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He Meant The Kingdom Was Over, The Kingdom Of Heaven, It Was All Finished. We Shouldn't Live As If It Mattered More Than This Life In This World, Because Where We Are Is Always The Most Important Place.... We Have To Be All Those Difficult Things Like Cheerful And Kind And Curious And Patient, And We've Got To Study And Think And Work Hard, All Of Us, In All Our Different Worlds, And Then We'll Build... The Republic Of Heaven.
-Philip Pullman
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He Meant The Kingdom

Philip Pullman
He Meant The Kingdom Was Over, The Kingdom Of Heaven, It Was All Finished. We Shouldn't Live As If It Mattered More Than This Life In This World, Because Where We Are Is Always The Most Important Place.... We Have To Be All Those Difficult Things Like Cheerful And Kind And Curious And Patient, And We've Got To Study And Think And Work Hard, All Of Us, In All Our Different Worlds, And Then We'll Build... The Republic Of Heaven.
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Hard Work
Thinking
Heaven
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No,' He Said, 'memory's A Poor Thing To Have. It's Your Own Real Hair And Mouth And Arms And Eyes And Hands I Want. I Didn't Know I Could Ever Love Anything So Much.
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All Good Things Pass Away.
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The Justice Of It Seems To Children Correct And Right - I Mean, We Laugh At It! We Underestimate Children's Ability To Know What Is A Story And What Isn't.
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All The History Of Human Life Has Been A Struggle Between Wisdom And Stupidity.
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Half A Dozen Brats Turned With Expressions Of Derision, And Lyra Threw Her Cigarette Down, Recognizing The Cue For A Fight. Everyone's Daemon Instantly Became Warlike: Each Child Was Accompanied By Fangs, Or Claws, Or Bristling Fur, And Pantalaimon, Contemptuous Of The Limited Imaginations Of These Gyptian Daemons, Became A Dragon The Size Of A Deer Hound.
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I'm With The Grimms On This: Stories For Young And Old. You Can't Characterize Them Any Better Than That.
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There Will Be Days When The Stuff Is Not Flowing Freely. What You Do Then Is Make It Up!
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Do You Think I Could Bear To Live On After You Died? Oh, Lyra, I'd Follow You Down To The World Of The Dead Without Thinking Twice About It, Just Like You Followed Roger; And That Would Be Two Lives Gone For Nothing, My Life Wasted Like Yours. No, We Should Spend Our Whole Lifetimes Together, Good Long Busy Lives, And If We Can't Spend Them Together, We... We'll Have To Spend Them Apart.
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And Then What?" Said Her Daemon Sleepily. "build What?" "the Republic Of Heaven," Said Lyra.
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When You Live For Many Hundreds Of Years, You Know That Every Opportunity Will Come Again.
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You Are Dead- What Am I Speaking To?
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Past
Tolkien Seems To Me Reactionary, Conservative, Fearful Of A Modern World. Fearful Of Anything That Isn't Sanctioned By The Passage Of Long Eons Of Time. I Think What I'm Doing In His Dark Materials Is Politically The Reverse Of That.
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Thinking
Long
She Found Out That Having Something To Do Prevented You From Feeling Seasick, And That Even A Job Like Scrubbing A Deck Could Be Satisfying, If It Was Done In A Seamanlike Way. She Was Very Taken With This Notion, And Later On She Folded The Blankets On Her Bunk In A Seamanlike Way, And Put Her Possessions In The Closet In A Seamanlike Way, And Used 'stow' Instead Of 'tidy' For The Process Of Doing So. After Two Days At Sea, Lyra Decided That This Was The Life For Her.
