Charles De Lint Quotes

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Write from the heart, what has meaning to you personally; have the patience and discipline to sit down and do it every day whether you're feeling inspired or not; never be afraid to take chances, in fact, make sure you take chances. As soon as you become complacent, you become boring ... Read as much as possible, not simply in the genre, or what you think you're interested in, but other things as well.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Write from the heart, what
I'd say that any character or setting can be given a bit of an otherworldly sheen and be the better for it. The one thing I insist on with my own writing is that I won't let magic solve my characters' real world problems. The solutions have to come from the characters themselves.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I'd say that any character
I've always been aware of the otherworld, of spirits that exist in that twilight place that lies in the corner of our eyes, of fairie and stranger things still that we spy only when we're not really paying attention to them, whispers and flickering shadows, here one moment, gone the instant we turn our heads for a closer look. But I couldn't always find them. And when I did, for a long time I thought they were only this excess of imagination that I carry around inside me, that somehow it was leaking out of me into the world.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I've always been aware of
I've always been interested in the outsider.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I've always been interested in
That's the thing about magic; you've got to know it's still here, all around us, or it just stays invisible for you.
Charles De Lint Quotes: That's the thing about magic;
To me there's no difference between writing YA and adult except that in YA I make the book a little shorter and the protagonists are teens. The difference is in the readers.
Charles De Lint Quotes: To me there's no difference
The beginning of a friendship, the fact that two people out of the thousands around them can meet and connect and become friends, seems like a kind of magic to me. But maintaining a friendship requires work. I don't mean that as a bad thing. Good art requires work as well.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The beginning of a friendship,
You've got to spread out as far as you can, cut down a whole forest, irrigate a whole desert, just to make sure that you won't accidentally stumble upon a place that's still in its natural state.
Charles De Lint Quotes: You've got to spread out
I think a good writer is a mix of confidence (sure that what they're writing is going to appeal to their readers) and uncertainty (what if all these words are crap?). If you're too confident, you get an attitude that seeps through into your writing, affecting the characters and the story. If you're too uncertain, you'll never finish anything.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I think a good writer
There's more to life than just surviving ... but ... sometimes just surviving is all you get
Charles De Lint Quotes: There's more to life than
All my life I've wanted to be the kid who gets to cross over into the magical kingdom.
Charles De Lint Quotes: All my life I've wanted
Every book tells a different story to the person who reads it. How they perceive that book will depend on who they are. A good book reflects the reader, as much as it illuminates the author's text.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Every book tells a different
The past scampers like an alley cat through the present, leaving the paw prints of memories scattered helter-skelter.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The past scampers like an
[She] had felt straight away that she wasn't meeting a new friend, but recognizing an old one.
Charles De Lint Quotes: [She] had felt straight away
There is no plan, no future laid out for any of us beyond what we make for ourselves.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There is no plan, no
People want to know those details. They think it gives them greater insight into a piece of art, but when they approach a painting in such a manner, they are belittling both the artist's work and their own ability to experience it. Each painting I do says everything I want to say on its subject and in terms of that painting, and not all the trivia in the world concerning my private life will give the viewer more insight into it than what hangs there before their eyes. Frankly, as far as I'm concerned, even titling a work is an unnecessary concession.
Charles De Lint Quotes: People want to know those
It's all a matter of paying attention, being awake in the present moment, and not expecting a huge payoff. The magic in this world seems to work in whispers and small kindnesses.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It's all a matter of
What if time's not linear, the way people think it is? What if the past, present and future are all going on at the same time, only they're separated by- oh, I don't know- a kind of gauze or something. And maybe there are people that can see through that gauze.
Charles De Lint Quotes: What if time's not linear,
It's easy to believe in magic when you're young. Anything you couldn't explain was magic then. It didn't matter if it was science or a fairy tale. Electricity and elves were both infinitely mysterious and equally possible - elves probably more so.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It's easy to believe in
We end up stumbling our way through the forest, never seeing all the unexpected and wonderful possibilities and potentials because we're looking for the idea of a tree, instead of appreciating the actual trees in front of us.
Charles De Lint Quotes: We end up stumbling our
If you're not ready to die, then how can you live?
