"A while ago there was an article in the New York Times about some women in Tennessee who wanted the middle grade text books removed from the school curriculum, not because they were inadequate educationally, but because these women were afraid that they might stimulate the childrens' imaginations. What!?! It was a good while later that I realized that the word, imagination, is always a bad word in the King James translation of the Bible. I checked it out in my concordance, and it is always bad. Put them down in the imagination of their hearts. Their imagination is only to do evil. Language changes. What meant one thing three hundred years ago means something quite different now. So the people who are afraid of the word imagination are thinking about it as it was defined three centuries ago, and not as it is understood today, a wonderful word denoting creativity and wideness of vision. Another example of our changing language is the word, prevent. Take it apart into its Latin origin, and it is prevenire. Go before. So in the language of the King James translation if we read, "May God prevent us," we should understand the meaning to be, "God go before us," or "God lead us." And the verb, to let, used to mean, stop. Do not let me, meant do not stop me. And now it is completely reversed into a positive, permissive word."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Essayists from the United StatesEpiscopalians from the United StatesMemoirists from the United StatesNovelists from New York CityPoets from New York City
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Madeleine_L'Engle
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Madeleine L'Engle
Madeleine L'Engle Camp (November 29, 1918 – September 6, 2007) was an American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction, including the Newbery Medal-winning winning A Wrinkle in Time. An Episcopalian, her works for both adults and children are products of her strong Christian universalist faith and an intense interest in modern science.
82 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Madeleine L'Engle →
Related Quotes
"I endeavor To hold the I as one only for the cloud Of which I am a fragment, yet to which I'm vowed To be responsible…"
"All will be redeemed in God's fullness of time, all, not just the small portion of the population who have been given…"
"We are all strangers in a strange land, longing for home, but not quite knowing what or where home is. We glimpse it …"
"Poetry, at least the kind I write, is written out of immediate need; it is written out of pain, joy, and experience t…"
"The first people a dictator puts in jail after a coup are the writers, the teachers, the librarians — because these p…"
"Speaking of ways, pet, by the way, there is such a thing as a tesseract."
"Just because we don't understand doesn't mean that the explanation doesn't exist."
"Suddenly there was a great burst of light through the Darkness. The light spread out and where it touched the Darknes…"
"As the skipping rope hit the pavement, so did the ball. As the rope curved over the head of the jumping child, the ch…"
"Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it."