Quotes About Narrative

While historians may go on attempting grand, sweeping and defining narratives, they work in a time when readers know that another narrative always lies in wait, and that the more intelligent an historian is, the more tentative and self-scrutinizing the tone.

For me, everything about the telling is guided by tone. It's a bit mysterious; it's either there, or it isn't.

My lip curls in a snide reflex whenever I hear that a new novel is written from the point of view of a child or a monster, a lunatic or an animal. I immediately expect a nasty coyness of tone, cheesy artifice, the world through cardboard 3-D lenses.

Even the most meticulous historians work subjectively. The historian's point of view, his or her selection of subject and sources, the emphasis, the tone - all of these lead to subjective history, inevitably so. I do not say this as a criticism, merely as an observation.

You look at 'Arrested Development' or 'Community,' we're constantly either deconstructing genre or tone. We like to say it's like being a mad scientist: you get to play in a laboratory and experiment with directions to take narrative in.

Character is key. Once you've got that voice going, everything else can follow. If you've also got the right tone, you're in the right area - an inconsistent tone can screw up a project.

The narrative behind bitcoin has been dominated by bad behavior. The reality is bitcoin is filled with tons of talented developers building infrastructure.

I read tons of books, listen to music non-stop, watch as many movies as possible, catch a play when I can, art shows, concerts, bar talks - I just try to engage in art, which to me is everywhere, as often as I can because narrative lives in it all.

They always compare my 'Crazy Story' to Meek's 'Tony Story.'

For me, there's a fine line between telling a story that's fictional with lots of details and then removing yourself too much from it, so it's bloodless, a little too fictional.

I always try to find a story in the margins of history, but I don't like to do too much that's improbable.

A lot of shorts spend too much time setting up the idea; sometimes they meander.

A special effect is a tool, a means of telling a story. A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing.

Interactive storytelling emphasizes a personal connection with the characters. It is a powerful tool that can draw you so deeply into the world of a story that you lose sight of it as a story. You think you are there - at least, if it is done right.

As a filmmaker, every tool you get to tell the scene better is important.

When you're doing a film, narrative is your most important tool, but it's a tool to create a cinematographic experience, to create those moments that are beyond narrative, that are almost an abstraction of that moment that hits your psyche.

As a writer, it's a great narrative tool to have that character who is slightly detached but at the same time observant of his reality, because I think that's pretty much what being a writer is - being there, watching and internalizing.

President Obama likes to say Guantanamo Bay is a terrorist recruiting tool, and while that may be an easy excuse, it's simply not true. The reality is the motivations of radical Islamic jihadism existed before Guantanamo Bay. The ideology is premised on a narrative of conquest, in the spiritual as well as the earthly world.

Monsters are a storytelling tool, like domestic realism and close third.

It's great to engage with the mainstream media to get messages out, but the most empowering tool is to create records of our lives, and our own images, which are not filtered through judgements, biases, or misunderstandings.

I think 'Lost' didn't invent the flashback, obviously. It's been a cinematic tool. It's been around almost as long as cinema has.

Technology remains a tool: you can have the best tool in the world, but if you have nothing to say, it will remain an empty experience.

Forecasting is simply not a strength of the species; we are much better with tools and narrative storytelling.

I don't actually see that much difference between telling stories in journalism and telling them on film. The tools are very different, but the basic idea is the same.