George MacDonald
George MacDonald
George MacDonaldwas a Scottish author, poet, and Christian minister. He was a pioneering figure in the field of fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow writer Lewis Carroll. His writings have been cited as a major literary influence by many notable authors including W. H. Auden, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Walter de la Mare, E. Nesbit and Madeleine L'Engle. C. S. Lewis wrote that he regarded MacDonald as his "master": "Picking up a copy of Phantastes one...
NationalityScottish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth10 December 1824
When a feeling was there, they felt as if it would never go; when it was gone, they felt as if it had never been; when it returned, they felt as if it had never gone.
As you grow ready for it, somewhere or other you will find what is needful for you in a book.
Age is not all decay; it is the ripening, the swelling, of the fresh life within, that withers and bursts the husk.
Nothing makes one feel so strong as a call for help.
A condition which of declension would indicate a devil, may of growth indicate a saint.
A fairytale is not an allegory. There may be allegory in it, but it is not an allegory.
We should teach our children to think no more of their bodies when dead than they do of their hair when cut off, or of their old clothes when they have done with them.
It is only by loving a thing that you can make it yours.
The ruin of a man's teaching comes of his followers, such as having never touched the foundation he has laid, build upon it wood, hay, and stubble, fit only to be burnt. Therefore, if only to avoid his worst foes, his admirers, a man should avoid system. The more correct a system the worse will it be misunderstood; its professed admirers will take both its errors and their misconceptions of its truths, and hold them forth as its essence.
This is a wise, sane Christian faith: that a man commit himself, his life, and his hopes to God; that God undertakes the special protection of that man; that therefore that man ought not to be afraid of anything.
I wondered over again for the hundredth time what could be the principle which, in the wildest, most lawless, fantastically chaotic, apparently capricious work of Nature, always kept it beautiful.
I begin indeed to fear that I have undertaken an impossibility, undertaken to tell what I cannot tell because no speech at my command will fit the forms in my mind.
All is loss that comes between us and Christ.
Were I asked, what is a fairytale? I should reply, Read Undine: that is a fairytale.