Charles De Lint Quotes: If you're not ready to
Sculptors, poets, painters, musicians-they're the traditional purveyors of Beauty. But it can as easily be created by a gardener, a farmer, a plumber, a careworker.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Sculptors, poets, painters, musicians-they're the
The family we choose for ourselves is more important than the one we were born into; that people have to earn our respect and trust, not have it handed to them simply because of genetics.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The family we choose for
There was too much going on here
too much that strayed from odd all the way over into seriously weird.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There was too much going
The trouble with advice is that it's usually something you don't want to hear.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The trouble with advice is
Faerie music is the wind", he says, "and their movement is the play of shadow cast by moonlight, or starlight, or no light at all. Faerie lives like a ghost beside us, but only the city remembers. But then the city never forgets anything.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Faerie music is the wind
An now the silences come in a single lifetime, in a single year ... when species die, leaving a silent space in the world song that can never be filled.
Charles De Lint Quotes: An now the silences come
I believe in a different kind of magic. The kind we make between each other.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I believe in a different
Magic's never what you expect it to be, but it's often what you need.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Magic's never what you expect
My theory about writing is that one should write books you'd like to read, but no one else has written yet. So, as long as I stick with that, I'm entertaining myself, and then hopefully my readers as well. I hope to god I realize that I'm repeating myself, if I ever do. But if I don't, I'm sure my readers will let me know.
Charles De Lint Quotes: My theory about writing is
On a quiet day, when the wind was still, the creek could be heard all the way up to where the old beech stood. Under its branches, cats would come to dream and be dreamed. Black cats and calicos, white cats and marmalade ones, too. But they hadn't yet gathered on the day the orphan girl fell asleep among its roots, nestling in the weeds and long grass like the gangly, tousle-haired girl she was.

Her name was Lillian.
Charles De Lint Quotes: On a quiet day, when
Beauty isn't what you see on TV or in magazine ads or even necessarily in art galleries. It's a lot deeper and a lot simpler than that. It's realizing the goodness of things, it's leaving the world a little better than it was before you got here. It's appreciating the inspiration of the world around you and trying to inspire others.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Beauty isn't what you see
You hear this kind of thing, rednecks and their guys and--"
"Don't call them that," I say. "They're just assholes. Most people you run into around here...well, maybe they won't like the length of your hair, but they'll keep their feelings to themselves.
Charles De Lint Quotes: You hear this kind of
Ghosts were just a way that some stupid people dealt with their dull lives.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Ghosts were just a way
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 Quotes: Don't forget - no one
If you don't believe that the world has a heart, then you won't hear it beating, you won't think it's alive and you won't consider what you're doing to it.
Charles De Lint Quotes: If you don't believe that
How hard would it be to ask children what they see in their heads? How big should the house be in comparison to the family standing in front of it? What is it about the anatomy of the people that doesn't look right? Then let them try it again. Teach them to learn how to see and ask questions.
Charles De Lint Quotes: How hard would it be
I can't imagine it now, but I must've been innocent at some time in my life. A baby don't just get itself born bad, do it?
Charles De Lint Quotes: I can't imagine it now,
All forests are one... They are all echoes of the first forest that gave birth to Mystery when the world began.
Charles De Lint Quotes: All forests are one... They
We chase after ghosts and spirits and are left holding only memories and dreams. It's not that we want what we can't have; it's that we've held all we could want and then had to watch it slip away.
Charles De Lint Quotes: We chase after ghosts and
You can't stand up to the night until you understand what's hiding in its shadows.
Charles De Lint Quotes: You can't stand up to
It reminded me of that tongue-in-cheek quick history of art I'd overheard ... Used to be people couldn't draw very well, then they could, and now they can't again.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It reminded me of that
I was going through the motions of life, instead of really living, and there's no excuse for that. It's not something I'll let happen to me again.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I was going through the
In the dark attics of our minds, all times mingle.
