WIST Quotations

Shakespeare, William -- Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, sc. 1, ll. 4ff (5.1.4-8) (1605)

Dave — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 15:23:43 +0000

THESEUS: Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet
Are of imagination all compact.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, sc. 1, ll. 4ff (5.1.4-8) (1605)
(Source)

Hugo, Victor -- Les Misérables, Part 1 “Fantine,” Book 3 “The Year 1817,” ch. 6 (1.3.6) (1862) [tr. Donougher (2013)]

Dave — Mon, 06 Jan 2025 23:18:30 +0000

Table talk, lovers’ talk — both are equally elusive. Lovers’ talk is castlebuilding, table talk is pipe-dreaming.

[Propos de table et propos d’amour; les uns sont aussi insaisissables que les autres; les propos d’amour sont des nuées, les propos de table sont des fumées.]

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
Les Misérables, Part 1 “Fantine,” Book 3 “The Year 1817,” ch. 6 (1.3.6) (1862) [tr. Donougher (2013)]
(Source)

(Source (French)). Alternate translations:

Table talk and lovers' talk equally elude the grasp; lovers' talk is clouds, table talk is smoke.
[tr. Wilbour (1862)]

Love talk and table talk are equally indescribable, for the first is cloud, the second smoke.
[tr. Wraxall (1862)]

Chat at table, the chat of love; it is as impossible to reproduce one as the other; the chat of love is a cloud; the chat at table is smoke.
[tr. Hapgood (1887)]

Table-talk and lovers’ talk, both fleeting as air. Lovers’ talk is the mist and table-talk the scent.
[tr. Denny (1976)]

Table talk and lovers' talk are equally elusive; lovers' talk is clouds, table talk is smoke.
[tr. Wilbour/Fahnestock/MacAfee (1987)]

Martin, George R. R. -- Interview (2014-04-23) by Mikal Gilmore, “The Rolling Stone Interview,” Rolling Stone

Dave — Fri, 20 Dec 2024 22:11:48 +0000

The war that Tolkien wrote about was a war for the fate of civilization and the future of humanity, and that’s become the template. I’m not sure that it’s a good template, though. The Tolkien model led generations of fantasy writers to produce these endless series of dark lords and their evil minions who are all very ugly and wear black clothes. But the vast majority of wars throughout history are not like that.

George R. R. Martin (b. 1948) American author and screenwriter [George Raymond Richard Martin]
Interview (2014-04-23) by Mikal Gilmore, “The Rolling Stone Interview,” Rolling Stone
(Source)

Degas, Edgar -- Quoted in Georges Jeanniot, “Souvenirs sur Degas [Memories of Degas],” La Revue Universelle (1933-10-15)

Dave — Thu, 15 Aug 2024 15:03:27 +0000

It is very good to copy what one sees; it is much better to draw what you can’t see any more but is in your memory. It is a transformation in which imagination and memory work together. You only reproduce what struck you, that is to say the necessary. There your memories and your fantasy are freed from the tyranny exercised by nature.

[C’est très bien de copier ce qu’on voit, c’est beaucoup mieux de dessiner ce que l’on ne voit plus que dans son mémoire. C’est une transformation pendant laquelle l’ingéniosité collabore avec la mémoire. Vous ne reproduisez que ce qui vous a frappé, c’est-à-dire le nécessaire. Là, vos souvenirs et votre fantaisie sont libérés de la tyrannie qu’exerce la nature.]

Edgar Degas (1834-1917) French Impressionist artist [b. Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas]
Quoted in Georges Jeanniot, “Souvenirs sur Degas [Memories of Degas],” La Revue Universelle (1933-10-15)
(Source)

The quotation is often cited to Maurice Sérullaz, L'univers de Degas (1979), but Sérullaz says he is requoting Degas from Swiss-French Impressionist painter Pierre-Georges Jeanniot.

Baum, L. Frank -- The Lost Princess of Oz, Introduction (1917)

Dave — Thu, 04 Jul 2024 17:07:36 +0000

Some of my youthful readers are developing wonderful imaginations. This pleases me. Imagination has brought mankind through the Dark Ages to its present state of civilization. Imagination led Columbus to discover America. Imagination led Franklin to discover electricity. Imagination has given us the steam engine, the telephone, the talking-machine, and the automobile, for these things had to be dreamed of before they became realities. So I believe that dreams — day dreams, you know, with your eyes wide open and your brain machinery whizzing — are likely to lead to the betterment of the world. The imaginative child will become the imaginative man or woman most apt to create, to invent, and therefore to foster civilization. A prominent educator tells me that fairy tales are of untold value in developing imagination in the young. I believe it.