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One Of The Ways In Which Writers Most Show Their Inventiveness Is In The Things They Tell Us About How They Write. Generally Speaking, I Don't Like To Make A Plan Before I've Written A Story. I Find It Kills The Story - Deadens It, Makes It Uninteresting. Unless I'm Surprised By Something In A Story, The Reader's Not Going To Be Surprised Either.
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The Christian Religion Is A Very Powerful And Convincing Mistake.
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The State Of Mind Which I Put Myself When I Tell A Story Is One In Which Superstition Flourishes Very Easily. And I Welcome That Because It Helps Me.
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...his Face Bore An Expression That Mingled Haughty Disdain With A Tender, Ardent Sympathy, As If He Would Love All Things If Only His Nature Could Let Him Forget Their Defects.
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Faces
Forget
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Writing
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The E-book Revolution Has Made It Very Easy To Pay Writers A Good Deal Less Than What Their Work Is Worth. I Do Strongly Believe That We Writers Ought To Hold Out For Much Better Royalties.
Book
Believe
Pay
But I Know That All The Things I Do Know Are Very Small Compared With The Things That I Don't Know.
Knows
Marisa! Marisa!” The Cry Was Torn From Lord Asriel, And With The Snow Leopard Beside Her, With A Roaring In Her Ears, Lyra’s Mother Stood And Found Her Footing And Leapt With All Her Heart, To Hurl Herself Against The Angel And Her Daemon And Her Dying Lover, And Seize Those Beating Wings, And Bear Them All Down Together Into The Abyss.
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Heart
Angel
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His Dark Materials
You Speak Of Destiny As If It Was Fixed.
Fate
Destiny
Speak
If You Can't Think Of What To Write, Tough Luck; Write Anyway.
Writing
Thinking
Luck
We Feel Cold, But We Don't Mind It, Because We Will Not Come To Harm. And If We Wrapped Up Against The Cold, We Wouldn't Feel Other Things, Like The Bright Tingle Of The Stars, Or The Music Of The Aurora, Or Best Of All The Silky Feeling Of Moonlight On Our Skin. It's Worth Being Cold For That.
Stars
Winter
Feelings
We Are All Subject To The Fates. But We Must All Act As If We Are Not, Or Die Of Despair...death Will Sweep Through All The Worlds; It Will Be The Triumph Of Despair, Forever. The Universes Will All Become Nothing More Than Interlocking Machines, Blind And Empty Of Thought, Feeling, Life...
Fate
Forever
Feelings
All Things From The North Are Devilish.
All Things
Devilish
...because Where We Are Is Always The Most Important Place.
Important
A Murderer Was A Worthy Companion.
Worthy
Companion
Murderer
That's The Duty Of The Old, To Be Anxious On Behalf Of The Young. And The Duty Of The Young Is To Scorn The Anxiety Of The Old.
Maturity
Anxiety
Young
What I Do Say Is That I Can Write Verse, And That The Writing Of Verse In Strict Form Is The Best Possible Training For Writing Good Prose
Writing
Training
Form
Gradually, At Various Points In Our Childhoods, We Discover Different Forms Of Conviction. There's The Rock-hard Certainty Of Personal Experience ("i Put My Finger In The Fire And It Hurt,"), Which Is Probably The Earliest Kind We Learn. Then There's The Logically Convincing, Which We Probably Come To First Through Maths, In The Context Of Pythagoras's Theorem Or Something Similar, And Which, If We First Encounter It At Exactly The Right Moment, Bursts On Our Minds Like Sunrise With The Whole Universe Playing A Great Chord Of C Major.
Hurt
Math
Science
I'm Perfectly Happy About Being Superstitious And Atheistic.
Atheistic
Superstitious
Well, I Have An Idea, Usually A Visual Image Of Some Sort. A Setting. A Particular, I Don't Know, Urban Scene, A Particular Time Of Day. Something That Grips My Imagination For Some Reason.
Ideas
Imagination
Urban
If A Coin Comes Down Heads, That Means That The Possibility Of Its Coming Down Tails Has Collapsed. Until That Moment The Two Possibilities Were Equal. But On Another World, It Does Come Down Tails. And When That Happens, The Two Worlds Split Apart.
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Two
Doe
Everything Has A Meaning, If Only We Could Read It.
His Dark Materials
Ifs