Charles De Lint Quotes: In the dark attics of
Magic lies in between things, between the day and the night, between yellow and blue, between any two things.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Magic lies in between things,
The excitement I get from writing is finding out each day what happens next.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The excitement I get from
The minutes dragged by as they only did when you had no choice but to wait for something.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The minutes dragged by as
There's bad apples in whatever way you want to group people - doesn't matter if it's religious, political or social. The big mistake is generalizing.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There's bad apples in whatever
Lies were like having a pregnant rabbit. One day you had one, but before you knew it, there were rabbits all over the place.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Lies were like having a
Sometimes we wonder what it's like to feel normal," Maida said. "You know, like all the people you see out on the streets or sitting in their little boxy homes."

...

"But then", Maida went on, "we see how boring they are and we're happy to be the way we are.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Sometimes we wonder what it's
Why did men worship in churches, locking themselves away in the dark, when the world lay beyond its doors in all its real glory?
Charles De Lint Quotes: Why did men worship in
You must always confront your fears," Goon said as though she hadn't spoken. "Then skulking monsters become merely unfamiliar shadows, thrown by a tree bough. Whispering voices are just the wind. The wild flare of panic is merely a burst of emotion, not a terror spell cast by some evil witch.
Charles De Lint Quotes: You must always confront your
What we take from the spirit world is only a reflection of what lies inside ourselves.
Charles De Lint Quotes: What we take from the
A body of work may be reviled
mostly by those who have no knowledge of its workings
and yet still carry elements of what can only be considered eternal truths.
Charles De Lint Quotes: A body of work may
I've always known and been interested in people who are a little bit off the norm. I like to call attention to the idea that they are there, that they are real people, not invisible.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I've always known and been
The lonesome dark.
That's what Jack called a night like this. When you were distanced from everything and everybody. Out on your own and there was nobody to care if you were happy or sad. If you lived or died.
The lonesome dark hadn't existed in the old days. That was something people invented. Like time. Parcel up the days, parcel up the seasons. Add a minute here, a day there when it doesn't quite fit. Trim the square peg so that you could slide it into the round hole. In the old days the night was as open as the day. It wasn't a better place to hide because there was nothing to hide from. You weren't outside because there was no in.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The lonesome dark.<br />That's what
When one of my characters becomes aware of a magical element, it might be because the world is wider than we assume it to be, but it might also be a reminder to pay attention to what is here already, hidden only because it's been forgotten.
Charles De Lint Quotes: When one of my characters
Books and music saved me as a teenager because it was through them that I realized that I wasn't alone in my obsessive love for words and music.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Books and music saved me
Thing is, while I know better, I like sounding ignorant. Talk like this and people figure you're about as dumb as a fencepost, which suits me fine. Makes it all that much easier to take advantage of 'em.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Thing is, while I know
I don't actually talk about my books much, because I find if I talk about them I don't want to write them anymore. I write to find out what happens. You know how you read a book? That's what I'm doing except I'm just doing it a lot slower because it takes a lot longer to do.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I don't actually talk about
There's nothing wrong with a youthful prospective. Don't forget- no one else sees the world the way you do, so no one else can tell the stories you have to tell.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There's nothing wrong with a
Yes, no. I don't know. It's all so confusing. I'm just a kid."
Abuelo smiled. "You kept saying that while you told me your story, but what does it mean?"
"That I'm too young to have to be making decisions like this."
"You're never too young to do the right thing," Abuelo said.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Yes, no. I don't know.
By enlarging your knowledge of things, you will find your knowledge of self is enlarged.
Charles De Lint Quotes: By enlarging your knowledge of
It's not all about getting your own way. Sometimes there's a bigger picture.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It's not all about getting
We are wise women," Abuela liked to say. "Not because we are wise, but because we seek wisdom.
