Quotes About Fiction

I have always held the old-fashioned opinion that the primary object of work of fiction should be to tell a story.

Anything you can imagine is probably true. And the worst you can imagine is probably worth money.

Reality is in the business of killing off fiction.

Aber seien wir doch ehrlich, es ist ein seltsamer Beruf. Ein wenig lächerlich für einen erwachsenen Menschen. Sie sitzen daheim und denken sich Geschichten aus, die nie passiert sind.

Stories within stories within stories. You never know where one ends and another begins! In truth, they all flow into one another. It's only in books that they're clearly divided.

Even in the world of make-believe there have to be rules. The parts have to be consistent and belong together.

Si no conocemos los procesos que nos llevan a creer ciertas cosas, no seremos capaces de evitar creer ciertas cosas que en realidad son ficciones sin fundamento. Son cosas que aprisionan la mente como una soporífera y pesada tela de araña, y no le permiten cobrar altura. Son cosas que si usted las cree pueden llevarlo a la muerte prematura, y no querrá usted morir antes de tiempo, ¿verdad?

like literary fiction, mathematical imagination entertains pure possibilities.

On romance books: We might assume then that men, major consumers of thrillers, westerns, and detective fiction, enjoy being beaten up, tortured, shot, stabbed, dragged by galloping horses, and thrown out of moving vehicles.

he wondered if it was even possible to have happiness in a story, when one was required to imagine both a beginning and an end.

Their [politicians] fiction mechanisms are immune to trauma.

There was a vaguely battered look to the outside of the TARDIS herself, but she seemed basically whole and intact. The main door (which the Doctor could quite distinctly remember not closing, being far more interested in putting some distance between himself and his young companions and the assortment of monstrous creatures spilling out of it) was now firmly shut, with the sense that it would take rather more than simple cajolery for it ever to open again.

None of this is real.

Fictional tales are better and more enjoyable the nearer they approach the truth or the semblance of the truth

Writers (of supernatural fiction), who used to strive for awe and achieve fear, now strive for fear and achieve only disgust.

All writing is lies. Good writing is lies skillfully told.

Truth might be stranger than fiction, but it needs a better editor.

You're a writer. Make it up.

James Hansen, one of the most distinguished scientists to warn of the dangers of climate change, once said that being in his line of work is like screaming at people from behind a soundproof glass wall. You've written that being an author of fiction who is concerned with environmental questions often feels frighteningly similar.

in the years ahead discover his métier as a writer, that enduring profession of skilled liars

Just kidding. That's really good, actually. I'm glad you weren't attacked by KillSims or Rodents of Unusual Size.

History, like love, is so apt to surround her heroes with an atmosphere of imaginary brightness.

An interesting fiction... however paradoxical the assertion may appear... addresses our love of truth- not the mere love of facts expressed by true names and dates, but the love of that higher truth, the truth of nature and principals, which is a primitive law of the human mind.

The function of the Society and of Department 17 is to keep track of all espionage and related acts recorded in literature. In other words, the Department reads spy thrillers and murder mysteries