L. Frank Baum (1856-1919) American author [Lyman Frank Baum]
The Lost Princess of Oz, Introduction (1917)
(Source)

Bernstein, Leonard -- Commencement Speech, Johns Hopkins University (1980-05-30)

Dave — Thu, 14 Mar 2024 15:53:13 +0000

The gift of imagination is by no means an exclusive property of the artist; it is a gift we all share; to some degree or other all of us, all of you, are endowed with the powers of fantasy.

Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer, pianist
Commencement Speech, Johns Hopkins University (1980-05-30)
(Source)

Collected in Findings: Fifty Years of Meditations on Music, Part 4 (1982).

McCarthy, Cormac -- All the Pretty Horses (1992)

Dave — Wed, 14 Feb 2024 21:22:15 +0000

Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real. The events that cause them can never be forgotten, can they?

Cormac McCarthy (1933-2023) American novelist, playwright, screenwriter
All the Pretty Horses (1992)
(Source)

Chamfort, Nicolas -- Products of Perfected Civilization [Produits de la Civilisation Perfectionée], Part 1 “Maxims and Thoughts [Maximes et Pensées],” ch. 6, ¶ 359 (1795) [tr. Dusinberre (1992)]

Dave — Mon, 06 Nov 2023 16:16:07 +0000

Love, such as it exists in high society, is merely an exchange of whims and the contact of skins.

[L’amour, tel qu’il existe dans la société, n’est que l’échange de deux fantaisies et le contact de deux épidermes.]

Nicolas Chamfort (1741-1794) French writer, epigrammist (b. Nicolas-Sébastien Roch)
Products of Perfected Civilization [Produits de la Civilisation Perfectionée], Part 1 “Maxims and Thoughts [Maximes et Pensées],” ch. 6, ¶ 359 (1795) [tr. Dusinberre (1992)]
(Source)

(Source (French)). Alternate translations:

Love as it exists in society is nothing more than the exchange of two fancies and the contact of two epidermes.
[tr. Hutchinson (1902)]

Love, as it s practiced in Society, is nothing but the exchange of two caprices and the contact of two skins.
[tr. Mathers (1926)]

Love as it exists in society is merely the mingling of two fantasies and the contact of two skins.
[tr. Merwin (1969)]

Love as it exists in society is only the exchange of two fantasies and the contact of two epidermises.
[tr. Siniscalchi (1994)]

Pratchett, Terry -- Foreword to David Pringle, ed., The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy (1999)

Dave — Fri, 05 May 2023 20:34:02 +0000

The suggestion that the world could be completely other than it is always annoys those who are content with the way things are. Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one. Rulers are suspicious of new worlds where their writ does not run. Jailers don’t like escapism.

Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Foreword to David Pringle, ed., The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy (1999)
(Source)

Often just given as "Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one."

Martin, George R. R. -- Interview (2014-04-23) by Mikal Gilmore, “The Rolling Stone Interview,” Rolling Stone

Dave — Wed, 16 Nov 2022 16:46:04 +0000

Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it’s not that simple. Tolkien can say that Aragorn became king and reigned for a hundred years, and he was wise and good. But Tolkien doesn’t ask the question: What was Aragorn’s tax policy? Did he maintain a standing army? What did he do in times of flood and famine? And what about all these orcs? By the end of the war, Sauron is gone but all of the orcs aren’t gone — they’re in the mountains. Did Aragorn pursue a policy of systematic genocide and kill them? Even the little baby orcs, in their little orc cradles?