What Is Worth Having Is Worth Working For.
Just Finished 'secrecy' - Truly Enthralling Both As A Love Story And As A Tale Of Suspense - But Much More Than Both.
Suspense
Stories
Love Story
Lee Saw The Fireball And Head Through The Roar In His Ears Hester Saying, "that's The Last Of 'em Lee." He Said, Or Thought, "those Poor Men Didn't Have To Come To This, Nor Did We." She Said, "we Held 'em Off. We Held Out. We're A-helping Lyra." Then She Was Pressing Her Little Proud Broken Self Against His Face, As Close As She Could Get, And Then They Died.
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Self
Broken
If You Can't Think Of What To Write, Tough Luck; Write Anyway. If You Can Think Of Lots More When You've Finished The Three Pages, Don't Write It; It'll Be That Much Easier To Get Going Next Day.
Writing
Thinking
Next Day
You Don't Win Races By Wishing, You Win Them By Running Faster Than Everyone Else Does.
Running
Winning
Race
You Going To Be A Scientist When You Grow Up?” That Sort Of Question Deserved A Blank Stare, Which It Got.
Growing Up
Scientist
Blank
I Am A Religious Person, Although I Am Not A Believer.
Religious
Believer
Persons
The Fairy Tale Is In A Perpetual State Of Becoming And Alteration. To Keep To One Version Or One Translation Alone Is To Put Robin Redbreast In A Cage.
Robins
Becoming
Cages
And Think What Worrying Does: Has Anyone Ever Added A Single Hour To The Length Of His Life By Worrying About It?
Thinking
Worry
Doe
Lonely? I Don't Know. They Tell Me This Is Cold. I Don't Know What Cold Is, Because I Don't Freeze. So I Don't Know What Lonely Means Either. Bears Are Made To Be Solitary.
Lonely
Mean
Bears
Lyra Learns To Her Great Cost That Fantasy Isn’t Enough. She Has Been Lying All Her Life, Telling Stories To People, Making Up Fantasies, And Suddenly She Comes To A Point Where That’s Not Enough. All She Can Do Is Tell The Truth. She Tells The Truth About Her Childhood, About The Experiences She Had In Oxford, And That Is What Saves Her. True Experience, Not Fantasy - Reality, Not Lies - Is What Saves Us In The End.
Lying
Reality
Oxford
What Work Do I Have To Do Then?" Said Will, But Went On At Once, "no, On Second Thought, Don't Tell Me. I Shall Decide What I Do. If You Say My Work Is Fighting, Or Healing, Or Exploring, Or Whatever You Might Say, I'll Always Be Thinking About It. And If I Do End Up Doing That, I'll Be Resentful Because It'll Feel As If I Didn't Have A Choice, And If I Don't Do It, I'll Feel Guilty Because I Should. Whatever I Do, I Will Choose It, No One Else.
Healing
Fighting
Thinking
We Need To Ensure That Children Are Not Forced To Waste Their Time On Barren Rubbish.
Children
Needs
Waste
For Every Once Upon A Time There Must Be A Story To Follow, Because If A Story Doesn't, Something Else Will, And It Might Not Be As Harmless As A Story.
Once Upon A Time
Stories
Might
This Is The Value For Me Of Writing Books That Children Read. Children Aren't Interested In Your Appalling Self-consciousness. They Want To Know What Happens Next. They Force You To Tell A Story.
Children
Book
Writing
So Lyra And Her Daemon Turned Away From The World They Were Born In, And Looked Toward The Sun, And Walked Into The Sky.
Sky
World
Sun
Seems To Me-" Lee Said, Feeling For The Words, "seems To Me The Place You Fight Cruelty Is Where You Find It, And The Place You Give Help Is Where You See It Needed.
Fighting
Giving
Feelings
Long Before Writing, People Were Telling Each Other Stories And The Audiobook Goes All The Way Back To That Tradition.
Writing
Long
People
I Don't Profess Any Religion; I Don't Think It's Possible That There Is A God.... My Books Are About Killing God.
Book
Thinking
Killing
There Are Some Themes, Some Subjects, Too Large For Adult Fiction; They Can Only Be Dealt With Adequately In A Children's Book.
Children
Book
Adults
I Have Maintained A Passionate Interest In Education, Which Leads Me Occasionally To Make Foolish And Ill-considered Remarks Alleging That Not Everything Is Well In Our Schools. My Main Concern Is That An Over-emphasis On Testing And League Tables Has Led To A Lack Of Time And Freedom For A True, Imaginative And Humane Engagement With Literature.
School
League
Passionate
