Feminist Fantasy Quotes

I have a lot of fantasies about being tied up and spanked. I suppose it isn't very liberated, is it? What kind of fantasies do feminists have? ~ J. F. Lawton

A woman of battle cannot take the same risks as a woman of the fields or a woman of the town. One may not strap a baby basket to one's back along with one's swords and ride off to battle.
Renda of Brannagh, ~ Jordan MacLean

When a band means a lot to you, you build the fantasy more than the reality. Always. ~ Stephen Malkmus

I wanted to give you something that would last forever. Something that would surpass the world, that would still be alive and bright even after you passed away. Something beautiful. For your eyes and smile only. But I never found it. All I could give you is words. Words which were as fleeting as the heartbeats that shook my soul whenever you looked my way. ~ F.K. Preston

When she had arranged her household affairs, she came to the library and bade me follow her. Then, with the mirror still swinging against her knees, she led me through the garden and the wilderness down to a misty wood. It being autumn, the trees were tinted gloriously in dusky bars of colouring. The rowan, with his amber leaves and scarlet berries, stood before the brown black-spotted sycamore; the silver beech flaunted his golden coins against my poverty; firs, green and fawn-hued, slumbered in hazy gossamer. No bird carolled, although the sun was hot. Marina noted the absence of sound, and without prelude of any kind began to sing from the ballad of the Witch Mother: about the nine enchanted knots, and the trouble-comb in the lady's knotted hair, and the master-kid that ran beneath her couch. Every drop of my blood froze in dread, for whilst she sang her face took on the majesty of one who traffics with infernal powers. As the shade of the trees fell over her, and we passed intermittently out of the light, I saw that her eyes glittered like rings of sapphires.

("The Basilisk") ~ R. Murray Gilchrist

I eat, sleep, and drink my character. It is my fantasy to go to another planet. ~ Ace Frehley

She's dressed in a white her soul doesn't reflect, a drop-dead beauty with drop-dead morals. ~ Halo Scot

You don't even know me, or what I am capable of, boy. ~ S.R. Crawford

...many people prefer the comfort of fantasy to the harshness of reality. They seem to reason this way: 'How can I arrange my beliefs so I'll feel most comfortable?' rather than arranging them to agree with reality. ~ Howard Kahane

What Foundling does isn't thinking outside the box so much as stealing the box and hitting her opponents with it until they stop moving."
– Extract from "A Commentary on the Uncivil Wars", by Juniper of the Red Moon Clan ~ ErraticErrata

To cherish my purity and set boundaries are, in my opinion, the highest forms of feminism - a woman who saves her body proves she is strong and secure enough to resist the men who seek to claim her, that she's more than what lies between her legs. ~ Caroline George

If you rescue me from my pipe dreams, I'll stop smoking fantasies. ~ Munia Khan

I stood here

in this kitchen

elaborating and embellishing this fantasy for some time instead of taking responsibility for what was happening around me because in truth what really tormented me was that all this filth and disorder offended my engineer's sense of structure, everything out of place and proper alignment, everything gathering towards some point of chaos beyond which it would be impossible to restore the place to its proper order and yet I stood looking at it, locked into a silent battle with the house itself and all the things which were slowly vacating their proper place, furniture and dishes and cutlery all over the place, curtains hanging awry and chairs and tables strewn about while books and papers slid across the floor, everything slowly shifting through the house as if they had a meeting to keep somewhere else, possibly in some higher realm where all this chaos would resolve into a refined harmony which had no need of my hand or intervention ~ Mike McCormack

I do not think, Prospero,' he said, 'that one should attribute a very high degree of reality to your house. ~ John Bellairs

And once upon a time I wondered: Is writing epic fantasy not somehow a betrayal? Did I not somehow do a disservice to my own reality by paying so much attention to the power fantasies of disenchanted white men?

But. Epic fantasy is not merely what Tolkien made it.

This genre is rooted in the epic - and the truth is that there are plenty of epics out there which feature people like me. Sundiata's badass mother. Dihya, warrior queen of the Amazighs. The Rain Queens. The Mino Warriors. Hatshepsut's reign. Everything Harriet Tubman ever did. And more, so much more, just within the African components of my heritage. I haven't even begun to explore the non-African stuff. So given all these myths, all these examinations of the possible… how can I not imagine more? How can I not envision an epic set somewhere other than medieval England, about someone other than an awkward white boy? How can I not use every building-block of my history and heritage and imagination when I make shit up?

And how dare I disrespect that history, profane all my ancestors' suffering and struggles, by giving up the freedom to imagine that they've won for me. ~ N.K. Jemisin

Well, I don't think of myself as a feminist at all. As soon as we start labeling and categorizing ourselves and others, that's going to shut down the world. ~ Melissa Leo

So, I show my uncovered scars
with a sense of pride.
Damn you and damn me.
If we cross swords, neither of us will survive. ~ Anne Fall

Frown deepening, Jared bounces a hand off the chair arm. 'You know you're different, Princess. And it's not just because you're some fancy, spoiled rich girl. Hell, you don't smell like anyone else. Money can't buy that smell.' I assume he wasn't talking about my expensive perfume, which money did in fact buy. ~ L.E. Sterling

She has been hanging on to the hope of him for so long that she doesn't realize there isn't anything left to hope for. ~ David Levithan

I took 'em because nobody else had found 'em yet. I brought 'em here ta be protected from mortals that didn't know the kinda power they once had, that might try ta unlock it again. ~ Eric Nierstedt

