She looked, and a scarlet butterfly flew away from her, away down the length of the tower, and then another, another, an unraveling scarf of butterflies like winged blood.
— Tanith Lee
The most informative Tanith Lee quotes that will inspire your inner self
We need the expressive arts, the ancient scribes, the storytellers, the priests.
Archetypes are universal, and, in subtle or extravagant ways, interchangeable.
The soul is a magician. Only living flesh hampers it.
I submitted manuscripts to publishers.
This was not so much a feeling that I should be published as a wish to escape the feared and hated drudgery of normal work.
Genre categories are irrelevant. I dislike them, but I do not have the casting vote.
I like writing about women, weak and strong, pathetic and heroic.
I like writing about men, ditto. And all the variants of men and women, beasts and demons.
If they had said my writing wasn't good enough, fair enough, that's an opinion.
But to say it's too complex is to insult the intelligence of the so-called young.
There was no violence, no speed. It moved to the rhythm of an elder dance, putting all the rituals of the world to shame. Black, silver, gold and moon-opal, night and sea, fire, earth, air and water.
Writers tell stories better, because they've had more practice, but everyone has a book in them. Yes, that old cliche.
As a child, my mother told me lots of fairy stories, many her own invention.
She, too, tended to reverse the norm.
I like films, or some films, and would be intrigued to see my work on screen.
Madness. I did not get myself born to die. I have better things to do.
In the greater part of humankind there resides an instinct for survival.
It is this which can clutch at straws and effect a rescue from them. It is this which can, now and then, outwit fate.
It's very selfish when I write. I'm not aware, ever, of writing for another person; I'm not even really aware of writing for myself.
Ecstasy and vulnerability belonged in the same dish.
The fear the cup would be snatched away was what gave the wine its savor.
I hardly ever work from a synopsis -- I find they act like chains.
I hate the way, once you start to know someone, care about them, their behavior can distress you, even when it's unreasonable and not your fault, even if you were really trying to be careful, tactful.
We need the expressive arts, the ancient scribes, the storytellers, the priests.
And that's where I put myself: as a storyteller. Not necessarily a high priestess, but certainly the storyteller. And I would love to be the storyteller of the tribe.
World's flying like birds; my car's in flight. The city lights are spattered on my windshield like the fragments of the night. And I'm in flight. The sky's a wheel, a merry-go-round of wings and snow and steel, and fire. We'll tread the sky, we'll ride the scarlet horses.
The worst vulgarity is to avoid vulgarity solely on the grounds that it is vulgar.
Hope is a punishable offense. The verdict is always death; one more death of the heart.
The dictate of the light says: Know yourself and what you are.
The dark replies, By all means, but then become afraid.
I've been criticised for writing in too complex a manner for younger people.
I also love Disney, and will defend doing so, because there's so much in those films and I don't care if it's stereotyped.
Now, writing every day, and being paid for it and encouraged to do it, it was as if, in the midst of the clich?d dark and stormy night, I found the magical inn, its windows golden lit, and Summer was due to start tomorrow. I can only work at one thing well. Deprive me of that, and my "back-up plan," even now, will be the empty, stormy, darkened heath -- where, incidentally, even unpublished, somehow I'll still be writing.
Condemned and executioner with aren't coupled in a primitive rite.
Writing is writing, and stories are stories.
Perhaps the only true genres are fiction and non-fiction. And even there, who can be sure?
Pirates have always fascinated me.
If I ever get to 100, I'd want to be filled with wonder and wild, adolescent, wide-eyed interest in newness. So let's keep the flame burning. Let's stop thinking everyone over 29, or 49, has to be reinforced by concrete.
Danger and anger are everywhere. Love is the rarity, the gem buried in the core of the mine, the outpost of God.
No one is ever ordinary.
I came up with a parallel Venice called Venus. set in a parallel Venice about 1701.
Dawn rose from the desert and turned the river to wine.
It's lovely. I hate it.
Tales of heroes end in bliss.
He sat by her, watching every gesture she made, as if he would paint her portrait afterward.
I began to feel lighthearted. Don't ever do that; it tempts some dark and evil force abroad in the universe.
I love writers all across the board, but one who influenced me very directly at the beginning was Mary Renault.
People are always the start for me... animals, when I can get into their heads, gods, supernatural beings, immortals, the dead... these are all people to me.
I tend not to analyse my work, though I'm frequently intrigued when other people take time to do so.
I was reading some complex books in my own youth-and no, I didnt always understand every word, let alone every concept-but I got the main thrust, which was like a lifeline in a fluctuating world.
I must suppose that reading wonderful writers may, inadvertently, teach an avid reader a great deal -- not only about life and other matters, but about how to write. Therefore doubtless I have benefited from frequent immersions in the glowing genius of others. It would be nice to think so. (I do actually think so). But to improve my skills will never be the prompting force of my reading -- that's just literary lust.
I just love writing. It's magical, it's somewhere else to go, it's somewhere much more dreadful, somewhere much more exciting. Somewhere I feel I belong, possibly more than in the so-called real world.
The bitterness of joy lies in the knowledge that is cannot last.
Nor should joy last beyond a certain season, for, after that season, even joy would become merely habit.
It gets cold in the desert at night, particularly up in the mountains;
the stars hammer on the rock and strike frost.
Oh, love. Love is best of all. There is no such total element, not even pain. Who has ever loved, knows this. I need not say more.
I'm writing what comes into my head, or through me, or from somewhere else, and it is the most extraordinary, exciting thing. I love it, and I'm very greedy, and I really enjoy it!
For me, everyone I write of is real. I have little true say in what they want, what they do or end up as (or in). Their acts appall, enchant, disgust or astound me. Their ends fill me with retributive glee, or break my heart. I can only take credit (if I can even take credit for that) in reporting the scenario. This is not a disclaimer. Just a fact.