Quotes About Magic

Art is magic... But how is it magic? In its metaphysical development? Or does some final transformation culminate in a magic reality? In truth, the latter is impossible without the former. If creation is not magic, the outcome cannot be magic.

Cats were often familiars to workers of magic because to anyone used to wrestling with self-willed, wayward, devious magic--which was what all magic was--it was rather soothing to have all the same qualities wrapped up in a small, furry, generally attractive bundle that...might, if it were in a good mood, sit on your knee and purr. Magic never sat on anybody's knee and purred.

Writing is the act of creation. Put words on page. Words to sentences, sentences to paragraphs, paragraphs to 7-book epic fantasy cycles with books so heavy you could choke a hippo. But don't give writing too much power, either. A wizard controls his magic; it doesn't control him. Push aside lofty notions and embrace the workmanlike aesthetic. Hammers above magic wands; nails above eye-of-newt. The magic will return when you're done. The magic is what you did, not what you're doing.

We didn't have a whole lot of money when I was growing up either. I would always ask for magic books or magic tricks for my birthday or for Christmas and the rest of the year I either had to mow lawns or find part time jobs to help supplement the cost of doing magic.

Stairs," Valkyrie said, disappointed. "Not just ordinary stairs," Skulduggery told her as he led the way down. "Magic stairs." "Really?" "Oh, yes." She followed him into the darkness. "How are they magic?" "They just are." "In what way?" "In a magicky way." She glared at the back of his head. "They aren't magic at all, are they?" "Not really.

The artist brain is the sensory brain: sight and sound, smell and taste, touch. These are the elements of magic, and magic is the elemental stuff of art. In filling the well, think magic. Think delight. Think fun. Do not think duty. Do not do what you should do-spiritual sit-ups like reading a dull but recommended critical text. Do what intrigues you, explore what interests you; think mystery, not mastery.

The background of the Negro culture is voodoo and magic; and the purposes the magic are control and power over God, man, nature and society. Voodoo and magic was the religion and life of America's Negro.

She was sitting cross-legged on her bed in her white kimono, writing in a notebook with an ink pen she dipped in a bottle. 'Never let a man stay the night,' she told me. 'Dawn has a way of casting a pall on any night magic.' The night magic sounded lovely. Someday I would have lovers and write a poem after.

Hope can be a powerful force. Maybe there's no actual magic in it, but when you know what you hope for most and hold it like a light within you, you can make things happen, almost like magic.

Magic is never totally scientifically explainable, but science has always been, at one time or another, considered magic.

[Magic] can guide people to the very edge of reason - and then push them off. Thoughts collapse for a moment and the mind is free to just experience. Magic is a window to eternity.

It was a magic caused by the collision of modern methods and old ones; modern history and ancient; accessibility and isolation. And it was a magic which could only strike spark about that time. A few years earlier, from the point of view of aircraft alone, it would have been impossible to reach these places; a few later, and there will be no such isolation.

A river seems a magic thing. A magic, moving, living part of the very earth itself.

I continue to say that I wish we had another word other than magic. It no longer means what we are doing or we are attempting to do. We have to find another terminology. Magic is first and foremost a way of belief.

I totally believe in magic. Because my life, I think, has been very magic, and magical things have come true for me time after time after time.

One of my basic feelings is that the mind, and the heart alike, of the photographer must be dedicated to the glory, the magic, and the mystery of light. The mystery of time, the magic of light, the enigma of reality - and their interrelationships - are my constant themes and preoccupations.

I definitely went through my magic phase. I think all little boys do at some point or another - they get fascinated by magic tricks.

Now I can do the bolts," she slurred. "I've been trying to focus enough magic all week." The magic shifted and swirled, finally etching a picture in the air. It was a rough picture of Foaly, and he was laughing. I hate you, centaur!" screamed Opal, lunging toward, and then through, the insubstantial image. Her eyes rolled back into her head, and then she collapsed, snoring, on the floor. Artemis straightened his tie. Freud, he was certain, would have a field day with that.

Dai Vernon, the greatest sleight of hand figure in the history of the art, rarely performed. But he invented magic and had an enormous influence on the whole range of sleight of hand. And so often the magic he was doing was to fool other magicians.

The Web is cool, but the library is magic. Where else can the spirit of generations of writers stir your soul? So many writers talk about libraries setting them on their magical paths, it's almost a groaner. But we know it's true. Wander through the stacks and you can feel the dreams, the unique worlds bubbling within each volume. The magic enters you as if by osmosis. On the Web, you may feel clever, lucky and driven to download--but rarely inspired to dream and to write.

I think photographs should be provocative and not tell you what you already know. It takes no great powers or magic to reproduce somebody's face in a photograph. The magic is in seeing people in new ways.

Formerly, when religion was strong and science weak, men mistook magic for medicine; now, when science is strong and religion weak, men mistake medicine for magic.