We all behave like Maxwell's demon. Organisms organize. In everyday experience lies the reason sober physicists across two centuries kept this cartoon fantasy alive. We sort the mail, build sand castles, solve jigsaw puzzles, separate wheat from chaff, rearrange chess pieces, collect stamps, alphabetize books, create symmetry, compose sonnets and sonatas, and put our rooms in order, and all this we do requires no great energy, as long as we can apply intelligence. We propagate structure (not just we humans but we who are alive). We disturb the tendency toward equilibrium. It would be absurd to attempt a thermodynamic accounting for such processes, but it is not absurd to say we are reducing entropy, piece by piece. Bit by bit. The original demon, discerning one molecules at a time, distinguishing fast from slow, and operating his little gateway, is sometimes described as "superintelligent," but compared to a real organism it is an idiot savant. Not only do living things lessen the disorder in their environments; they are in themselves, their skeletons and their flesh, vesicles and membranes, shells and carapaces, leaves and blossoms, circulatory systems and metabolic pathways - miracles of pattern and structure. It sometimes seems as if curbing entropy is our quixotic purpose in the universe. ~ James Gleick

Kiss me good."
Jordan went on tiptoe and kissed him with everything she had. His mouth mashed against hers just as greedily, tongues tangling, hearts beating wildly against each other. The embrace of his arms tightened, and he lifted her. She didn't need a stupid floor with him near. Together they could fly.
"Bow chicks wow wow," said another voice. ~ Erin Kellison

Horeb bent over me and ran his hand down my neck, not stopping when his fingers reached my chest.
I jerked backward. "What are you doing?"
His eyes were black and intense. "A little taste before the wedding, Jayden? ~ Kimberley Griffiths Little

I got a crash-course education in urban fantasy. I suddenly had to look up all these other writers I was supposed to be in a genre with. I instantly had to become an expert in this genre I knew almost nothing about. ~ Carrie Vaughn

If feminism wasn't powerful, if feminism wasn't influential, people wouldn't spend so much time putting it down. ~ Jessica Valenti

People talk about mainstream fiction and sf as though they were two quite different kinds of writing, and fantasy as well, as though it was quite different. But I think this a false distinction, that it is a labelling that helps librarians, and people who know the kind of thing they like and don't want their prejudices to be disturbed. ~ Angela Carter

Women create an idealized, hopeful vision for the future to inspire other women. Fiction and fantasy are the crucial first steps to changing the world. ~ Maya Rodale

Before i launch into a discussion of what a nerd is and where the idea of nerds comes from, I'd like to diclose that when i was eleven, I had a rich fantasy life in which I carried a glowing staff. ~ Benjamin Nugent

Labelling is no longer a liberating political act but a necessity in order to gain entrance into the academic industrial complex and other discussions and spaces. For example, if so called "radical" or "progressive" people don't hear enough "buzz" words (like feminist, anti-oppression, anti-racist, social justice, etc.) in your introduction, then you are deemed unworthy and not knowledgeable enough to speak with authority on issues that you have lived experience with. The criteria for identifying as a feminist by academic institutions, peer reviewed journals, national bodies, conferences, and other knowledge gatekeepers is very exclusive. It is based on academic theory instead of based on lived experiences or values. Name-dropping is so elitist! You're not a "real" feminist unless you can quote, or have read the following white women: (insert Women's Studies 101 readings). ~ Krysta Williams

You do not believe in the magic and power of this book only because you cannot comprehend that it is possible. The lack of faith of your part does not make the power less capable or less real...You only have to open up your mind to the possibilities. There is a sea of power out there, all around us. It doesn't wait until someone believes in order for it to exist. It just does."
-Madison Thorne Grey, Sustenance ~ Madison Thorne Grey

Georgia gulped as the entire doorway suddenly filled with a man she didn't recognize. She'd been expecting Jesper MacMillian.
This was definitely not Jesper MacMillian.
This man had a rich black complexion. His head was bald- whether by nature or design, she couldn't be sure. Tiny studs flashed in his ears. He wore a beautiful black suit, painstakingly tailored to fit his massive shoulders. Dark tattoos curled just above his pressed white collar, and down below the edges of his cuffs.
His face was neither kind nor unkind. He studied her with vague disinterest, his eyes quiet and guarded beneath solid brows. ~ Laura Oliva

The war gave women like her opportunities, not a feminist movement, and if the opportunities dwindled after the war, she feels that it was because women didn't want them. ~ Rosalyn Sussman Yalow

Tea? At the beach? No time for luxuries, Holly. There is important work to be done." He winked at Butler.
"Are you sure you're at the library? I thought I heard water."
Artemis smiled, enjoying the exchange. "Water? Surely not. The only thing flowing here is information."
"Are you grinning, Artemis? For some reason I get the feeling that you're wearing that smug smile of yours. ~ Eoin Colfer

I have an unforgettable destiny for this girl's virginity."
~Larsson TIGER ~ Pet Torres

Perhaps most important of all, and this is so central to the development of feminist abolitionist theories and practices: we have to learn how to think and act and struggle against that which is ideologically constituted as "normal." Prisons are constituted as "normal." It takes a lot of work to persuade people to think beyond the bars, and to be able to imagine a world without prisons and to struggle for the abolition of imprisonment as the dominant mode of punishment. ~ Angela Y. Davis

Violet will carry he mark of Merlin's bloodline and she'll be able to wake The Lady from her slumber. ~ Allison Sipe