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All fiction is a process of imagining: whatever you write, in whatever genre or medium, your task is to make things up convincingly and interestingly and new.
Neil Gaiman
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Creating fiction involves imagination and the ability to present ideas in an engaging way.

Neil Gaiman's quote emphasizes the essence of fiction as a creative process rooted in imagination. It highlights the responsibility of writers to not only invent unique ideas but to also craft them in a manner that captivates and intrigues the audience, regardless of the genre or medium they choose to work within.

Themes

FictionImaginationWritingCreativityArt

In practice

Example use cases

In a writing workshop to inspire creativity among the participants.

More from Neil Gaiman

A short story is the ultimate close-up magic trick -- a couple of thousand words to take you around the universe or break your heart.
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As a teenager I wrote to R.A. Lafferty. And he responded, too, with letters that were like R.A. Lafferty short stories, filled with elliptical answers to straight questions and simple answers to complicated ones.
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The important thing to understand about American history, wrote Mr. Ibis, in his leather-bound journal, is that it is fictional, a charcoal-sketched simplicity for the children, or the easily bored.
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Nothing’s changed. You’ll go home. You’ll be bored. You’ll be ignored. No one will listen to you, really listen to you. You’re too clever and too quiet for them to understand. They don’t even get your name right.
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I like the stars. It's the illusion of permanence, I think. I mean, they're always flaring up and caving in and going out. But from here, I can pretend...I can pretend that things last. I can pretend that lives last longer than moments. Gods come, and gods go. Mortals flicker and flash and fade. Worlds don't last; and stars and galaxies are transient, fleeting things that twinkle like fireflies and vanish into cold and dust. But I can pretend.
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