Explore Quotes on Stories

All stories have a beginning, a middle and an ending, and if they're any good, the ending is a beginning.

The Negro. The South. These are the details. The real story is the universal one of men who destroy the souls of other men (and in the process destroy themselves) for reasons neither really understands. It is the story of the persecuted, the defrauded, the feared, and detested. I could have been a Jew in Germany, a Mexican in a number of states, or a member of any 'inferior' group. Only the details would have differed. The story would be the same.

A master was once unmoved by the complaints of his disciples that, though they listened with pleasure to his parables and stories, they were also frustrated for they longed for something deeper. To all their objections he would simply reply: 'You have yet to understand, my friends, that the shortest distance between a human being and truth is a story.'

Wrong is an addictive, repetitive story; Right is where the movement is.

I'd define it as self-awareness: an ability to trust your own judgment. An ability to see through veils of bullshit or spins on stories or propaganda. Maybe an ability to think for yourself.

The press was all over to get a picture of me. It got to the point where they were all over my house, following me to work... Then Tom Brokaw and everybody else was doing stories, 'A star is born.'

Without any intended hubris, I've lead a pretty exciting life. What I've tried to do in Mission Compromised is draw on those experiences to create a sense of excitement and realism within the story

I can't change the past, and I don't think I would. I don't expect to be understood. I like what I've written, the stories and two novels. If I had to give up what I've written in order to be clear of this disease, I wouldn't do it.

Merilyn Simonds maintains an effortless balance between the dictates of story and memory . . .these aren't just the stories of one life; here are the patterns found in all our lives, richly celebrated.

I like to think that I am telling a story rather than writing it.

Some people read palms to tell your future, but I read hands to tell your past. Each scar makes a story worth telling. Each callused palm, each cracked knuckle is a missed punch or years in a factory.

The second draft is on yellow paper, that's when I work on characterizations. The third is pink, I work on story motivations. Then blue, that's where I cut, cut, cut.

I never plan my novels because if I know what is going to happen, it bores me rigid. I let the story tell itself.

I've always known that the best part of writing occurs before you've picked up a pen. When a story exists only in your mind, its potential is infinite; it's only when you start pinning words to paper that it becomes less than perfect. You have to make your choices, set your limits. Start whittling away at the cosmos, and don't stop until you've narrowed it down to a single, ordinary speck of dirt. And in the end, what you've made is not nearly as glorious as what you've thrown away.

For my father there was no sharper way to understand a country than by listening to its stories.

Stories are not like the real world; they aren't held back by what we know is false or true. What's important is how a story makes you feel inside.

Recruiting Station was a story that came as the result of many anxious awakenings during many nights.

The dead and past stories that I have told again in divers fashions, are not set down without authority.

I love vampire stories. That's why I did the movie. Women especially were taken with that movie-even more so when it came out on video.

That's probably when I get the most angry at American movies, when they just so cynically manipulate the audience without even trying to give a good story.

I don't recall having any self-awareness about the intricacy of my stories.