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21 " I've written about 2,000 short stories; I've only published 300 and I feel I'm still learning. Any man who keeps working is not a failure. He may not be a great writer, but if he applies the old fashioned virtues of hard, constant labor, he'll eventually make some kind of career for himself as a writer.Ray Bradbury, 1967 interview(Doing the Math - that means for every story he sold, he wrote six " un-publishable" ones. Keep typing!) "
22 " It is the kernel of truth in every story that makes its writing beautiful beyond standards. "
23 " In every story there is a silence, some sight concealed, some word unspoken, I believe. Till we have spoken the unspoken we have not come to the heart of the story. "
― J.M. Coetzee
24 " Every pause is a precursor to new thoughts, every thought is potentially a new story, every story is a new interpretation and every interpretation is a new shade of grey. "
25 " It’s all about truth,” he said. “We don’t trust governments because they don’t tell us the truth. They make every story sound like it’s good news, even when it’s not. Those who are in power sing their own praises. Those who aren’t in power criticise those that are. And no-one tells the whole truth. That’s why we look for conspiracies. We know we are being lied to. We just don’t know what they are lying to us about. "
26 " Finally, I’d say to anyone who wants to tell these tales, don’t be afraid to be superstitious. If you have a lucky pen, use it. If you speak with more force and wit when wearing one red sock and one blue one, dress like that. When I’m at work I’m highly superstitious. My own superstition has to do with the voice in which the story comes out. I believe that every story is attended by its own sprite, whose voice we embody when we tell the tale, and that we tell it more successfully if we approach the sprite with a certain degree of respect and courtesy. These sprites are both old and young, male and female, sentimental and cynical, sceptical and credulous, and so on, and what’s more, they’re completely amoral: like the air-spirits who helped Strong Hans escape from the cave, the story-sprites are willing to serve whoever has the ring, whoever is telling the tale. To the accusation that this is nonsense, that all you need to tell a story is a human imagination, I reply, ‘Of course, and this is the way my imagination works. "
― Philip Pullman , Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version
27 " I have a story to tell you. It has many beginnings, and perhaps one ending. Perhaps not. Beginnings and endings are contingent things anyway; inventions, devices. Where does any story really begin? There is always context, always an encompassingly greater epic, always something before the described events, unless we are to start every story with “BANG! Expand! Sssss…,” then itemize the whole subsequent history of the universe before settling down, at last, to the particular tale in question. Similarly, no ending is final, unless it is the end of all things… "
― Iain M. Banks , The Algebraist
28 " Because every story is a ghost story, even mine. "
― Samantha Hunt , Mr. Splitfoot
29 " How many beginnings can a story have, Daddy?" " As many as you can eat, my lamb. But only one ending. Or maybe it's the other way around: one beginning and a whole Easter basket of endings." " Papa, don't be silly... A story has to start somewhere. And then it has to end somewhere. That's the whole point. That's how it is in real life." " But that's not how it is in real life, Rinny. Real life is all beginnings. Days, weeks, children, journeys, marriages, inventions. Even a murder is the beginning of a criminal. Perhaps even a spree. Everything is prologue. Every story has a stutter. It just keeps starting and starting until you decide to shut the camera off. Half the time you don't even realize that what you're choosing for breakfast is the beginning of a story that won't pan out till you're sixty and staring at the pastry that made you a widower. No, love, in real life you can get all the way to death and never have finished one single story. Or never even get one so much as half-begun. "
30 " The problem with secrets is that they don't want to stay that way. They say information wants to be free. And maybe that's the case. But what I do know is that every story wants to be told. You can bury them as deep as you want. You can hide them. You can toss them into the darkest places you can imagine, but sooner or later... They always come back. "
― Justin Jordan , Deep State, Vol. 1
31 " That's the kind of stories I know. Sad ones. Anyway, taken to it's logical conclusion, every story is sad, because at the end everyone dies. "
― Margaret Atwood , The Blind Assassin
32 " The seventh reader interrupts you: " Do you believe that every story must have a beginning and an end? In ancient times a story could only end in two ways: having passed all the tests, the hero and heroine married, or else they died. The ultimate meaning to which all stories refer has two faces: the continuity of life, the inevitability of death." You stop for a moment to reflect on these words. Then, in a flash, you decide you want to marry Ludmilla. "
33 " He says every story has at least some truth in it, even if most are made up. "
― Darren Shan , Cirque Du Freak: A Living Nightmare (Cirque Du Freak, #1)
34 " If we told every story from the middle, we would never appreciate happy endings. "
― Jessica Brody , The Karma Club
35 " The movie I was working on, " Cleopatra" , it's about how destructive a force love can be. But maybe that's what every story is about. "
36 " white middle-upper class guys in highly educated families have a unique burden placed on us to be the hero of every story that we tell. I don’t think it’s merely that we’re self-centered and arrogant, but that we feel like we’re supposed to be in charge, and if we’re not the hero of the story, we’ve somehow failed in our life duty.group "
37 " Until the lion learns how to write, every story will glorify the hunter. "
― J. Nozipo Maraire
38 " Remember that writing things down makes them real; that it is nearly impossible to hate anyone whose story you know; and, most of all, that even in our post-postmodern era, writing has a moral purpose. With twenty-six shapes arranged in varying patterns, we can tell every story known to mankind, and make up all the new ones—indeed, we can do so in most of the world’s known tongues. If you can give language to experiences previously starved for it, you can make the world a better place. "
― Andrew Solomon
39 " Every life is a story. Every story has mistakes. If you focus too much on the mistakes, you will miss the story. In doing that, you are making a dreadful mistake yourself. Sometimes, it is the mistakes that enrich and give the story so much more meaning than it would have had otherwise. "
40 " There is a story behind everything and every story is worth telling... "