Top 99 Quotes & Sayings by Gail Carson Levine

Ideas sometimes come from nowhere, and sometimes they take lots of thinking.

If a big person invests time in reading, kids learn reading is important, the child is important, words are important, stories are important.

I loved fairy tales as a kid, so that's where my mind gravitates.

Most of the authors I liked were dead, so it didn't seem like a safe occupation.

I had to write something and couldn't think of a plot, so I decided to write a Cinderella story because it already had a plot! Then, when I thought about Cinderella's character, I realized that she was too much of a goody-two-shoes for me, and I would hate her before I finished ten pages.

Encourage children to write their own stories, and then don't rain on their parade. Don't say, 'That's not true.' Applaud flights of fantasy. Help with spelling and grammar, but stand up and cheer the use of imagination.

I found that I was much more interested in writing and that I didn't like the illustrating at all. I had always been the hardest on myself when I drew and painted. I am not hard on myself when I write. I like what I write, so it is a much happier process.

I was excited to make my own 'Neverland.'

Sometimes the kids come up with better endings than the real story.

I make mistakes on a very grand scale.

As a child, I loved fairy tales because the story, the what-comes-next, is paramount. As an adult, I'm fascinated by their logic and illogic.

My interest in the theater led me to my first writing experience as an adult. My husband David wrote the music and lyrics and I wrote the book for a children's musical, 'Spacenapped' that was produced by a neighborhood theater in Brooklyn.

It feels presumptuous to think of writing for adults.

Managing to tell a story is very gratifying.

I grew up in New York City. In elementary school, I was a charter member of the Scribble Scrabble Club, and in high school, my poems were published in an anthology of student poetry.

I wrote as a kid, but I never wanted to be a writer, particularly. I had been drawing and painting for years and loved that.

Most of my job life has had to do with welfare, first helping people find work and then as an administrator. The earlier experience was more direct and satisfying, and I enjoy thinking that a bunch of people somewhere are doing better today than they might have done if not for me.

Get to know your kids' minds and how they think.

I didn't want to be a writer. First I wanted to act, and then I wanted to be a painter like my big sister.

Contemporary fiction is the hardest for me because I am not really in the popular culture - I don't watch TV.

My good ideas are shy. But if they see that I treat the stupid ideas with respect, they come forward.

I have a very vivid memory of the way my parents spoke, and the 50's that I grew up in are closer to the 20's, I think, than today in many, many ways.

'EIla Enchanted' began in a marvelous writing course at New York City's The New School.

I wonder how Admat can be everywhere. Is he in my sandal? Or is he my sandal itself? Why would a god bother to be a sandal? Does he wear shoes or sandals himself, invisible ones?

She asks why I like her. Might as well ask Why I breathe. Maybe tomorrow I won't Breathe or like her Anymore. Maybe tomorrow the tides Will stop. Maybe tomorrow will bring No more rainbows. Maybe tomorrow She will stop Asking useless questions.

Who judges the judge who judges wrong?

He is flawless, without a blemish. Majesic . . . muscular.

I became simply a pair of eyes, staring through my mask at Char. I needed no ears because I was too far off to hear his voice, no words because I was too distant for speech, and no thoughts - those I saved for later. He bent his head. I loved the hairs on the nape of his neck. He moved his lips. I admired their changing shape. He clasped his hand. I blessed his fingers. Once, the power of my gaze drew his eyes.

Climb the day, Drop your dreams, Possess the day.

Step follows step, Hope follows Courage, Set your face towards danger, Set your heart on victory.

I wished she’d never stop squeezing me. I wished I could spend the rest of my life as a child, being slightly crushed by someone who loved me.

That's funny, you're funny. I like you, I'm quite taken by you.

I want to be with you forever and beyond.

Drualt took Freya's warm hand, Her strong hand, Her sword hand, And pressed it to his lips, Pressed it to his heart. Come with me,' he said. Come with me to battle, My love. Tarry at my side. Stay with me When battle is done. Tarry at my side. Laugh with me, And walk with me The long, long way. Tarry with me, My love, at my side.

And so, with laughter and love, we lived happily ever after.

Luck was with me. I saw no spiders. Luck was against me. I saw no specters.

Writing is a weird thing because we can read, we know how to write a sentence. It's not like a trumpet where you have to get some skill before you can even produce a sound. It's misleading because it's hard to make stories. It seems like it should be easy to do but it's not. The more you write, the better you're going to get. Write and write and write. Try not to be hard on yourself.

No music. No rituals. At home I write in my office or on the laptop in the kitchen where our puppy likes to sleep, and I love his company. But I've trained myself to be able to work anywhere, and I write on trains, planes, in automobiles (if I'm not the driver), airports, hotel rooms. I travel often. If I couldn't write wherever I was I would get little done. I also can write in short bursts. Fifteen minutes are enough to move a story forward.

I never met a word I didn't love

There's nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over. When you do, the words get inside you, become a part of you, in a way that words in a book you've read only once can't.

No, I won't marry you. I won't do it. No one can force me.

I'm solitary as a pulled tooth, Lonely as an unwelcome truth, Lost as a minnow out of school, A genius in a crop of fools.

He loved me. He'd loved me as long as he he'd known me! I hadn't loved him as long perhaps, but now I loved him equally well, or better. I loved his laugh, his handwriting, his steady gaze, his honorableness, his freckles, his appreciation of my jokes, his hands, his determination that I should know the worst of him. And, most of all, shameful though it might be, I loved his love for me.

Do you like to slide?" His voice was eager. Stair rails! Did he suspect me? I forced a sigh. "No, Majesty. I'm terrified of heights." "Oh." His polite tone had returned. "I wish I could enjoy it. This fear of heights is an affliction." He nodded, a show of sympathy but not much interest. I was losing him. "Especially," I added, "as I've grown taller.

He -it- was a specter! I stepped back, stunned.

I didn't think [Ella Enchanted] would get published. Everything I'd written till then had been rejected. If it was published, I thought it might sell a few thousand copies and go out of print. I thought if I was lucky I could write more books and get them published, too. I still pinch myself over the way things have worked out.

When I write, I make discoveries about my feelings.

You're Only the fairest when your fairest to yourself

That fool of a fairy Lucinda did not intend to lay a curse on me. She meant to bestow a gift. When I cried inconsolably through my first hour of life, my tears were her inspiration. Shaking her head sympathetically at Mother, the fairy touched my nose. "My gift is obedience. Ella will always be obedient. Now stop crying, child." I stopped.

I shan't marry a prince!

When you become a teenager, you step onto a bridge. You may already be on it. The opposite shore is adulthood. Childhood lies behind. The bridge is made of wood. As you cross, it burns behind you

I trust you to find the good in me, but the bad I must be sure you don't overlook.

In books and in life, you need to read several pages before someone's true character is revealed.

I was born singing. Most babies cry, I sang an aria.

There's nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over.

Fate...may...be...thwarted.

Hush Hattie!" I said, intoxicated with my success. "I don't want to go to my room. Everyone must know I shan't marry the prince." I ran to the door to our street, opened it, and called out into the night, "I shan't marry the prince." I turned back into the hall and ran to Char and threw my arms about his neck. "I shan't marry you." I kissed his cheek. He was safe from me.

A library is infinity under a roof.

Things change, people change, but that doesn't mean you should forget the past.

I put my fingers around the unmarked ring of the spyglass and twisted. The scene became clear. Oh no! A hairy brown spider clung to a vine! I couldn't go there! I'd go to the desert to find a dragon. I began to reset the spyglass, but then I stopped myself. A spider was worse than a dragon? No. My first monsters would be spiders, then.