Quotes About Narrative

Don't you think scars make better stories than tattoos?

Using only nonnarrative portions of the Bible to interpret narrative is not only disrespectful to the narrative portions but also suggests a misguided approach to nonnarrative parts of the Bible.

The fact that our traditional method of extracting doctrine from Scripture does not work well on narrative does not mean that Bible stories do not send clear messages. Instead, it suggests that the way we apply our traditional method of interpretation is inadequate because we are ignoring too much of God's Word.

Living history is thrilling, especially in an eloquent city, in a talkative town, in a place where people fought to get here, fought to stay here, fought to get out.

the key insight for now is that we will miss Jesus' solution if we follow some narrative that pushes everything out toward external blame. Such a narrative is like a faulty sign pointing us away from Jesus because his acceptance of us takes place inside us—it doesn't happen "out there.

We specialize in story-- story is what defines us, what brings people together

But what was wanted—what was wanted for Mrs. Mitwisser—was simply Story: a story about men and women free of history, except their own.

What does it mean to write a story of your own life in your head? We all do that whether we are writers or not. We all have a story about who we are: what gender we are, what experiences we have . . . all sorts of stories and narratives we allow ourselves to believe in and create as we go along.

There is simply no substitute for taking the time to determine the meaning of the narrative. Only after this has been secured, by the steps suggested above, will it be possible to ask how this text may now be applied in the times, culture, and situations that a present audience of readers and listeners faces.

Where I live is one of the places where suburban stories were first mass-produced. They were stories then for displaced Okies and Arkies, Jews who knew the pain of exclusion, Catholics who thought they did, and anyone white with a steady job.

It happened to me on 'King of the Hill,' where I'd left it before the end and didn't really participate in the ending, and I always felt a little bit like I wanted to try a different version of that story.

There's always a version of me who is the narrator. And I make myself look better than other people.

I have always been drawn to young characters and seeing big tapestries through the eyes of a child. It probably comes from being a father myself and having a young son and seeing the world through his eyes. I write stories that are sort of the exaggerated version of that.

One of the great challenges of being a modern historian is interviewing multiple people who were all there for something, some event. No one's version matches up 100% with other people's, even if it's three or four people on a conference call.

The forward march of American literature is usually chronicled by way of its male novelists. There is little sense, in that version of the story, that women writers of those eras were doing much worth remembering.

There's so many versions of 'Red Riding Hood.' It goes back 700 years.

There is very much a sense of different versions of storytelling within our 'Camelot' - who tells those stories, who creates them, who shifts them.

I love picture books - with picture books, you can use words and pictures as a double act, even tell two different versions of a story at the same time.

I just feel that I don't agree with sensationalized versions of history or me. Any version that's sensationalized.

When there are multiple versions of a story, you really have three ways to go. You can pick the most sensational version. You can try to balance things in your gut to get to what you think is the honest truth. Or you can err on the side of kindness.

For 'Frost/Nixon,' everyone I spoke to told the story their way. Even people in the room tell different versions. There's no one truth about what happened in those interviews, so I feel very relaxed about bringing my imagination to the piece. God knows everyone else has.

What I love about what I get to do is that I'm allowed to create the stories that I want to tell with minimal interference by some very big corporations like Microsoft and Sprint and EA and BioWare. The advantage that these tech companies have is that they understand the space organically, versus traditional media companies.

I tend to relate to a character in terms of the arc: what's interesting is where he starts versus where he ends up.

The thrill of doing television versus features is, in television, you get to focus more on the characters.