Monday, March 29, 2010

 

Quotable: Ideas, the State, & Revolution in The Dispossessed


... ideas never were controlled by laws and governments ... You can't crush ideas by suppressing them. You can only crush ideas by ignoring them. By refusing to think, refusing to change ... the innate cowardice of the average human mind. Public opinion! That's the power structure ... The unadmitted, inadmissible government that rules the ... society by stifling the individual mind. --Character of Bedap, p. 165.

To say that a good end will follow from a bad means is just like saying that if I pull a rope on this pulley it will lift the weight on that one. --Character of Shevek, p. 225.

The individual cannot bargain with the State. The State recognizes no coinage but power: and it issues the coins itself. --Character of Shevek, p. 272.

We are not seeking power. We are seeking the end of power! ... The means are the end. ... Only peace brings peace, only just acts bring justice! --Character of Maedda, p. 296.

You cannot buy the Revolution. You cannot make the Revolution. You can only be the Revolution. It is in your spirit or, it is nowhere. --Character of Shevek, p. 301.

... revolution begins in the thinking mind. --Character of Shevek, p. 333.

Revolution is our obligation: our hope of evolution. 'The Revolution is in the individual spirit, or it is nowhere. It is for all, or it is nothing. If it is seen as having any end, it will never truly begin.' --Character of Shevek quoting character of Odo, p. 359.

Source: The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin (New York: Eos, 2001).

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