Quotes About Interpretation

Who knows how much of our stories are true?

Miles Davis saying, "Don't play what's there, play what's not there.

Writing involves seeing people suffer and, as Robert Stone once put it, finding some meaning therein. But you can't do that if you're not respectful. If you look at people and just see sloppy clothes or rich clothes, you're going to get them wrong.

All you can give us is what life is about from your point of view. You are not going to be able to give us the plans to the submarine. Life is not a submarine. There are no plans.

You don't get to sit next to your readers and explain little things you left out, or fill in details that would have made the action more interesting or believable. The material has got to work on its own, and the dream must be vivid and continuous.

Whales might not lie, but like anybody else, Sean suspected they probably wanted to put the best spin they could on an error in judgment when called to account for their actions.

If the truth is not in the face, then where is it? In the hands! In the hands.

One can look deeply for meaning or one can invent it.

Miss Petitfour loved the little pictures, each in its own serrated frame and each seeming to tell it's own little story.

Who knows the colors someone else sees?

nonsenses to them that reminded her of

Science is just the latest theory we have, and as soon as another one comes along, a new discovery, a new way of interpreting them, then there's a new answer! It's not like mathematics that always adds up the same way, if you do it right. Science is a method of reaching a conclusion, not a conclusion itself.

It is not necessarily what is but what is perceived that society will judge.

embroidering the account, and decided it offered

What is written beneath this heavy handsome book cover will count, so sayeth this cover…

Laura remarked that science was dependent upon poetry, that all scientific description was metaphoric.

There were many markings in pencil, and those strange symbols again, dashed off, it seemed, revealing their opacity what a complex and abstract thing written language is.

You painted armless beings, swimming in blinding color, and they had to exist like that forever. Could they see you with all those tiny, scattered eyes? Or did they only see the heaven and hell of their own shining realm, anchored to the studs in the wall by a piece of twisted wire?

She was innately suspicious of language because she could "hear" with remarkable accuracy what lay behind it, and also she just didn't know how to talk very well.

For most people, words are just symbols for sounds, made on paper. For you, they can create all new worlds in your mind.

You will learn as you get older, my dear girl, that not everyone reads as you do. Not everyone has the same encounter with language.

Los pensamientos son imprecisos. Si te abro mi mente, no puedo controlar realmente lo que puedas leer en ella. Y, si soy yo quien lee en la tuya, es posible malinterprete lo que vea u oiga. Prefiero utilizar el lenguaje hablado y dejar que mis facultades mentales se expresen a traves de el....Para ser totalmente sincero, creo que el lenguaje es el mayor don que comparten mortales e inmortales.

Who could trust language?

Yes, I see.' 'Beware.' 'Of thinking I understand?' 'Precisely [...]