George R. R. Martin (b. 1948) American author and screenwriter [George Raymond Richard Martin]
Interview (2014-04-23) by Mikal Gilmore, “The Rolling Stone Interview,” Rolling Stone
(Source)

Rothfuss, Patrick -- “Exploring the Edge of the Fantasy Map,” interview by Paul Goat Allen, Publisher’s Weekly (31 Jan 2011)

Dave — Mon, 10 Oct 2022 17:32:38 +0000

Fantasy is my favorite genre for reading and writing. We have more options than anyone else, and the best props and special effects. That means if you want to write a fantasy story with Norse gods, sentient robots, and telepathic dinosaurs, you can do just that. Want to throw in a vampire and a lesbian unicorn while you’re at it? Go ahead. Nothing’s off limits. But the endless possibility of the genre is a trap. It’s easy to get distracted by the glittering props available to you and forget what you’re supposed to be doing: telling a good story. Don’t get me wrong, magic is cool. But a nervous mother singing to her child at night while something moves quietly through the dark outside her house? That’s a story. Handled properly, it’s more dramatic than any apocalypse or goblin army could ever be.

Patrick Rothfuss (b. 1973) American author
“Exploring the Edge of the Fantasy Map,” interview by Paul Goat Allen, Publisher’s Weekly (31 Jan 2011)
(Source)

Morrison, Grant -- “All Star Memories: Grant Morrison on All Star Superman, Part 1,” Interview with Zack Smith, Newsarama.com (21 Oct 2008)

Dave — Fri, 19 Aug 2022 22:23:39 +0000

In the end, I saw Superman not as a superhero or even a science fiction character, but as a story of Everyman. We’re all Superman in our own adventures. We have our own Fortresses of Solitude we retreat to, with our own special collections of valued stuff, our own super-pets, our own Bottle Cities that we feel guilty for neglecting. We have our own peers and rivals and bizarre emotional or moral tangles to deal with.

Grant Morrison (b. 1960) Scottish comic book writer and playwright
“All Star Memories: Grant Morrison on All Star Superman, Part 1,” Interview with Zack Smith, Newsarama.com (21 Oct 2008)
(Source)

Morrison, Grant -- “SUPERMAN and THE AUTHORITY annotations Pt 2,” blog entry (16 Feb 2022)

Dave — Fri, 12 Aug 2022 20:52:44 +0000

This is a purely a personal bias but the desire to compel fantasy worlds to conform to the allegedly superior rules of grim reality can feel to me like a form of memetic colonialism I’ve generally found distasteful ….

Grant Morrison (b. 1960) Scottish comic book writer and playwright
“SUPERMAN and THE AUTHORITY annotations Pt 2,” blog entry (16 Feb 2022)
(Source)

Serling, Rod -- Quoted in Anne Serling, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling (2013)

Dave — Tue, 08 Mar 2022 16:08:00 +0000

A Martian can say things that a Republican or a Democrat can’t.

Rod Serling (1924-1975) American screenwriter, playwright, television producer, narrator
Quoted in Anne Serling, As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling (2013)
(Source)

On being able to slip more controversial television script ideas past networks and sponsors if done in a science fiction or fantasy setting.

McLaughlin, Mignon -- The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)

Dave — Thu, 24 Feb 2022 17:34:55 +0000

Nostalgia for what we have lost is more bearable than nostalgia for what we have never had, for the first involves knowledge and pleasure, the second only ignorance and pain.

Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)

Adams, Abigail -- Letter to Hannah Lincoln (5 Oct 1761)

Dave — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 21:56:20 +0000

Many of our disappointments and much of our unhappiness arise from our forming false notions of things and persons. We strangely impose upon ourselves; we create a fairyland of happiness. Fancy is fruitful and promises fair, but, like the dog in the fable, we catch at a shadow, and when we find the disappointment, we are vexed, not with ourselves, who are really the imposters, but with the poor, innocent thing or person of whom we have formed such strange ideas.

Abigail Adams (1744-1818) American correspondent, First Lady (1797-1801)
Letter to Hannah Lincoln (5 Oct 1761)
(Source)

Le Guin, Ursula K. -- “Escape Routes,” Galaxy (Dec 1974)

Dave — Mon, 13 Dec 2021 19:00:10 +0000

The oldest argument against SF is both the shallowest and the profoundest: the assertion that SF, like all fantasy, is escapist. […] If it’s worth answering, the best answer is given by Tolkien, author, critic, and scholar. Yes, he said, fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don’t we consider it his duty to escape? The moneylenders, the know-nothings, the authoritarians have us all in prison; if we value the freedom of the mind and soul, if we’re partisans of liberty, then it’s our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can.

Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018) American writer
“Escape Routes,” Galaxy (Dec 1974)

Reprinted in The Language of the Night (1979).

Though Le Guin makes it clear it's a paraphrase, the main body of this passage is often misrepresented as an actual quotation from J. R. R. Tolkien (and with an exclamation point on the final sentence). It was, instead, inspired by Tolkien's comments on escapism in "On Fairy-Stories" (1939).

More discussion on this quotation: Not a Tolkien quote: "Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory" - thetolkienist.com

Tolkien, J.R.R. -- “On Fairy-Stories” (1939, rev 1947)

Dave — Mon, 13 Dec 2021 18:23:43 +0000

I have claimed that Escape is one of the main functions of fairy-stories, and since I do not disapprove of them, it is plain that I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which “Escape” is now so often used: a tone for which the uses of the word outside literary criticism give no warrant at all. In what the misusers are fond of calling Real Life, Escape is evidently as a rule very practical, and may even be heroic. In real life it is difficult to blame it, unless it fails; in criticism it would seem to be the worse the better it succeeds. Evidently we are faced by a misuse of words, and also by a confusion of thought. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if, when he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls? The world outside has not become less real because the prisoner cannot see it. In using escape in this way the critics have chosen the wrong word, and, what is more, they are confusing, not always by sincere error, the Escape of the Prisoner with the Flight of the Deserter. Just so a Party-spokesman might have labelled departure from the misery of the Führer’s or any other Reich and even criticism of it as treachery.

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
“On Fairy-Stories” (1939, rev 1947)
(Source)

Hofstadter, Douglas -- “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” Herbert Spencer Lecture, Oxford (Nov 1963)

Dave — Wed, 30 Dec 2020 20:19:15 +0000

We are all sufferers from history, but the paranoid is a double sufferer, since he is afflicted not only by the real world, with the rest of us, but by his fantasies as well.

Douglas R. Hofstadter (b. 1945) American academic, cognitive scientist, author
“The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” Herbert Spencer Lecture, Oxford (Nov 1963)
(Source)

Reprinted in Harpers (Nov 1964).

Lewis, Charlton Miner -- Gawayne and the Green Knight, Canto 2 “Elfinhart” (1903)

Dave — Tue, 22 Dec 2020 21:09:56 +0000

But she pursued them through their tangled lair
And caught them, and put fire-flies in their hair;
And then they all joined hands, and round and round
They danced a morris on the moonlit ground.

Charlton Miner Lewis (1866-1923) American scholar of English literature, author
Gawayne and the Green Knight, Canto 2 “Elfinhart” (1903)
(Source)

Pratchett, Terry -- Discworld No. 20, Hogfather (1996)

Dave — Tue, 22 Dec 2020 20:49:34 +0000

“All right,” said Susan. “I’m not stupid. You’re saying humans need … fantasies to make life bearable.”
Really? As if it was some kind of pink pill? No. Humans need fantasy to be human. To be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
“Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little –”
Yes. As practice. You have to start out learning to believe the little lies.
“So we can believe the big ones?”
Yes. Justice. Mercy. Duty. That sort of thing.
“They’re not the same at all!”
You think so? Then take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy. And yet — Death waved a hand. And yet you act as if there is some ideal order in the world. As if there is some … some rightness in the universe by which it may be judged.
“Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what’s the point –”
My point exactly.

Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 20, Hogfather (1996)
(Source)

Pratchett, Terry -- Discworld Series No. 24, The Fifth Elephant [footnote] (1999)

Dave — Tue, 10 Nov 2020 17:14:20 +0000

He’d noticed that sex bore some resemblance to cookery: it fascinated people, they sometimes bought books full of complicated recipes and interesting pictures, and sometimes when they were really hungry they created vast banquets in their imagination — but at the end of the day they’d settle quite happily for egg and chips. If it was well done and maybe had a slice of tomato.

Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld Series No. 24, The Fifth Elephant [footnote] (1999)
(Source)

Nash, Ogden -- “My Dream” (1954), You Can’t Get There from Here (1957)

Dave — Fri, 07 Aug 2020 20:56:22 +0000

Here is a dream.
It is my dream,
My own dream,
I dreamt it.
I dreamt that my hair was kempt,
Then I dreamt that my true love unkempt it.

