19th October: Philip Pullman

Today some quotes from Philip Pullman, author of the His Dark Materials Trilogy, who was born on this date in 1946.

1. Argue with anything else, but don't argue with your own nature.
2. That's the duty of the old, to be anxious on behalf of the young. And the duty of the young is to scorn the anxiety of the old.
3. After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.
4. I think it's perfectly possible to explain how the universe came about without bringing God into it, but I don't know everything, and there may well be a God somewhere, hiding away. Actually, if he is keeping out of sight, it's because he's ashamed of his followers and all the cruelty and ignorance they're responsible for promoting in his name. If I were him, I'd want nothing to do with them.
5. I came to believe that good and evil are names for what people do, not for what they are.
6. People are too complicated to have simple labels.
7. All the history of human life has been a struggle between wisdom and stupidity.
8. Can is not the same as must. But if you must and you can, then there's no excuse.
9. Children are not less intelligent than adults; what they are is less informed.
10. What is worth having is worth working for.