A shade of sorrow passed over Taliesin's face. 'There are those,' he said gently, 'who must first learn loss, despair, and grief. Of all paths to wisdom, this is the cruelest and longest. Are you one who must follow such a way? This even I cannot know. If you are, take heart nonetheless. Those who reach the end do more than gain wisdom. As rough wool becomes cloth, and crude clay a vessel, so do they change and fashion wisdom for others, and what they give back is greater than what they won.

Fantasy is hardly an escape from reality. It's a way of understanding it.

I know that some readers think (The High King) should have ended differently. I cried for three days afterwards.

You know how chickens are, imagining the world coming to an end one moment, then pecking corn the next.

If a storyteller worried about the facts - my dear Lucian, how could he ever get at the truth?

...alas, raising a young lady is a mystery even beyond an enchanter's skill.

Fantasy, in addition to being great storytelling, moves us at some unique and profound level. It has, I think, the power of mythology, or ancient dreams we have always and forever shared. In it, we find our real world and our real selves.