Ogden Nash (1902-1971) American poet
“My Dream” (1954), You Can’t Get There from Here (1957)
(Source)

Wharton, Edith -- French Ways and Their Meaning, ch. 4 “Intellectual Honesty” (1919)

Dave — Thu, 11 Apr 2019 00:49:22 +0000

What Mr. Howells said of the American theater is true of the whole American attitude toward life. “A tragedy with a happy ending” is exactly what the child wants before he goes to sleep: the reassurance that “all’s well with the world” as he lies in his cozy nursery. It is a good thing that the child should receive this reassurance; but as long as he needs it he remains a child, and the world he lives in is a nursery-world. Things are not always and everywhere well with the world, and each man has to find it out as he grows up. It is the finding out that makes him grow, and until he has faced the fact and digested the lesson he is not grown up — he is still in the nursery.

Edith Wharton (1862-1937) American novelist
French Ways and Their Meaning, ch. 4 “Intellectual Honesty” (1919)
(Source)

Commenting on William Dean Howells' comment to her on American taste in theater and drama: "What the American public wants is a tragedy with a happy ending."

Orwell, George -- Essay (1945-05), “Notes on Nationalism,” Polemic Magazine (1945-10)

Dave — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 15:22:53 +0000

Although endlessly brooding on power, victory, defeat, revenge, the nationalist is often somewhat uninterested in what happens in the real world. What he wants is to feel that his own unit is getting the better of some other unit, and he can more easily do this by scoring off an adversary than by examining the facts to see whether they support him.

George Orwell (1903-1950) English journalist, essayist, writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
Essay (1945-05), “Notes on Nationalism,” Polemic Magazine (1945-10)
(Source)

Dickinson, Emily -- “There is no Frigate like a Book,” ll. 1-4 (c. 1873)

Dave — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 17:39:49 +0000

There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away,
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing poetry.

Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) American poet
“There is no Frigate like a Book,” ll. 1-4 (c. 1873)
(Source)

Nicoll, James -- “SFBC 1999 June,” rec.arts.sf.written, Usenet (11 Feb 2004)

Dave — Mon, 08 Feb 2016 15:33:54 +0000

Nothin’g sa’ys q’uality fantas’y l’ike misuse’d apos’tro’phes.

James Nicoll (b. 1961) Canadian reviewer, editor
“SFBC 1999 June,” rec.arts.sf.written, Usenet (11 Feb 2004)
(Source)

Review of James Clemens's Wit'ch Storm.

Pratchett, Terry -- Interview in Leonard Marcus, The Wand in the World: Conversations with Writers of Fantasy (2006)

Dave — Wed, 08 Jul 2015 13:22:31 +0000

Fantasy is an exercise bicycle for the mind. It might not take you anywhere, but it tones up the muscles that can.

Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Interview in Leonard Marcus, The Wand in the World: Conversations with Writers of Fantasy (2006)
(Source)

This quotation is sometimes given with "But I may be wrong" as a following sentence, but that does not appear in the original.

Pasternak, Boris -- Doctor Zhivago [До́ктор Жива́го], Part 2, ch. 9 “Varykino,” sec. 14 [Yury to Larissa] (1955) [tr. Hayward & Harari (1958), UK ed.]

Dave — Wed, 01 Apr 2015 12:31:36 +0000

Man is born to live, not to prepare for life. Life itself — the gift of life — is such a breathtakingly serious thing! — Why substitute this childish harlequinade of adolescent fantasies, these schoolboy escapades?

Boris Pasternak (1890-1960) Russian poet, novelist, and literary translator
Doctor Zhivago [До́ктор Жива́го], Part 2, ch. 9 “Varykino,” sec. 14 [Yury to Larissa] (1955) [tr. Hayward & Harari (1958), UK ed.]
(Source)

Criticizing the immature aspirations of revolutionaries.

Alternate translation:

Man is born to live, not to prepare for life. Life itself, the phenomenon of life, the gift of life, is so breath-takingly serious! So why substitute this childish harlequinade of immature fantasies, these schoolboy escapades?
[tr. Hayward & Harari (1958), US ed.]

