may find are not always one.Collection: May
Fantasy, in addition to being great storytelling, moves us at some unique and profound level. It has, I think, the power of mythology, or ancient dreams we have always and forever shared. In it, we find our real world and our real selves.Collection: Dream
You have a point," said Fronto, "and even a poet must occasionally bow to logic.Collection: Bows
A taste for adventure is by no means a masculine monopoly.Collection: Adventure