For me, I was watching Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Orson Welles, Victor Fleming movies, and I said, "I want to tell stories like that. I want to move people like that. But I'm good at magic, so what am I going to do?" So I started using magic for the right reasons - to get the girl.

The purely formal language of geometry describes adequately the reality of space. We might say, in this sense, that geometry is successful magic. I should like to state a converse: is not all magic, to the extent that it is successful, geometry?

I didn't want to believe that killing was deep inside of me. I didn't want to think about the part of me that took a dark joy in gathering all the power it could and using it as I saw fit, everything else be damned. There was power to be had in hatred, too, in anger and in lust, in selfishness and in pride. And I knew that there was some dark corner of me that would enjoy using magic for killing—and then long for more. That was black magic, and it was easy to use. Easy and fun. Like Legos.

When I started out back in Louisville, there was Harry Collins. He was my first teacher. He saw that I was so obsessed with magic that he taught me the love of magic.

Magic consists of creating, by misdirection of the senses, the mental impression of supernatural agency at work. That, and only that, is what modern magic really is, and that meaning alone is now assignable to the term.

Magic--that's just a label, you know. Completely meaningless. It wasn't so very long ago that people were saying that electricity was magic.

Trace of Magic caught me up fast and pulled me in tight for a fun, action-and-sass adventure full of deadly magic and dangerous romance. Diana Pharaoh Francis delivers a downright terrific read.

The difference between magic and meditation methods is the difference between drugs and diet—medicines will do swiftly what diet can only effect slowly, and in critical cases there is no time to wait for the slow processes of dietetics, so it must be either medicines or nothing. Nevertheless, drugs are no substitute for right diet and wholesome regime, and although magic enables a speedy and potent result to be attained, is is only by means of right understanding and right ethics that the position which has been won can be held.

I am absorbed in the magic of movement and light. Movement never lies. It is the magic of what I call the outer space of the imagination.

Why is monotheistic faith better than polytheistic? I mean, either you believe - if you believe in, like, a magic person who can do magic things, why is it different - so different if it's Superman or the Fantastic Four?

Everyone does magic all the time in different ways. "Life" plus "significance" = magic.

If Goddess religion is not to become mindless idiocy, we must win clear of tendency of magic to become supertition. Magic - and among its branches I include psychology as its purpose to describe and change consciousness - is an art.

Of course, the toxic bullshit of incessant advertising and show biz for nearly a century has stripped us of cognitive abilities for dealing with reality that used to be part of the normal equipment of adulthood - for instance, knowing the difference between wishing for stuff and making stuff happen. We bamboozled ourselves with too much magic.

The glance is natural magic. The mysterious communication established across a house between two entire strangers, moves all the springs of wonder.

Keep thinking, keep interested, keep praying, keep dreaming. Be mentally sensitive at all times so that the magic word that motivates you may one day speak to your deep inner self.

Hemingway and Saroyan had the line, the magic of it. The problem was that Hemingway didn't know how to laugh and Saroyan was filled with sugar.

You thought I was that type: that you could forget me, and that I'd plead and weep and throw myself under the hooves of a bay mare, or that I'd ask the sorcerers for some magic potion made from roots and send you a terrible gift: my precious perfumed handkerchief. Damn you! I will not grant your cursed soul vicarious tears or a single glance. And I swear to you by the garden of the angels, I swear by the miracle-working ikon, and by the fire and smoke of our nights: I will never come back to you.

Everyone was talking about having airplanes disappear. And I said, "Wait, wait, wait. That's what you like? I'd tell you a story about something like my girlfriend leaving me, and the magic was really hard. The airplane thing was comparatively easy, and people liked that thing?" I realized at that moment, the power of the simple idea.

Performing magic has a lot to do with the arrangement of apparent coincidences and providing pathways along which desires can travel, or, to put it in more basic terms, there's little point in sigilizing for a lottery win if you don't also buy a lottery ticket.

There is no magic to achievement. It's really about hard work, choices, and persistence.

The world used to think we are a land of snake charmers and black magic. But our youth has surprised the world with its IT [information technology] skills. I dream of a digital India.

I’ve spent more than two decades speaking to women through magazines. What’s so exciting about Yahoo is that I can inspire and connect with hundreds of millions more women, and bring them the magic of the fashion world in ways they haven’t yet experienced.

To the children who loved Harry Potter, I want to say your enthusiasm was the real magic. I so enjoyed being on the journey with you. And to the adults who bought the Harry Potter books and devoured them, I just want to say, those books were for children.

these hips have never been enslaved, they go where they want to go they do what they want to do. these hips are mighty hips. these hips are magic hips

You've used up all your school sick days," he said, persuing my file. "You've requested to leave school one hundred and thirty days out of the one hudred and forty days of school so far." So thirty-one might be the magic number?" Principal Reed and Raven

The greatest work of art about New York? The question seems nebulous. The city's magic and majesty are distilled in the photographs of Alfred Stieglitz and Paul Strand.