I Will Love You For Ever, Whatever Happens. Till I Die And After I Die, And When I Find My Way Out Of The Land Of The Dead I'll Drift About Forever, All My Atoms, Till I Find You Again.
Love You
Land
Forever
There Are Some Who Live By Every Rule And Cling Tightly To Their Rectitude Because They Fear Being Swept Away By A Tempest Of Passion, And There Are Others Who Cling To The Rules Because They Fear That There Is No Passion There At All, And That If They Let Go They Would Simply Remain Where They Are, Foolish And Unmoved; And They Could Bear That Least Of All. Living A Life Of Iron Control Lets Them Pretend To Themselves That Only By The Mightiest Effort Of Will Can They Hold Great Passions At Bay.
Letting Go
Passion
Iron
Tell Them Stories. They Need The Truth You Must Tell Them True Stories, And Everything Will Be Well, Just Tell Them Stories.
Needs
Stories
True Story
The Lord Of The Rings' Is Fundamentally An Infantile Work. Tolkien Is Not Interested In The Way Grownup, Adult Human Beings Interact With Each Other. He's Interested In Maps And Plans And Languages And Codes.
Adults
Maps
Way
My Books Are About Killing God.
Book
Killing
I Stopped Believing There Was A Power Of Good And A Power Of Evil That Were Outside Us. And I Came To Believe That Good And Evil Are Names For What People Do, Not For What They Are.
Life
Believe
Names
We Have To Build The Republic Of Heaven Where We Are, Because For Us There Is No Elsewhere.
Heaven
Republic
His Dark Materials
But We Can Trust Him Roger, I Swear," She Said With A Final Effort,"because He's Will.
Effort
Finals
Roger
The First Ghost To Leave The World Of The Dead Was Roger. He Took A Step Forward, And Turned To Look Back At Lyra, And Laughed In Surprise As He Found Himself Turning Into The Night, The Starlight, The Air. . .and Then He Was Gone, Leaving Behind Such A Vivid Little Burst Of Happiness.
Night
Air
Leaving
Was There Only One World After All Which Spent Its Time Dreaming Of Others?
Dream
World
If You Want To Write Anything That Works, You Have To Go With The Grain Of Your Talent, Not Against It. If Your Talent Is Inert And Sullen In The Face Of Business Or Politics...but Takes Fire At The Thought Of Ghosts And Vampires And Witches And Demons Then Feed The Flames, Feed The Flames.
Writing
Fire
Flames
I'm Just Trying To Wake Up - I'm So Afraid Of Sleeping All My Life And Then Dying - I Want To Wake Up First. I Wouldn't Care If It Was Just For An Hour, As Long As I Was Properly Alive And Awake.
Sleep
Long
Dying
Writing Is Tyranny ... But Reading Is Democracy.
Reading
Writing
Democracy
The Crucifixion Saved Him [jesus]. He Never Had To Deal With The Fact That The Kingdom Of God Wasn't Ever Going To Come. His Disciples, Of Course, Had To Deal With It, And Little By Little They Had To Realize That It's A Metaphorical Thing. Well, That's Not What Jesus Meant. I'm Fairly Sure He Meant It Literally. But He Must Have Been The Most Fascinating Man.
Jesus
Men
Littles
And Among Academicians, And Among Spirits. I Found Folly Everywhere, But There Were Grains Of Wisdom In Every Stream Of It. No Doubt There Was Much More Wisdom That I Failed To Recognize. Life Is Hard, Mr. Scoresby, But We Cling To It All The Same.
Life Is Hard
Doubt
Spirit
For That Reason You Can't Write With Music Playing, And Anyone Who Says He Can Is Either Writing Badly, Or Not Listening To The Music, Or Lying. You Need To Hear What You're Writing, And For That You Need Silence
Lying
Writing
Silence
I Think It's Perfectly Possible To Explain How The Universe Came About Without Bringing God Into It, But I Don't Know Everything, And There May Well Be A God Somewhere, Hiding Away. Actually, If He Is Keeping Out Of Sight, It's Because He's Ashamed Of His Followers And All The Cruelty And Ignorance They're Responsible For Promoting In His Name. If I Were Him, I'd Want Nothing To Do With Them.
Ignorance
Thinking
Sight
Maybe Sometimes We Don't Do The Right Thing Because The Wrong Thing Looks More Dangerous, And We Don't Want To Look Scared, So We Go And Do The Wrong Thing Just Because It's Dangerous. We're More Concerned With Not Looking Scared Than With Judging Right.
Fear
Judging
Looks
I Wanted To Avoid What Some Modern Tellers Have Done, Quite Legitimately, To Make Fairy Tales More Like Novels And Short Stories, To Characterize The Heroes And The Heroines Much More Than They Are Characterized In Grimm. I Like The Psychological Flatness Of Them, The Fact That They're More Like Masks Than Individuals.
