No Time To Spare: Thinking About What Matters
Ursula K. Le Guin
Top 10 Best Quotes
“The direction of escape is toward freedom. So what is ‘escapism’ an accusation of?”
“Meaning in art isn’t the same as meaning in science. The meaning of the second law of thermodynamics, so long as the words are understood, isn’t changed by who reads it, or when, or where. The meaning of Huckleberry Finn is.”
“I don’t believe in Darwin’s theory of evolution. I accept it. It isn’t a matter of faith, but of evidence.”
“It appears that we've given up on the long-range view. That we've decided not to think about consequences—about cause and effect. Maybe that's why I feel that I live in exile. I used to live in a country that had a future.”
“A decision worthy of the name is based on observation, factual information, intellectual and ethical judgment. Opinion—that darling of the press, the politician, and the poll—may be based on no information at all.”
“Opinion all too often leaves no room for anything but itself.”
“Let age be age. Let your old relative or old friend be who they are. Denial serves nothing, no one, no purpose.”
“Meaning - this is perhaps the common note, the bane I am seeking. What is the Meaning of this book, this event in the book, this story ... ? Tell me what it Means. But that is not my job, honey. That's your job.”
“Literature is a field a great many men consider theirs by right. Virginia Woolf committed successful competition in that field. She barely escaped the first and most effective punishment--omission from the literary canon after her death. Yet eighty or ninety years later charges of snobbery and invalidism are still used to discredit and diminish her. Marcel Proust's limitations and his neuroticism were at least as notable as hers. But that Proust needed not only a room of his own but a cork-lined one is taken as proof he was a genius. That Woolf heard the birds singing in Greek shows only that she was a sick woman.”
“If I’m ninety and believe I’m forty-five, I’m headed for a very bad time trying to get out of the bathtub.”
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Book Keywords:
pessimism, truth, escapism, politics
