Quotes About Narrative

It is remarkable how events and truths can be reshaped, like wax that's sat too long in the sun. There is no such thing as a fact. There is only how you saw the fact, in a given moment. How you reported the fact. How your brain processed that fact. There is no extrication of the storyteller from the story.

I know how powerful a story can be. It can change the course of history. It can save a life. But it can also be a sinkhole, a quicksand in which you become stuck, unable to write yourself free.

A trial, it often came down to who had the best story.

Every life has a beginning, a middle, and an end; dissect history and you'll see the word that defines it as a tale, a narrative.

JUST SO YOU KNOW, WHEN THEY SAY "ONCE UPON a time"… they're lying. It's not once upon a time. It's not even twice upon a time. It's hundreds of times, over and over, every time someone opens up the pages of this dusty old book.

a story will tell itself, when it's ready.

It's because you don't just tell stories," Darija explained. "You paint with words.

There's something horribly unfair about dying in the middle of a good story, before you have a chance to see how it all comes out. Of course, I suppose everyone ALWAYS dies in the middle of a good story, in a sense. Your own story. Or the story of your grandchildren. Death is a raw deal for narrative junkies.

With great animation Heidi read the story of the prodigal son

The facts of history have been too well rehearsed (I'm speaking needless to say not of written history but the oral kind that goes on in you without your having to do anything about it). . .

Fictional characters are made of words, not flesh; they do not have free will, they do not exercise volition. They are easily born, and as easily killed off.

The policeman insists that there be a plot. However, life itself is plotless.

The story of your life is not your life. It is your story.

Mi è sempre parso, nei pochi romanzi che ho letto di quando in quando, che esigano parecchio dai lettori quegli autori che iniziano i loro racconti furiosamente, nel bel mezzo delle cose, invece che entrandovi, indietreggiando o di sbieco, con dolcezza.

Am I boring you? I don't really care, I suppose, but I'll be more comfortable if I knew all this interested you. No doubt when I get the hang of storytelling, after a chapter or two, I'll go faster and digress less often.

A myth is an unverifiable and typically fantastic story that is nonethless felt to be true and that deal with a theme of some importance to the believer.

He tells a story, and that's what I like. Does this fella tell a story? He doesn't spend twenty pages describing the colour of the sky?' 'He hasn't so far.' 'Good. Jeffrey Archer never talks about the colour of the sky and I like that in a writer. I'd say Jeffrey Archer has never even looked up at the sky his entire life.' 'Especially now that he's in prison,' I suggested.

Fences such as the one at the heart of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas still exist; it is unlikely that they will ever fully disappear. But whatever reaction you have to this story, I hope that the voices of Bruno and Shmuel will continue to resonate with you as they have with me. Their lost voices must continue to be heard; their untold stories must continue to be recounted. For they represent the ones who didn't live to tell their stories themselves.

E' la storia che ci ha condotto fin qui. Se non fosse per la storia, nessuno di noi oggi sarebbe seduto a questa tavola. Saremmo tranquillamente seduti nella nostra casa di Berlino. Stiamo correggendo la storia, qui.

Tell a story often enough and it becomes the truth.

A vida é fácil de narrar, mas atordoante de se praticar. Uma História de Solidão

NO NOTES. This was truly an oral event. Storytellers didn't read their stories; they told them, which allowed for eye contact.

When you get right down to it, intentional living is about living your best story.

Most people want to hear or tell a good story. But they don't realize they can and should be the good story. That requires intentional living.