Charles De Lint Quotes: We are wise women,
I never even considered writing a career option. I just liked the play of words. I was certainly interested in story, but the stories I was telling then were in narrative verse and prose poems, short and succinct, except for one novel-length poem written in narrative couplets.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I never even considered writing
Growing up, I'd already decided I wanted to be a beatnik. A Bohemian poet, I thought. Or a musician. Maybe an artist. I'd dress in black turtlenecks and smoke Gitanes. I'd listen to cool jazz in clubs, getting up to read devastating truths from my notebook, leaning against the microphone, cigarette dangling from my hand.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Growing up, I'd already decided
Let me give you some advice: Try to approach things without preconceived ideas, without supposing you already know everything there is to know about them. Get that trick down and you'll be surprised at what's really all around you.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Let me give you some
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 Quotes: People didn't realize it, but
There was dusting and sweeping to do, books to be put away. Lovely books. It didn't matter to Dick if they were serious leather-bound tomes or paperbacks with garish covers. He loved them all, for they were filled with words, and words were magic to this hob. Wise and clever humans had used some marvelous spell to imbue each book with every kind of story and character you could imagine, and many you couldn't. If you knew the key to unlock the words, you could experience them all - Pixel Pixies
Charles De Lint Quotes: There was dusting and sweeping
My characters seem real because they are drawn from the realities of my life. I didn't have to research their pain; I just tapped into my own.
Charles De Lint Quotes: My characters seem real because
He's this Goth dude, can control people." "Goth, like a Visigoth German Viking of the middle ages, or a Neil Gaiman-looking, Robert Smith, make-up-and-moonbeams Cure fan?" "What's a Neil Gaiman?" "You're an idiot.
Charles De Lint Quotes: He's this Goth dude, can
Years ago, when I was about to go on a book tour for Someplace to Be Flying, my editor at the time Terri Windling and I sat down to figure out what to call what I was writing for the interviews that were to come. Terri came up with the term mythic fiction and I think that sums it up perfectly. There are almost invariably mythic elements in my fiction (as well as bits of folk and faerie lore) and the term doesn't lock me into writing only in an urban setting since many of my stories take place in rural areas. It never caught on, but when I don't describe what I do as simply fiction, I'll go with mythic fiction.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Years ago, when I was
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 Quotes: We're so quick to cut
It seems like I always wrote, I just didn't think of it as a career choice. I just liked to tell stories ... to myself, to pen pals (I had a lot of them, all over the world). Of course this was in the days before computers were everywhere, and anyone could access the Web. You had to make an effort keeping up a correspondence, and the arrival of the mail once a day was a big deal. I think if modern technology had been around when I was a kid, I would never have left my bedroom except to take the dogs out for their run three times a day.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It seems like I always
Compromise is necessary ... so long as you never give up who you are. That isn't compromise; that's spiritual death. You have to remain true to yourself.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Compromise is necessary ... so
As children, we come into the world with a natural desire to both speak and draw. Society makes sure that we learn language properly, right from the beginning, but art is treated as a gift of innate genius, something we either have or don't.
Charles De Lint Quotes: As children, we come into
If all the darkness each of us carries within us, all our angers and unhappiness and bad moments were pulled out of us and given shape, we would all create monsters.
Charles De Lint Quotes: If all the darkness each
Only fools think they're wise; the rest of us just muddle through as we can.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Only fools think they're wise;
I'm not Chinese. I thrive in interesting times.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I'm not Chinese. I thrive
The problem with children is that you have to put up with their parents.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The problem with children is
There isn't a single day I don't do some writing
if you don't, you won't have a book. When you're self-employed it is very easy to burn away your time instead
answering e-mails, surfing the Internet, or hanging out with friends. You really must have the discipline to sit down and write every day. Most of what I am writing is living in the back of my head or in my subconscious. I find if I write every day, my subconscious will do the job for me.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There isn't a single day
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 Quotes: Fairy tales and mythology have
Well, you know this world isn't perfect.' 'No, you're wrong. This world IS perfect, people just come along and mess it up sometimes.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Well, you know this world
There are as many stories to be told as there are people to tell them about; only the mean-spirited would consider there to be a competition at all.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There are as many stories
It's my diary", she'd explained. "Every mark I've had drawn on my skin connects me to where and who I've been- so I never forget who I am and how I got here."There was humour in the smile she offered him. "And you know what the real beauty of it is?"
Hank had shaken his head.
"Nobody can take it away.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It's my diary
I wouldn't like to live in a world where everything's as cut-and-dried as most people think it is
Charles De Lint Quotes: I wouldn't like to live
She knew this music
knew it down to the very core of her being
but she had never heard it before. Unfamiliar, it had still always been there inside her, waiting to be woken. It grew from the core of mystery that gives a secret its special delight, religion its awe. It demanded to be accepted by simple faith, not dissected or questioned, and at the same time, it begged to be doubted and probed.