Hero
Stories
Done
He Meant The Kingdom Was Over, The Kingdom Of Heaven, It Was All Finished. We Shouldn't Live As If It Mattered More Than This Life In This World, Because Where We Are Is Always The Most Important Place.... We Have To Be All Those Difficult Things Like Cheerful And Kind And Curious And Patient, And We've Got To Study And Think And Work Hard, All Of Us, In All Our Different Worlds, And Then We'll Build... The Republic Of Heaven.
Hard Work
Thinking
Heaven
If A Witch Needs Something, Another Witch Will Give It To Her. If There Is War To Be Fought, We Don't Consider Cost One Of The Factors In Deciding Whether Or Not It Is Right To Fight. Nor Do We Have Any Notion Of Honor. An Insult To A Bear Is A Deadly Thing. To Us...inconceivable. How Could You Insult A Witch? What Would It Matter If You Did?
War
Fighting
Giving
Men Pass In Front Of Our Eyes Like Butterflies, Creatures Of A Brief Season. We Love Them; They Are Brave, Proud, Beautiful, And Clever.
Beautiful
Clever
Butterfly
The Sight Filled The Northern Sky; The Immensity Of It Was Scarcely Conceivable. As If From Heaven Itself, Great Curtains Of Delicate Light Hung And Trembled. Pale Green And Rose-pink, And As Transparent As The Most Fragile Fabric, And At The Bottom Edge A Profound Fiery Crimson Like The Fires Of Hell, They Swung And Shimmered Loosely With More Grace Than The Most Skillful Dancer.
Fire
Light
Sight
It Takes Long Practice, Yes. You Have To Work. Did You Think You Could Snap Your Fingers, And Have It As A Gift? What Is Worth Having Is Worth Working For.
Thinking
Practice
Long
People Are Too Complicated To Have Simple Labels.
Simple
People
Labels
If I'm Reading Something I Happen To Know And Gets It Wrong, I Just Don't Trust The Book Any More. What I Ask Of A Novel I'm Reading Is That It Should Know A Fraction More About The Things I Know Than I Do. When I'm Writing...i Ask Myself: Would I Be Convinced By This If I Read It? If I Knocked Against This Bit Of Scenery, Would It Feel Solid?
Book
Reading
Writing
The Moment In The Account Of Adam And Eve In The Book Of Genesis Is When They Realize They're Naked And Try And Cover Themselves With Fig Leaves. That Seemed To Me A Perfect Allegory Of What Happened In The 20th Century With Regard To Literary Modernism. Literary Modernism Grew Out Of A Sense That, “oh My God! I'm Telling A Story! Oh, That Can't Be The Case, Because I'm A Clever Person. I'm A Literary Person! What Am I Going To Do To Distinguish Myself?...a Lot Of Modernism Does Seem To Come Out Of A Fear Of Being Thought An Ordinary Storyteller.
Clever
Book
Perfect
I Was Born In Norwich In 1946, And Educated In England, Zimbabwe, And Australia, Before My Family Settled In North Wales.
Zimbabwe
Australia
England
We Measure The Value Of A Civilized Society By The Number Of #‎ Libraries It Opens, Not The Number It Closes Down.
Numbers
Library
Civilized Society
When You Choose One Way Out Of Many, All The Ways You Don't Take Are Snuffed Out Like Candles, As If They'd Never Existed. At That Moment All Will's Choices Existed At Once. But To Keep Them All In Existence Meant Doing Nothing. He Had To Choose, After All.
Choices
Doing Nothing
Way
The Way You Speak Of The Characters In Your Story Shows What You Think Of The Values Of Conservatives‚ Or Evolution, For Example. It Shows Where Your Moral Center Is. So You Are In The Message Business Whether You Like It Or Not.
Character
Thinking
Example
All The Stories Of The Bible That I Know Came To Me First From My Grandfather's Lips... He Would See Stories In Everything. He Told Stories Very Easily And Very Generously, So I Loved Him For That. He Was A Simple Man, A Victorian; He Was Born In 1890-something. He Saw No Reason And Had Never Seen Any Reason To Question His Christian Faith. His Faith Was Strong And Simple And That's It. And I, Like His Other Grandchildren And The Children In His Parish, Sheltered Underneath It.
Christian
Strong
Children
We Don't Need Lists Of Rights And Wrongs, Tables Of Do's And Don'ts: We Need Books, Time, And Silence. Thou Shalt Not Is Soon Forgotten, But Once Upon A Time Lasts Forever.
Book
Rights
Silence
