"

As for what it's against - the story is against those who pervert and misuse religion, or any other kind of doctrine with a holy book and a priesthood...more

"

After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.

"

There are some themes, some subjects, too large for adult fiction; they can only be dealt with adequately in a children’s book. In adult literary fict...more

"

There's a hunger for stories in all of us, adults too. We need stories so much that we're even willing to read bad books to get them, if the good book...more

"

I write almost always in the third person, and I don't think the narrator is male or female anyway. They're both, and young and old, and wise and sill...more

"

It was a shocking thing to say and I knew it was a shocking thing to say. But no one has the right to live without being shocked. No one has the right...more

"

Tolkien, who created this marvellous vehicle, doesn't go anywhere in it. He just sits where he is. What I mean by that is that he always seems to be l...more

"

All writing is difficult. The most you can hope for is a day when it goes reasonably easily. Plumbers don’t get plumber’s block, and doctors don’t get...more

"

I have said that His Dark Materials is not fantasy but stark realism, and my reason for this is to emphasise what I think is an important aspect of th...more

"

Fritz had to stop himself from interrupting when Karl spoke about the difficulty of working. Stories are just as hard as clocks to put together, and t...more

"

You don't win races by wishing, you win them by running faster than everyone else does.

"

If you want something you can have it, but only if you want everything that goes with it, including all the hard work and the despair, and only if you...more

"

The fairy tale is in a perpetual state of becoming and alteration. To keep to one version or one translation alone is to put robin redbreast in a cage...more

"

I shall decide what I do. If you say my work is fighting, or healing, or exploring, or whatever you say, I'll always be thinking about it, and if I en...more