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Do nothing because it is righteous or praiseworthy or noble to do so do nothing because it seems good to do so do only that which you must do and which you cannot do in any other way.

Ursula K. Le Guin

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Ursula K. Le Guin
Age: 88 †
Born: 1929
Born: October 21
Died: 2018
Died: January 22
Author
Feminist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Prosaist
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Translator
Writer
Berkeley
California
Ursula Kroeber
Ursula Kroeber Le Guin
Way
Good
Praiseworthy
Righteous
Noble
Cannot
Seems
Nothing
Must

More quotes by Ursula K. Le Guin

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And I speak of spiritual suffering! Of people seeing their talent, their work, their lives wasted. Of good minds submitting to stupid ones. Of strength and courage strangled by envy, greed for power, fear of change. Change is freedom, change is life
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Truth is a matter of the imagination. The soundest fact may fail or prevail in the style of its telling: like that singular organic jewel of our seas, which grows brighter as one woman wears it and, worn by another, dulls and goes to dust.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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I came into science fiction at a very good time, when the doors were getting thrown open to all kinds of more experimental writing, more literary writing, riskier writing. It wasn't all imitation Heinlein or Asimov. And of course, women were creeping in, infiltrating. Infesting the premises.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Only in silence the word, only in dark the light, only in dying life: bright the hawk's flight on the empty sky.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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All or nothing at all, the true lover says, and that's the truth of it. My love will never die, he says. He claims eternity. And rightly. How can it die when it's life itself? What do we know of eternity but the glimpse we get of it when we enter in that bond?
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Great self-destruction follows upon unfounded fear.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Everything gives way before the recurring torment and festivity of passion.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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To me the female principle is, or at least historically has been, basically anarchic. It values order without constraint, rule by custom not by force. It has been the male who enforces order, who constructs power structures, who makes, enforces, and breaks laws.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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... the habit of literature [is] the best defense against believing the half-truths of ideologues and the lies of demagogues.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Sure, it's simple, writing for kids... Just as simple as bringing them up.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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The king was pregnant.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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As a kitten does what all other kittens do, so a child wants to do what other children do, with a wanting that is as powerful as it is mindless. Since we human beings have to learn what we do, we have to start out that way, but human mindfulness begins where that wish to be the same leaves off.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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Paradise is for those who make paradise.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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I've got some gift for languages. You follow your gift. But Latin's not easy.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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A man does not make his destiny: he accepts it or denies it.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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By such literalism, fundamentalism, religions betrayed the best intentions of their founders. Reducing thought to formula, replacing choice by obedience, these preachers turned the living word into dead law.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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A profound love between two people involves, after all, the power and chance of doing profound hurt.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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By and large books are mankind's best invention.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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To claim power over what you do not understand is not wise, nor is the end of it likely to be good.
Ursula K. Le Guin
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What else can the young be? When you are on the bottom, you must organize from the bottom up
Ursula K. Le Guin