I Seemed To Have Spent The Whole Time Either Reading, Which I Loved, Or Laughing, Which I Love, Or Fooling About, Which I Loved. There Was The Usual Teenage Angst: "nobody Understands Me" And "i'm The Only Genius In The World" And All That Stuff. But That Didn't Get Very Deep.
Teenage
Reading
Laughing
You Cannot Change What You Are, Only What You Do.
Change
Being Yourself
Life Changing
All Writing Is Difficult. The Most You Can Hope For Is A Day When It Goes Reasonably Easily. Plumbers Don't Get Plumber's Block, And Doctors Don't Get Doctor's Block; Why Should Writers Be The Only Profession That Gives A Special Name To The Difficulty Of Working, And Then Expects Sympathy For It?
Block
Writing
Doctors
It Does Not Make Sense. It Cannot Exist. It's Impossible, And If It Isn't Impossible, It's Irrelevant, And If It Isn't Either Of Those Things, It's Embarrassing.
Doe
Impossible
Academic
As Jane Austen Might Have Put It: It Is A Truth Universally Acknowledged That Young Protagonists In Search Of Adventure Must Ditch Their Parents.
Writing
Adventure
Parent
There’s Been Terrible Things We Seen, En’t There? And More A Coming, More’n Likely. So I Think I’d Rather Not Know What’s In The Future. I’ll Stick To The Present.
Thinking
Sticks
Terrible
To Get The Best Out Of Life Here ...good Grief. There's Plenty Of It About, So Indulge. Give Yourself Some Thing To Remember. Fall In Love. Fall Out Of Love. Gamble. Get Drunk. See How Long You Can Stay Awake. Go For Long Walks At Night. Discover What You're Afraid Of Doing, And Then Do It.
Falling In Love
Grief
Night
Human Beings Can't See Anything Without Wanting To Destroy It. That's Original Sin. And I'm Going To Destroy It. Death Is Going To Die.
Sin
Humans
Originals
Disney Is A Huge Presence When It Comes To Fairy Tales Because He’s Made Of Them Such Brilliant Artifacts In Terms Of Movie-making. But It’s Very Hard To Ignore What He’s Done To Them. I'm Not Interested In Denigrating Disney Or Even Commenting On Him Very Much. I'm More Interested In Seeing What I Can Do With The Stories Myself.
Stories
Done
Fairy Tale
The Idea Hovered And Shimmered Delicately, Like A Soap Bubble, And She Dared Not Even Look At It Directly In Case It Burst. But She Was Familiar With The Way Of Ideas, And She Let It Shimmer, Looking Away, Thinking About Something Else.
Thinking
Ideas
Soap Bubbles
You Don't Read It In The Sense Of Reading A Message; It Doesn't Work Like That. What's Happening Is That The Shadows Are Responding To The Attention You Pay Them.
Reading
Shadow
Attention
Symbols And Emblems Were Everywhere. Buildings And Pictures Were Designed To Be Read Like Books. Everything Stood For Something Else; If You Had The Right Dictionary, You Could Read Nature Itself. It Was Hardly Surprising To Find Philosophers Using The Symbolism Of Their Time To Interpret Knowledge That Came From A Mysterious Source.
Book
Symbolism
Philosopher
My Only Real Claim To Anyone's Attention Lies In My Writing
Real
Lying
Writing
I Know Whom We Must Fight...it Is The Church. For All Its History, It's Tried To Suppress And Control Every Natural Impulse.that Is What The Church Does, And Every Church Is The Same: Control, Destroy, Obliterate Every Good Feeling.
Fighting
Feelings
Church
The Best Way To Get Kids To Read A Book Is To Say: 'this Book Is Not Appropriate For Your Age, And It Has All Sorts Of Horrible Things In It Like Sex And Death And Some Really Big And Complicated Ideas, And You're Better Off Not Touching It Until You're All Grown Up. I'm Going To Put It On This Shelf And Leave The Room For A While. Don't Open It.
Sex
Book
Kids
From What We Are, Spirit; From What We Do, Matter. Matter And Spirit Are One.
Matter
Spirit
Because The Great Thing About Fairy Tales And Folk Tales Is That There Is No Authentic Text. It's Not Like The Text Of Paradise Lost Or James Joyce's Ulysses, And You Have To Adhere To That Exact Text.
Paradise
Fairy Tale
Ulysses
Her Last Conscious Thought Was Disgust At Life; Her Senses Had Lied To Her. The World Was Not Made Of Energy And Delight But Of Foulness, Betrayal, And Lassitude. Living Was Hateful, And Death Was No Better, And From End To End Of The Universe This Was The First And Last And Only Truth.
Betrayal
Energy
Delight
