Hans Christian Andersen Quotes

I am always coming up with architectural metaphors when I think about writing. But I think one of the things that draw us to literature is that it gives us this very attractive illusion that there is meaning in the world - things connect.

Everything for me becomes allegory.

I seldom deal in symbolisms; if there be hidden meanings in my verse, they are there without my knowledge.

Speech is like cloth of Arras opened and put abroad, whereby the imagery doth appear in figure; whereas in thoughts they lie but as packs.

The world is emblematic. Parts of speech are metaphors, because the whole of nature is a metaphor of the human mind.

The fairy tale emanates from specific struggles to humanize bestial and barbaric forces, which have terrorized our minds and communities in concrete ways, threatening to destroy free will and human compassion. The fairy tale sets out to conquer this concrete terror through metaphors.

Poetry is the shadow cast by our streetlight imaginations.

In daylight I belong to the world . . . in the night to sleep and eternity. But in the dusk I'm free from both and belong only to myself . . . and you

Thought must be hidden in the verse like nutritional virtue in a fruit.

The metaphor is the story, not the character.

[But] we accept irony through a device called metaphor. And through that we grow and become deeper human beings.

This is what metaphor is. It is not saying that an ant is an elephant. Perhaps; both are alive. No. Metaphor is saying the ant is an elephant. Now, logically speaking, I know there is a difference. If you put elephants and ants before me, I believe that every time I will correctly identify the elephant and the ant. So metaphor must come from a very different place than that of the logical, intelligent mind. It comes from a place that is very courageous, willing to step out of our preconceived ways of seeing things and open so large that it can see the oneness in an ant and in an elephant.

The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor.

Spiritual teaching must always be by symbols.

I love metaphor. It provides two loaves where there seems to be one. Sometimes it throws in a load of fish.

It'is like a book, I think, this bloomin' world.

We don't suffer from a shortage of metaphors . . . But you have to be careful which metaphor you choose, because it matters.

I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence. I much prefer history – true or feigned– with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author.

They [Fairy Tales] are talking about real emotions, telling true stories, through the medium of metaphor. People used to understand metaphor better than I think we do now. But these stories are so potent, they refuse to die.

The mirror is the mother dew, the book of desiccated twilights, echo become flesh.

The natural object is always the adequate symbol.

The symbol in the dream has more the value of a parable: it does not conceal, it teaches.

A metaphor is not an ornament. It is an organ of perception. Through metaphors, we see the world as one thing or another.

The word "metaphor" means carrying something from one place to another . . . and it is when you describe something by using a word for something that it isn't. This means that the word "metaphor" is a metaphor. I think it should be called a lie because a pig is not like a day and people people do not have skeletons in their cupboards. And when I try and make a picture of the phrase in my head it just confuses me because imagining and apple in someone's eye doesn't have anything to do with liking someone a lot and it makes you forget what the person was talking about.

A figure of speech is a shifty thing; it can be twisted or it can be straight.