Charles De Lint Quotes: She knew this music<br>knew it
She wanted to tell him what happened wasn't really his fault, but she knew that wasn't the way this kind of guilt worked. Intellectually, he already knew that. It was his emotions that were tripping him up. The tangle of love and memory and what might have been.
Charles De Lint Quotes: She wanted to tell him
I write on a computer, but I've run the complete gambit. When I was very young, I wrote with a ballpoint pen in school notebooks. Then I got pretentious and started writing with a dip pen on parchment (I wrote at least a novel-length poem that way). Moved on to a fountain pen. Then a typewriter, then an electric self-correct. Then someone gave me a word processor and I was amazed at being able to fit ten pages on one of those floppy discs.
Charles De Lint Quotes: I write on a computer,
The only real reason for self-referencing is the fun factor. It's fun for the writer, getting little peeks at what old characters might be up to. And it's fun for readers to spot a familiar face, or pick up on a made-up book title or something from an earlier story. I don't know that it does
or even should
contribute to the story in hand being any better than it would have been without it.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The only real reason for
So she goes to see the Old Man of the Mountains–looks just like you, Bear. Same face, same hair. A big old bear, sitting up there on the top of the mountain, looking out at everything below. Doesn't smile so much, but understands how everybody's got a secret dark place sits way deep down there inside, hidden but wanting to get out. Understands how you can be happy but not happy at the same time. Understands that sometimes you feel you got to go all the way out to get back in, but if you do, you can't. There's no way back in.
Charles De Lint Quotes: So she goes to see
There was nothing wrong with being a homebody. There was nothing wrong with not wanting - not needing - the constant jostle and noise of a party or bar or... whatever.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There was nothing wrong with
Not everything has to mean something. Some things just are.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Not everything has to mean
The old gods and their magics did not dwindle away into murky memories of brownies and little fairies more at home in a Disney cartoon; rather, they changed. The coming of Christ and Christians actually freed them. They were no longer bound to people's expectations but could now become anything that they could imagine themselves to be. They are still here, walking among us. We just don't recognize them anymore.
Charles De Lint Quotes: The old gods and their
It is so easy for your people to forget that everything has a spirit, that all are equal. That magic and mystery are a part of your lives, not something to store away in a child's bedroom, or to use as an escape from your lives.
Charles De Lint Quotes: It is so easy for
One of my favourite things to do when I write is to bring a sense of wonder to a normal everyday setting... Yes, there are magical elements, but there are also very down-to-earth elements and often what shines through isn't the magic, but the lanterns that the characters light against the dark... If you substitute the words "fairy tale" or "myth" for "fantasy," the reason I use these elements in my own work is that they create resonances that illuminate solutions to the real world struggle without the need for an authorial voice to point them out. Magic never solves the problems–we have to do that on our own–but in fiction it allows the dialogue to have a much more organic approach than the talking heads one can encounter in fiction that doesn't utilize the same tools.

[from the interview Year's Best 2012: Charles de Lint on "A Tangle of Green Men"]
Charles De Lint Quotes: One of my favourite things
There's something wrong inside of me," she said. "I don't know at it is. It feels big and heavy and sometimes it makes it hard to breathe." She lifted her hands eyes. "And tears keep leaking out of my eyes. Is this what sadness feels like?" "That's what it feels like for me." I replied. "It's funny. I've heard about it in a lot of the stories I've collected, but I never knew it felt like this before." She sighed "it's so heavy......"
"I know." I replied "I know.
Charles De Lint Quotes: There's something wrong inside of
Labels don't mean much to me one way or another
except when they close the minds of potential readers. I'd much rather we do away with genres and simply file everything under fiction. I know it can work
one of my favourite record stores (Waterloo Music in Austin) simply files everything alphabetically and no one seems to have much problem finding what they're looking for.
Charles De Lint Quotes: Labels don't mean much to
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 Quotes: Children are the brightest treasures
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