Reading yourself as a fiction as well as a fact is the only way to keep the narrative open - the only way to stop the story from running away under its own momentum, often towards an ending no one wants.

All Bette's stories have happy endings. That's because she knows where to stop. She's realized the real problem with stories—if you keep them going long enough, they always end in death.

Luz's manner of speaking made it clear that she had no idea what she might say next. It wasn't that she made things up, strictly speaking--only that facts were merely a point of departure for her.

Stories are psycho-diagnostic ― they diagnose the condition of our psyches. When we watch, read or hear a story, whatever detail jumps out reflects an issue in our psyche that requires our attention.

Some stories aren't meant to be told. The more they get told, the more they change from what they once were, worn down and smooth like pieces of sea glass too beautiful to have ever been broken bottles.

You know what pulp is, Mr. Tallis? It's the flesh of a luscious fruit, mashed down into an incredible, half liquid richness. so saturated with flavor that it fills your whole body, not just your mouth.

We all spin stories. That's what we do. We want people to see certain things about us and not others. What matters is whether you let others in to the truest story, the one that's the hardest to tell.

No one could say the stories were uselessfor as the tongue clackedfive or forty fingers stitchedcorn was grated from the huskpathwork was piecedor the darning was done...(from 'The Storyteller Poems')

ككل الأشياء التي تبدأ كبيرة ثم تصغر

The stars we are given. The constellations we make. That is to say, stars exist in the cosmos, but constellations are the imaginary lines we draw between them, the readings we give the sky, the stories we tell.

Writers are liars, my dear, surely you know that by now? And yet, things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow-truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot.

There is, I believe now, a force in stories, words in motion, that either drives them forward past things into feelings or doesn't. Sometimes the words fly over the fence and all the way out to the feelings.

This earth that we live on is full of stories in the same way that, for a fish, the ocean is full of ocean. Some people say when we are born we’re born into stories. I say we’re also born from stories.

When you’re here, an i in the Ocean, you’re no longer waiting for something to happen or to change. When you’re here you have what you seek. Your heart opens to the gift you receive, that you are.

I know that I too could try a story out, rebuild mine, make it live again several minutes before the full of the day, the sun, the city. But I haven't the strength, stupidly. I rise and carry on. One more time.