Madeleine L'Engle Quotes

We do live, all of us, on many different levels, and for most artists the world of imagination is more real than the world of the kitchen sink.

It takes too much energy to be against something unless it's really important.

We do learn and develop when we are exposed to those who are greater than we are. Perhaps this is the chief way we mature.

It's not my brain that's writing the book, it's these hands of mine.

A book comes and says, 'Write me.

The discipline of creation, be it to paint, compose, write, is an effort towards wholeness.

People are more than just the way they look.

Art is communication.

When the work takes over, then the artist is enabled to get out of the way, not to interfere. When the work takes over, then the artist listens.

In reading we must become creators.

Come t'e' picciol fallo amaro morso! Dante. What grievous pain a little fault doth give thee!

You don't want him for a reason. You want him because he's your father.

Stories are like children. They grow in their own way.

The best way to guide children without coercion is to be ourselves.

Believing takes practice.

You cannot see the past that did not happen any more than you can foresee the future.

We are suspicious of grace. We are afraid of the very lavishness of the gift.

We think because we have words, not the other way around. The more words we have, the better able we are to think conceptually.

It was the same way with silence. This was more than silence. A deaf person can feel vibrations. Here there was nothing to feel.

Silence fell between them, as tangible as the dark tree shadows that fell across their laps and that now seemed to rest upon them as heavily as though they possessed a measurable weight of their own.

One cannot be humble and aware of oneself at the same time.

I do not believe that true optimism can come about except through tragedy.

Maybe that's the best part of going away for a vacation-coming home again.

When I am constantly running there is no time for being. When there is no time for being there is no time for listening.

I believe that consistently we need to look for good, and not for evil, that when we look for evil we call up evil, while heaven comes closer when we acknowledge it.

God understands. And God understands that part of us which is more than we think we are.

There is nothing we need be afraid to say before the Lord.

I have a point of view. You have a point of view. God has view.

And joy is always a promise.

I love my mother, not as a prisoner of atherosclerosis, but as a person; and I must love her enough to accept her as she is, now, for as long as this dwindling may take.

I share Einstein's affirmation that anyone who is not lost in rapturous awe at the power and glory of the mind behind the universe "is as good as a burnt out candle."

science never threatens God - it opens up more possibilities.

Integrity, like humility, is a quality which vanishes the moment we are conscious of it in ourselves. We see it only in others.

To share poetry is one of the most intimate acts of friendship possible.

When we can play with the unself-conscious concentration of a child, this is: art: prayer: love.

As far as I'm concerned, there is only one absolute: God is love.

Yes! I dare disturb the universe.

If we aren't capable of being hurt we aren't capable of feeling joy.

There is in God, some say, a deep but dazzling darkness.

I would like to travel light on this journey of life, to get rid of the encumbrances I acquire each day.

When we are self-conscious, we cannot be wholly aware; we must throw ourselves out first. This throwing ourselves away is the act of creativity.

As human beings, the closest we can get to truth is through story.

Sometimes when we aren't looking, the holiness comes breaking through like a rainbow.

The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living. What we lack is not a will to believe but a will to wonder.

If our love for each other really is participatory, then all other human relationships nourish it; it is inclusive, never exclusive.

You cannot take credit for your talents. It is what you do with them that counts.

Unlearning is the choice, conscious or unconscious, of any real artist. And it is the true sign of maturity.

Oh child, your language is so utterly simple and limited that it has the affect of extreme complication. -Aunt Beast

If I have something I want to say that is too difficult for adults to swallow, then I will write it in a book for children.

Stories have a richness that goes way beyond fact. My writing knows more than I know. What a writer must do is listen to her book. It might take you where you don't expect to go.