There are only three possible endings -aren't there? - to any story: revenge, tragedy or forgiveness. That's it. All stories end like that.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that all narratives ultimately culminate in one of three outcomes: revenge, tragedy, or forgiveness.
Jeanette Winterson reflects on the fundamental endings that stories can have, positing that every narrative can be distilled into one of three themes. The notion emphasizes the complexity of human experiences and emotions, where outcomes of conflicts either lead to revenge, destructive tragedy, or a path of reconciliation through forgiveness, thus shaping our understanding of life and storytelling.
In practice
In a discussion about the different outcomes in life, this quote can highlight the choices we make.
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
A sentimentalist is simply one who desires to have the luxury of an emotion without paying for it.
Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these dead doubts she gathers her most vital hope.
...Where and when God finds you ready, he must act and overflow into you, just as when the air is clear and pure, the sun must overflow into it and cannot refrain from doing that.
There are few men who dare to publish to the world the prayers they make to Almighty God.
Our society finds truth too strong a medicine to digest undiluted. In its purest form, truth is not a polite tap on the shoulder; it is a howling reproach.
The Kingdom is to be in the midst of your enemies. And he who will not suffer this does not want to be of the Kingdom of Christ; he wants to be among friends, to sit among roses and lilies, not with the bad people but the devout people. O you blasphemers and betrayers of Christ! If Christ had done what you are doing, who would ever have been spared?
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