Quotes About Imagination

It's a heartening fact about the human race that utopian fiction precedes dystopian fiction in the evolution of literature.

I am a bit of a 'dreamer,' so I love fantasizing about utopian futures, and I also love the way you can explore big concepts in sci fi.

I read The Old Curiosity Shop before I began Blackwood Farm. I was amazed at the utter madness in that book.

I think reading Shakespeare's plays when I was young was extremely important. He had the ability to make utter strangers come alive.

Almost all words do have color, and nothing is more pleasant than to utter a pink word and see someone's eyes light up and know it is a pink word for him or her, too.

I can imagine an utter hatred for the jazz avant-garde.

I believe art is utterly important. It is one of the things that could save us.

More than fantasy or even science fiction, Ray Bradbury wrote horror, and like so many great horror writers he was himself utterly without fear, of anything. He wasn't afraid of looking uncool - he wasn't scared to openly love innocence, or to be optimistic, or to write sentimentally when he felt that way.

Many fantasy novels - 'Lord of the Rings', for instance, or 'Lavondyss' by Robert Holdstock - are beautifully written. Geoff Ryman's 'The Child Garden' is exquisite and utterly beguiling. Mervyn Peake's 'Gormenghast' trilogy is an astonishing piece of multi-faceted storytelling. So quality of writing does not condemn the genre.

Writing is such a strange, utterly mysterious process. First, there was nothing; then, suddenly, there was something. I don't know where thoughts are born. Where the hell does it come from? I don't know. I really don't know.

It was a very idyllic childhood, surrounded by utterly beautiful landscapes that I got very, very bored of when I hit my teens. But being on your own a lot and being bored is good for your imagination. It makes it stretch.

When I grew up, we played in vacant lots.

When I go on vacation, I take very few clothes and a whole lot of books. It's the most soothing thing in the world. Reading 'Moby-Dick' is like being in a time machine. I almost feel as excited as the first time I read it and I always find something new.

I've only read three books by Stephen King. When I was 10 I read 'The Long Walk,' one of his pseudonymous Bachman books. In my early 20s, while trapped on a family vacation, I read 'The Dark Half,' which taught me a word I have never forgotten: psychopomp. Now I have read '11/22/63.'

I don't need the water to be inspired. My stories inspire me, not the location of where I'm parked. And good thing, since I've had to finish books in airports, in the RV we used to have, the lake house, while on vacation, at home, in the kitchen when my office PC was on the fritz.

Literary novelists who have a strong handle on plot are often characterized as good vacation reads because they manage to transport you elsewhere, away from the petty facts of ordinary life.

I used to be one of those people who read thrillers on vacation, but for some reason most thrillers no longer thrill me. Maybe because these days reality is far more unbelievable than any fiction?

Books have literally powered most of my life. Whether as a stress relief when doing hard things or as vacation fodder, they are a constant and important part of my life.

I don't seem to take vacations, but I must say, a jaunt into Central Park can be mighty transporting. My boy and I can spend hours in the Ramble scaling rocks and sword fighting with sticks. I often forget I'm in Manhattan when I'm in there.

In the '20s they were telling us we'd all have our own private plane and take vacations to the moon.

The human mind doesn't like a vacuum. We will populate that vacuum with the contents of our own head, and often that's scary stuff.

In 'Twilight,' you're setting up the world. You're introducing the world, and I was also writing in a vacuum because I didn't know who the actors were going to be. Now you're going to 'New Moon' and 'Eclipse,' and I could write specifically to them in my mind. So it becomes a more comfortable world.

Well, you know, writers just suck up new experiences - we're just like the vacuum cleaners of newness.

I always have to be thinking about who's going to be singing this song, what the context is. I don't sit around just writing in a vacuum, ever.