Considering Creative Works

Madeleine L'Engle has several insightful thoughts in her book Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith & Art. She reflects on her own creative writing experience as well as incorporates other artists' thoughts.

"Most artists are aware that during the deepest moments of that creation, they are out on the other side of themselves, and so are free from time, with the same joyousness that comes in the greatest moments of prayer." -L'Engle

"The role of the artist is exactly the same as the role of the lover. If I love you, I have to make you conscious of the things you don't see." -James Baldwin

"And as I listen to the silence, I learn that my feelings about art and my feelings about the Creator of the Universe are inseparable. To try to talk about art and about Christianity is for me one and the same thing, and it means attempting to share the meaning of my life, what gives it, for me, its tragedy and its glory." -L'Engle

"...when the words mean even more than the writer knew they meant, then the writer has been listening. And sometimes when we listen, we are led into places we do not expect, into adventures we do not always understand." -L'Engle

"The poet wrote the poem, no doubt. But he forgot himself while he wrote it, and we forget him while we read...We forget, for ten minutes, his name and our name, and I contend that this temporary forgetfulness, this momentary and mutual anonymity, is sure evidence of good stuff." -E.M. Forster