There Is Another Consequence Of Any Belief In A Single God, And That Is That It Is A Very Good Excuse For People To Behave Very Badly.
People
Belief
Excuse
Teachers Often Make The Mistake Of Thinking They're The Boss Of The Class; They're Not. The Boss Of The Class Is Sitting Down There Somewhere.
Teacher
Mistake
Thinking
D'you Know How Embarrassing It Is To Mention Good And Evil In A Scientific Laboratory? Have You Any Idea? One Of The Reasons I Became A Scientist Was Not To Have To Think About That Kind Of Thing.
Thinking
Ideas
Evil
We Shouldn't Live As If [other Worlds] Mattered More Than This Life In This World, Because Where We Are Is Always The Most Important Place.
Other Worlds
Important
This World
When He'd Sworn At Her And Been Sworn At In Return, They Became Great Friends.
Return
Great Friend
Once Upon A Time' Lasts Forever.
Forever
Once Upon A Time
Lasts
She Longed For Cutlasses, Pistols, And Brandy; She Had To Make Do With Coffee, And Pencils, And Verbs.
Life
Coffee
Verbs
Men And Women Are Moved By Tides Much Fiercer Than You Can Imagine, And They Sweep Us All Up Into The Current.
Men
Tides
Imagine
It's Only Through Honesty And Courage That Science Can Work At All. The Ptolemaic Understanding Of The Solar System Was Undermined And Corrected By The Constant Pressure Of More And More Honest Reporting.
Honesty
Hard Work
Science
Being In Love Was Like China: You Knew It Was There, And No Doubt It Was Very Interesting, And Some People Went There, But I Never Would.
Love
Travel
Knowing
I'm Superstitious About The Paper That I Use, For Example. I've Written All My Novels On A Paper Of A Particular Size With Lines Of A Particular Distance Apart And With Two Holes In The Paper For The Folder Clip.
Distance
Two
Example
If You Want Something You Can Have It, But Only If You Want Everything That Goes With It, Including All The Hard Work And The Despair, And Only If You're Willing To Risk Failure.
Hard Work
Want Something
Risk
Stories Are The Most Important Thing In The World. Without Stories, We Wouldn't Be Human Beings At All.
Important
Stories
World
All Stories Teach, Whether The Storyteller Intends Them To Or Not. They Teach The World We Create. They Teach The Morality We Live By. They Teach It Much More Effectively Than Moral Precepts And Instructions.
Stories
World
Morality
There's Some That Came Here Never Believing They Were Dead. They Insisted All The Way That They Were Alive, It Was A Mistake, Someone Would Have To Pay; Made No Difference. There's Others Who Longed To Be Dead When They Were Alive, Poor Souls; Lives Full Of Pain Or Misery; Killed Themselves For A Chance Of A Blessed Rest, And Found That Nothing Had Changed Except For The Worse, And This Time There Was No Escape; You Can't Make Yourself Alive Again.
Pain
Mistake
Believe
Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.


2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.


2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.


2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.


3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.


3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.


3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.



4. Proper Usage of Quotes


4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.


4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.


4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).


5. Common Mistakes to Avoid


5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.


5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.


5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.



6. Quotes in Different Contexts


6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.


6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.


6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.



7. Punctuation and Formatting


Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:


Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.


Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.


Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.



8. Ethical Considerations


Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes


Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.



Conclusion


Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.


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