“In intellectual disciplines and in the enjoyment of art and nature we discover value in our ability to forget self, to be realistic, to perceive justly.  We use our imagination not to escape the world, but to join it, and this exhilarates us because of the distance between our ordinary dulled consciousness and an apprehension of the real.”

Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good.

 “Real isn’t how you are made…It’s a thing that happens to you…When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt…It doesn’t happen all at once…You become.  It takes a long time.  That’s why it often doesn’t happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or have to be carefully kept…once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand” Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit

"Imagination is what, above all, makes empathy possible."

Maxine Greene