Quotes from Jane Yolen

I do not know where I am going or what I will do when I get there. I know only that to put one foot in front of the other, moves me on, away from you to a place, where I do not want to be.

from Taking Your Clothes to the Salvation Army: Okay, so strangers will be grateful for this, will wear the socks to keep their feet warm, blow their noses in your handkerchiefs, pull up the shorts, tuck in the size large shirts (too small for our boys, too big for our daughter), and bits of you will be out there, engaging in a life you no longer have.

Words shouldn't be dirty or clean But definitely sweet, On the tongue, in the mind.

The Baba gives me paper, and a pen that sputters ink. Write, she says, tell the true Though you may have to lie to do it.

People were dying around us, of starvation, tuberculosis, cholera, typhus, typhoid, deportation, influenza, heartbreak. Their lungs were filling up because of the cold. They were being shot for walking too quickly, staring too hard, not answering questions fast enough or answering too fast, or just because they wore the yellow star. To die was easy. To live was harder. Papa said to us, "We have chosen the more difficult path, that of life. Now we must walk it." We walked.

He knew he was not a brave man, but he had a great sense of drama. In some circumstances it could seem the same. Forcing

You see, my dear ice witch, I have had the love of children from all over the world because of my stories. A child's love is the perfect love, for it is given with a whole heart. That love will outlast me a hundredfold. And it will outlast you as well.

WHEN I'M GOOD, I'M VERY GOOD. BUT WHEN I'M BAD, I'M BETTER."—Mae West in I'm No Angel

Once we have accepted the story, we cannot escape the story's fate.

Beauty Sleep Wake up, princess, time to rise. Open up your dreamy eyes. Never mind the prince or kiss. By no means were you raised for this. Take the plot back from the witch. Kick her spindle in the ditch!

The storyteller in me asks: what if? And when I try to answer that, a story begins

Snow Speaks to the Mirror My nose is smudged, my hair in tangles. I do not like myself at angles. Skin's not clear, eyes all red. Another hour in my bed would be a gift, would feel real nice. But can I trust your strange advice? Don't be daft. I won't be guided by a glass that's so one-sided.

After a while, the story becomes the truth because no one actually remembers how things really happened.

I mean, then you hafta listen to all this "The mall? Again?" hassle and "Did you do your homework?" and "Your grades would be up where they could be if you spent as much time in math as you do in the mall, young lady." Ick.

Can lives that are merely constant be happy? If you asked Tom how he felt, he would have counted these out: wood, wind, waves. Not happy perhaps, but content. Ride Me Like a Wave (Stars anthology)

At least Em, long-suffering as she was, tried to give the child a bit of her heart, which - after all those years of living with Henry on that old gray farm in the middle of the gray prairie - was as dried up as an old pea. She tried, but she wasn't much good at it. It was a bit like trying to water a budding flower in the middle of a dry Kansas summer with a watering can poked through with holes.

Nothing is ever forgotten.

Why would anyone want to be God? he asked. It's a terrible occupation.

Read to me riddles and read to me rhymes Read to me stories of magical times Read to me tales about castles and kings Read to me stories of fabulous things Read to me pirates and read to me knights Read to me dragons and dragon-book fights Read to me spaceships and cowboys and then When you are finished– please read them again.

If he failed, it was with honor. In his name we all dwell in Camelot Long after the towers fall, and merlins nest in the ruined stones.

These smaller whaleboats are not powered by sails when they are on the close hunt, but by oars, which the men ply with rippling swiftness, as if they are the wind over choppy water.

I've many questions, but am not eager to know the Baba's answers. They'll be hard kernels between my teeth. Biting down becomes a question of physics, a reply only dentists can give.

It is a fearful thing to love what death can touch.

A name, Mag thought, is but a tag. A man may be born with one name, achieve another. Honor and power come from the heart.