Man is born to live, not to prepare for life. And life itself, the phenomenon of life, the gift of life, is so thrillingly serious! Why then substitute for it a childish harlequinade of immature inventions, these escapes of Chekhovian schoolboys to America?
[tr. Pevear & Volokhonsky (2010)]

Stevenson, Robert Louis -- Essay (1877-07), “An Apology for Idlers,” Cornhill Magazine, Vol. 36

Dave — Wed, 04 Dec 2013 13:48:37 +0000

Books are good enough in their own way, but they are a mighty bloodless substitute for life. It seems a pity to sit, like the Lady of Shalott, peering into a mirror, with your back turned on all the bustle and glamour of reality.

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
Essay (1877-07), “An Apology for Idlers,” Cornhill Magazine, Vol. 36
(Source)

Collected in Virginibus Puerisque and Other Papers, ch. 3 (1881).

Martin, Steve -- L. A. Story (1991)

Dave — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 13:04:45 +0000

SARA: Roland thinks L.A. is a place for the brain-dead. He says, if you turned off the sprinklers, it would turn into a desert. But I think — I don’t know, it’s not what I expected. It’s a place where they’ve taken a desert and turned it into their dreams. I’ve seen a lot of L.A. and I think it’s also a place of secrets: secret houses, secret lives, secret pleasures. And no one is looking to the outside for verification that what they’re doing is all right. So what do you say, Roland?

ROLAND: I still say it’s a place for the brain-dead.

Steve Martin (b. 1945) American comedian, actor, writer, producer, musician
L. A. Story (1991)
(Source)

(Source (Video))

Martin, Steve -- L. A. Story (1991)

Dave — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 15:07:48 +0000

HARRIS: Forget for this moment smog, cars, a restaurant, skating — remember only this: a kiss may not be the truth, but it is what we wish were true.

Steve Martin (b. 1945) American comedian, actor, writer, producer, musician
L. A. Story (1991)

The above text is what is actually said in the movie. Most sources, including IMDb, use a slightly longer form of the quote, possibly from the script.

Forget for this moment the smog and the cars and the restaurant and the skating and remember only this. A kiss may not be the truth, but it is what we wish were true.

Aristotle -- Poetics [Περὶ ποιητικῆς, De Poetica], ch. 24 / 1461b.11 (c. 335 BC) [tr. Sachs (2006)]

Dave — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 14:16:37 +0000

With a view to poetry, an impossible thing that is believable is preferable to an unbelievable thing that is possible.

[πρός τε γὰρ τὴν ποίησιν αἱρετώτερον πιθανὸν ἀδύνατον ἢ ἀπίθανον καὶ δυνατόν.]

Aristotle (384-322 BC) Greek philosopher
Poetics [Περὶ ποιητικῆς, De Poetica], ch. 24 / 1461b.11 (c. 335 BC) [tr. Sachs (2006)]
(Source)

Original Greek. Alternate translations:

"The poet should prefer probable impossibilities to improbable possibilities." [tr. Butcher (1895)]
"A likely impossibility is always preferable to an unconvincing possibility." [tr. Bywater (1909)]
"You should prefer a plausible impossibility to an unconvincing possibility." [tr. Margoliouth (1911)]
"For poetic effect a convincing impossibility is preferable to that which is unconvincing though possible." [tr. Fyfe (1932)]
"Probable impossibilities are preferable to implausible possibilities." [tr. Halliwell (1986)]
"In relation to the needs of the composition, a believable impossibility is preferable to an unbelievable possibility." [tr. Janko (1987)]
"With respect to the requirement of art, the probable impossible is always preferable to the improbable possible."
"For the purposes of poetry a convincing impossibility is preferable to an unconvincing possibility."

Tolkien, J.R.R. -- The Hobbit, ch. 1 “An Unexpected Party” [Thorin, et al.] (1937)

Dave — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 07:27:26 +0000

Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away ere break of day
To seek the pale enchanted gold.

The dwarves of yore made mighty spells,
While hammers fell like ringing bells
In places deep, where dark things sleep,
In hollow halls beneath the fells.

For ancient king and elvish lord
There many a gleaming golden hoard
They shaped and wrought, and light they caught
To hide in gems on hilt of sword.

On silver necklaces they strung
The flowering stars, on crowns they hung
The dragon-fire, in twisted wire
They meshed the light of moon and sun.

Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away, ere break of day,
To claim our long-forgotten gold.

