CHARLES DE LINT QUOTES
Canadian writer (1951- )
God doesn't do anything to us. He doesn't have to. We're too busy doing it to each other.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
I like living in the city where I have all my books and music and can go out to buy that night's dinner or easily see a band. But I also like the wild places, especially hiking in the desert and the Eastern woodlands. Do I have to choose?
CHARLES DE LINT
interview with Kim Antieau, April 28, 2008
One cannot seek to uphold honor in a being that has none.
CHARLES DE LINT
Moonheart
The thing with pretending you're in a good mood is that sometimes you can actually trick yourself into feeling better.
CHARLES DE LINT
"Journal Entries", Memory and Dream
You know how we'd get along better? If everybody'd just remember how we're all related. White, black, Asian, skin. No difference. All the bloodlines go back to that one old mama in Africa.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
Don't forget -- no one else sees the world the way you do, so no one else can tell the stories that you have to tell.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Blue Girl
People didn't realize it, but they needed myths to survive, just as much now as when their forebears were alive. Perhaps more. Mythology embodied the world's dreams, helped to make sense of the great human problems. Just as the dreams of individuals exist to give subconscious support to their conscious lives, so do myths serve as society's dreams. They uncover the dark, hidden places where mysteries dwell and can turn to nightmare if left untended. They make sense of injustice in archetypal terms. They give men and women a blueprint for how they may respond to success or failure, tragedy or joy.
CHARLES DE LINT
I'll Be Watching You
Fairy tales and mythology have always been an exaggerated distillation of the real world. Think of them as blueprints for how to deal with a multitude of situations that can arise in a person's life. The beauty of them is that their analogies resonate so deeply and they also entertain while they teach.
CHARLES DE LINT
"One Thing Leads to Another: An Interview with Charles de Lint", The Yalsa Hub, September 19, 2013
Children are the brightest treasures we bring forth into this world, but too large a percentage of the population continues to treat them as inconveniences and nuisances, when they're not treating them as possessions or toys.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
Magic lies in between things, between the day and the night, between yellow and blue, between any two things.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
I don't want to live in the kind of world where we don't look out for each other. Not just the people that are close to us, but anybody who needs a helping hand. I cant change the way anybody else thinks, or what they choose to do, but I can do my bit.
CHARLES DE LINT
Someplace to Be Flying
The thing to remember when you're writing is, it's not whether or not what you put on paper is true. It's whether it wakes a truth in your reader.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Blue Girl
As far as I'm concerned, the only difference between fact and what most people call fiction is about fifteen pages in the dictionary.
CHARLES DE LINT
"Tallulah", Dreams Underfoot: The Newford Collection
The fey wonders of the world only exist while there are those with the sight to see them.
CHARLES DE LINT
Into the Green
Well, while I didn't have the more extreme experiences of some of my characters, I didn't exactly come from the most normal of households. Or rather, it was normal, in that dysfunctional families appear to be the norm.
CHARLES DE LINT
"A Conversation With Charles de Lint", SFsite, 2000
I had the same questions for Superman as I did for God: If he was so powerful, why didn't he deal with some real problems? Why didn't he stop wars, feed the starving in Ethiopia, cure cancer? At least God had the Church to do His PR work for Him -- if you can buy their reasoning, they have any number of explanations ranging from how the troubles of this life build character to that inarguable catchall, "God's will." And the crap in this life sure makes heaven look good. When I was growing up, the writers and artists of Superman never even tried to deal with the problem. And since they didn't, I could only see Superman as a monster, not a hero. I couldn't believe his battles with criminals, superpowered geniuses and the like. I never believed in God either.
CHARLES DE LINT
"Bird Bones and Wood Ash", The Ivory and the Horn
I don't think the world works on merit.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
The past scampers like an alley cat through the present, leaving the paw prints of memories scattered helter-skelter.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl
We're so quick to cut away pieces of ourselves to suit a particular relationship, a job, a circle of friends, incessantly editing who we are until we fit in.
CHARLES DE LINT
Happily Ever After
In the dark attics of our minds, all times mingle.
CHARLES DE LINT
The Onion Girl