It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
Nothing said in words ever came out quite even. Things in words got twisted and ran together, instead of staying straight and fitting together.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Words often fail to convey our true thoughts and feelings clearly.
In this quote, Ursula K. Le Guin reflects on the inherent limitations of language. She suggests that words cannot fully capture our intentions or the complexities of human experience, frequently leading to misinterpretations and a distortion of meaning. It emphasizes the idea that communication is fraught with challenges, where the essence of thoughts might get tangled and obscured rather than expressed clearly.
Themes
CommunicationLanguageMeaningInterpretationThoughts
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture on the complexities of communication, one might use this quote to emphasize the challenges of accurately conveying ideas.
More from Ursula K. Le Guin
All quotes →In reading a novel, any novel, we have to know perfectly well that the whole thing is nonsense, and then, while reading, believe every word of it. Finally, when we're done with it, we may find - if it's a good novel - that we're a bit different from what we were before we read it, that we have changed a little... But it's very hard to say just what we learned, how we were changed.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
Reason is a faculty far larger than mere objective force. When either the political or the scientific discourse announces itself as the voice of reason, it is playing God, and should be spanked and stood in the corner.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
We read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel... is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
When he found that the administrators were upset, he laughed. “Do they expect students not to be anarchists?” he said. “What else can the young be? When you are on the bottom, you must organize from the bottom up
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
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