Goblets they carved there for themselves
And harps of gold; where no man delves
There lay they long, and many a song
Was sung unheard by men or elves.

The pines were roaring on the height,
The winds were moaning in the night.
The fire was red, it flaming spread;
The trees like torches blazed with light.

The bells were ringing in the dale
And men they looked up with faces pale;
The dragon’s ire more fierce than fire
Laid low their towers and houses frail.

The mountain smoked beneath the moon;
The dwarves they heard the tramp of doom.
They fled their hall to dying fall
Beneath his feet, beneath the moon.

Far over the misty mountains grim
To dungeons deep and caverns dim
We must away, ere break of day,
To win our harps and gold from him!

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
The Hobbit, ch. 1 “An Unexpected Party” [Thorin, et al.] (1937)
(Source)

Song sung by Thorin Oakenshield and the rest of his dwarvish company.

Tolkien, J.R.R. -- “On Fairy-Stories” (1939, rev 1947)

Dave — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 17:07:32 +0000

Fantasy remains a human right: we make in our measure and in our derivative mode, because we are made: and not only made, but made in the image and likeness of a Maker.

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) English writer, fabulist, philologist, academic [John Ronald Reuel Tolkien]
“On Fairy-Stories” (1939, rev 1947)
(Source)

Heinlein, Robert A. -- Glory Road, ch. 3 (1963)

Dave — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 09:17:22 +0000

I wanted the hurtling moons of Barsoom. I wanted Storisende and Poictesme, and Holmes shaking me awake to tell me, “The game’s afoot!” I wanted to float down the Mississippi on a raft and elude a mob in company with the Duke of Bilgewater and the Lost Dauphin.

I wanted Prester John, and Excalibur held by a moon-white arm out of a silent lake. I wanted to sail with Ulysses and with Tros of Samothrace and eat the lotus in a land that seemed always afternoon. I wanted the feeling of romance and the sense of wonder I had known as a kid. I wanted the world to be what they had promised me it was going to be — instead of the tawdry, lousy fouled-up mess it is.

I had had one chance — for ten minutes yesterday afternoon. Helen of Troy, whatever your true name may be — And I had known it … and I had let it slip away.

Maybe one chance is all you ever get.

Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Glory Road, ch. 3 (1963)

Brilliant, Ashleigh -- Pot-Shots, #0826

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

I have abandoned my search for truth, and am now looking for a good fantasy.

Ashleigh Brilliant (b. 1933) Anglo-American epigramist, aphorist, cartoonist
Pot-Shots, #0826

Shakespeare, William -- Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, sc. 1, l. 4 (5.1.4-6) (1605)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 19:00:00 +0000

THESEUS: Lovers and madmen have seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, sc. 1, l. 4 (5.1.4-6) (1605)
(Source)

Adams, John -- Speech (1770-12-04), “Argument in Defence of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials”

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.

John Adams (1735–1826) American lawyer, Founding Father, statesman, US President (1797–1801)
Speech (1770-12-04), “Argument in Defence of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials”
(Source)

Bovee, Christian Nestell -- Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 1 (1862)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 19:00:00 +0000

No man is happy without a delusion of some kind. Delusions are as necessary to our happiness as realities.

Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 1 (1862)

Watterson, Bill -- Calvin and Hobbes (1992-09-19)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

CALVIN: I’m a simple man, Hobbes.

HOBBES: You?? Yesterday you wanted a nuclear powered car that could turn into a jet with laser-guided heat-seeking missiles!

CALVIN: I’m a simple man with complex tastes.

Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin and Hobbes (1992-09-19)
(Source)

Lewis, C.S. -- “On Three Ways of Writing for Children,” lecture, Library Association Bournemouth Conference (29 Apr – 2 May 1952)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) English writer, literary scholar, lay theologian [Clive Staples Lewis]
“On Three Ways of Writing for Children,” lecture, Library Association Bournemouth Conference (29 Apr – 2 May 1952)
(Source)

Reprinted in On Stories (1966). Referencing 1 Corinthians 13:11.

Thoreau, Henry David -- Walden; or, Life in the Woods, ch. 18 “Conclusion” (1854)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) American philosopher and writer
Walden; or, Life in the Woods, ch. 18 “Conclusion” (1854)
(Source)