Quotes from Clive Barker

It is great good health to believe, as the Hindus do, that there are 33 million gods and goddesses in the world. It is great good health to want to understand one's dreams. It is great good health to desire the ambiguous and paradoxical.

Interestingly, although the 'Books of Blood' were greeted with cries of righteous horror - and smirks - I didn't think of them as being particularly excessive. God knows what I did think was excessive at the time, but I didn't think they were.

I think I'm less and less labelled a 'horror writer'. The books tend not to go on horror shelves any more, and when they do, I tend to take them off.

I love the idea of stories being about great beginnings and terrible endings.

One of the things I'm trying to do over and over again in my books is create new mythologies, create new ways to understand the complexity of the world. I think what mythology does is impress upon chaotic experience the patterns, hierarchies and shapes which allow us to interpret the chaos and make fresh sense of it.

All I've ever wanted to do is darken the day and brighten the night.

The thought of making a movie in which the monsters were the good guys was just financial suicide.

There's a lot of places where the image of a cube as a thing of power is pertinent. I don't know why that is. I don't have any mythic explanation for it, but it seems to work for people.

I certainly knew from an early age... how to tell stories; how to create pictures in other people's heads.

Though I respect hugely the effort and the care and the beauty of games, I want to be working with people who want to create the 'War & Peace' of games, the 'Citizen Kane' of games, and not just be warming up George Romero.

There was supposedly no point showing 'Nightbreed' to critics because the people who see these movies don't read reviews, in brackets, even if they can read at all! Immediately it was disqualified from serious criticism. Therefore, it had to be sold to the lowest common denominator.

I'm a poet,' the young man said, 'And it's my job to remember the sadness of things.

Maybe the man had taken the wrong turning, but at least he'd travelled some extraordinary roads.

What worth was a man who could not be haunted?

A man kills the thing he loves, and he must die a little himself.

Believe me, when I say; There are no two powers That command the soul. One is God The other is the tide. -Anon From the novel Abarat

So we make stories of our own, in fevered and envious imitation of our Maker, hoping that we'll tell, by chance, what God left untold. And finishing our tale, come to understand why we were born.

After all, where can the glorious, the goofy, and the god-like stand shoulder to shoulder?

I'm a great dog fanatic. My own dog died a little while ago and I take it very personally when things die-it's a major offence.

I want to be able to still surprise myself, even shock myself, whether it be sexual content, whether it be about the theological content, whatever. I want to be able to knock myself sideways. Otherwise, what a waste of a life that would be.

I remember when I watched 'Hellraiser' with my mother. She cried when she saw my name in the opening credits, and I had to tell her that that was the happiest she was going to be for the next two hours.

You can plan to be brave - it's even better if you just try to be brave.

Journey to the end of day, Come the fire-fly, Come the moon; Say a prayer for God's good grace And sleep with lore upon your face.

Neil Gaiman is a star. He constructs stories like some demented cook might make a wedding cake, building layer upon layer, including all kinds of sweet and sour in the mix.