It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
If you're a fiction writer, though, I can tell you how to let people talk through you. Listen. Just be quiet, and listen. Let the character talk. Don't censor, don't control. Listen, and write.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of listening to characters as a means of authentic storytelling.
Ursula K. Le Guin's quote highlights the vital role of listening in the creative process of writing fiction. By encouraging writers to step back, remain silent, and allow their characters to express themselves naturally, she advocates for an organic approach to storytelling where authenticity reigns over rigid control. This method fosters deeper connection and richer narratives as it respects the characters' autonomy and voice.
Themes
WritingListeningCreativityFictionStorytelling
In practice
Example use cases
In a workshop on writing techniques, an instructor can use this quote to illustrate how character development occurs through attentive listening.
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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