Philip Pullman Quotes
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You're lacking a human dimension of some sort if you're not interested in the arts.
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I don't like it when I see my books sold cheaply.
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Theatre is one of those things that children will love if they're helped to get there to see it. No child will find his or her own way to the theatre.
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Possibly because I earn my living as a writer of fiction and possibly because it's just the sensible thing to do, I like to pay attention to everything I come across, including things that evoke the uncanny or the mysterious.
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Trying to understand superstition rationally is like trying to pick up something made of wood by using a magnet.
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If you can't think of what to write, tough luck; write anyway. If you can think of lots more when you've finished the three pages, don't write it; it'll be that much easier to get going next day.
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Lyra and her dæmon moved through the darkening hall, taking care to keep to one side, out of sight of the kitchen.
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If a nation allows its literary culture to die, it's a sign that it doesn't fundamentally care.
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Argue with anything else, but don't argue with your own nature.
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Adam and Eve are like imaginary numbers, like the square root of minus one... If you include it in your equation, you can calculate all manners of things, which cannot be imagined without it.
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Seems to me the place you fight cruelty is where you find it, and the place you give help is where you see it needed.
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In Lyra’s heart, revulsion struggled with compassion, and compassion won.
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For a long time I thought I was a poet, but that's a high title to claim.
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One curious thing about growing up is that you don't only move forward in time; you move backwards as well, as pieces of your parents' and grandparents' lives come to you.
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One handy piece of equipment, which I recommend to any writer of fiction, is a set of Myriorama cards. I consult them frequently.
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'But suppose your dæmon settles in a shape you don't like?' 'Well, then, you're discontented, en't you? There's plenty of fold as'd like to have a lion as a dæmon and they end up with a poodle. And till they learn to be satisfied with what they are, they're going to be fretful about it. Waste of feeling, that is.'
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Comics are a wonderful form. You can do so much with it.
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Had she thought there was no meaning in life, no purpose, when God had gone? Yes, she had thought that. 'Well, there is now,' she said aloud, and again, louder: 'There is now!'
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I like every individual editor, designer, marketing and publicity person I deal with, but I don't like what publishers, corporately, are doing to the ecology of the book world. It's damaging, and it should change.
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The arts are beyond price; they're beyond value. They're of incalculable worth in what it means to be a human being.
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For that reason you can't write with music playing, and anyone who says he can is either writing badly, or not listening to the music, or lying. You need to hear what you're writing, and for that you need silence.
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This book contains a story and several other things. The other things might be connected with the story, or they might not; they might be connected to stories that haven't appeared yet. It's not easy to tell.
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Both the Oblation Board and the Specters of Indifference are bewitched by this truth about human beings: that innocence is different from experience. The Oblation Board fears and hates Dust, and the Specters feast on it, but it's Dust both of them are obsessed by.
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'Doesn’t it scare you, having your death close by all the time?' said Lyra. 'Why ever would it? If he’s there, you can keep an eye on him. I'd be a lot more nervous not knowing where he was.'