Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic.
Nothing's perfect, the world's not perfect. But it's there for us, trying the best it can; that's what makes it so damn beautiful.
Beauty is how you feel inside, and it reflects in your eyes. It is not something physical.
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic.
Nothing's perfect, the world's not perfect. But it's there for us, trying the best it can; that's what makes it so damn beautiful.
Beauty is how you feel inside, and it reflects in your eyes. It is not something physical.
When people dis fantasy—mainstream readers and SF readers alike—they are almost always talking about one sub-genre of fantastic literature. They are talking about Tolkien, and Tolkien's innumerable heirs. Call it 'epic', or 'high', or 'genre' fantasy, this is what fantasy has come to mean. Which is misleading as well as unfortunate.
Tolkien is the wen on the arse of fantasy literature. His oeuvre is massive and contagious—you can't ignore it, so don't even try. The best you can do is consciously try to lance the boil. And there's a lot to dislike—his cod-Wagnerian pomposity, his boys-own-adventure glorying in war, his small-minded and reactionary love for hierarchical status-quos, his belief in absolute morality that blurs moral and political complexity. Tolkien's clichés—elves 'n' dwarfs 'n' magic rings—have spread like viruses. He wrote that the function of fantasy was 'consolation', thereby making it an article of policy that a fantasy writer should mollycoddle the reader.
Needing to have reality confirmed and experience enhanced by photographs is an aesthetic consumerism to which everyone is now addicted. Industrial societies turn their citizens into image-junkies; it is the most irresistible form of mental pollution.
In so far as the mind sees things in their eternal aspect, it participates in eternity.
Color directly influences the soul. Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another purposively, to cause vibrations in the soul..
