“Sophie's hard first question to the cards had not, precisely, gone without an answer, it had been transmuted into questions about the question. It had branched and rooted like a tree, growing questions like buds, and then at some moment all the questions had become one question: what tree is this?”

—  John Crowley

Bk. 3, Ch. 4
Little, Big: or, The Fairies' Parliament (1981)

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John Crowley27
American writer 1942

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