405 Quotes by Jeff VanderMeer

But, in the end, joy cannot fend off evil.Joy can only remind you why you fight.

What am I? How am I connected? What is my purpose? What is all of this, felt in the flesh? Why is it so beautiful? What is beautiful? Why do I not know? What else don't I know? When will I know it? Will I ever know? Would knowing be too much?

My Manager forced me to put my beetle in my own ear, a clear waste and an act that gave me nightmares: of a burning city through which giant carnivorous lizards prowled, eating survivors off of balconies. In one particularly vivid moment, I stood on a ledge as the jaws closed in, heat-swept, and tinged with the smell of rotting flesh. Beetles intended for the tough, tight minds of children should not be used by adults. We still remember a kinder, gentler world.

The world is filled with people who have too much imagination solely because the people around them have too little.

That's how the madness of the world tries to colonize you: from the outside in, forcing you to live in its reality.

Observation had always meant more to me than interaction...My sole gift or talent, I believe now, was that places could impress themselves upon me, and I could become part of them with ease.

But there is a limit to thinking about even a small piece of something monumental. You still see the shadow of the whole rearing up behind you, and you become lost in your thoughts in part from the panic of realizing the size of that imagined leviathan.

Whatever your medium, the goal of any arts practice is to develop a greater set of skills for dealing with challenges. Experience will help you close that gap between your own vision and the piece's final execution.

I read the booklet from cover to cover like it was a wonderful meal and I was a starving man. I devoured every word.