Quotes About Story

A novel is just a story that hasn't yet discovered a way to be brief.

The Russians, when I found them a few years later, worked on me in the same way. They seemed to regard fiction not as something decorative but as a vital moral-ethical tool. They changed you when you read them, made the world seem to be telling a different, more interesting story, a story in which you might play a meaningful part, and in which you had responsibilities.

It's hard to get any beauty at all into a story. If and when we do, it might not be the type of beauty we've always dreamed of making. But we have to take whatever beauty we can get, however we can get it.

all a story is: a limited set of elements that we

that's really all a story is: a series of things that happen in sequence, in which we can discern a pattern of causality.

A story is an organic whole, and when we say a story is good, we're saying that it responds alertly to itself.

We could understand a story as simply a series of such expectation/resolution moments.

What a story is "about" is to be found in the curiosity it creates in us, which is a form of caring. So: What do you care about in this story, so far? It's Marya.

Halfway through the second paragraph, we find that the resisting element within the narrative voice belongs to one Marya Vasilyevna, who, failing to be moved by springtime, appears in the cart at the sound of her name.

We might think of structure as simply: an organizational scheme that allows the story to answer a question it has caused its reader to ask.

We might imagine structure as a form of call-and-response. A question arises organically from the story and then the story, very considerately, answers it. If we want to make good structure, we just have to be aware of what question we are causing the reader to ask, then answer that question.

We've said that a story is a system for the transfer of energy. Energy made in the early pages gets transferred along through the story, passed from section to section, like a bucket of water headed for a fire, and the hope is that not a drop gets lost.

The movie producer and all-around mensch Stuart Cornfeld once told me that in a good screenplay, every structural unit needs to do two things: (1) be entertaining in its own right and (2) advance the story in a non-trivial way.

In workshop, we talk a lot about raising the stakes of a story. Semyon just did this. There was a bare wire labeled Marya and a bare wire labeled Peasants in a Teahouse and electricity was coursing through each but they were laid out parallel to one another, several feet apart. Semyon, by reacting to the swearimg, just crossed them. Marya and those gathered peasants had nothing to do with one another, were not in relation. Now they do, and are.

Ya bir devam? vard?r,ya da yoktur.. Ya anlat?labilecek bir devam? vard?r,ya da yoktur.

It might have been supposed that Freddy, whose intellect was not of the first order, would have found it impossible to grasp the gist of an extremely tangled and discursive story, but once more the possession of three volatile and excitable sisters stood him in good stead.

The Merchant said it was wonderful - a great contribution to the body of English literature. Personally, I would have preferred a pirate story.

HBO working on the documentary about my experiences, One Survivor Remembers, went to Germany to film at locations where I had

Mr. Carter spoke, "I think your grandfather will be glad to help. I can go to Greenfield and tell him the whole story." He looked at his watch and got up quickly. "Good-by, children, and the best of luck." In one minute he was gone. Benny said, "Mystery men work fast, don't they?

What happened to-day, a narrative

Gastronomy is my hobby. I'm simply the casting director. Once I've brought all the right people together, it is they who must work together to tell a story.

There must be a story within him/her that wants to come out. That's the reason why 'Dil Chahta Hai,' 'Lagaan,' and 'Rang De Basanti' worked so well: Ashutosh, Farhan, and Rakesh had a story inside them. It's very important that the director should have the fire in the belly to tell the story.

I've worked with some really great directors, and I'm really choosy about them because they're telling the story at the end of the day.

I would say as a journalist, I would envision travelling to other countries that have had to reckon with their past and see how they've done it: what worked, what didn't work, finding characters that would tell the story of how that process was done.