Words made you laugh and history fell apart into tales and…

My heart broke open and history fell in.

— Salman Rushdie

Every word was a singing sparrow, a magic trick, a truffle for me. The words made me laugh in delight.

— Elizabeth Gilbert

“If the caveman had known how to laugh, history would have been different.”

— Oscar Wilde

Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the cave-man had known how to laugh, History would have been different.

— Oscar Wilde

“Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If cavemen had known how to laugh, history would have been different.”

— Chuck Klosterman

Some stories, you use up. Others use you up.

— Chuck Palahniuk

“Societies everywhere have a tendency to construct a genealogically useful past for themselves in which desirable versions of their history are favored and unwanted…

— Tudor Parfitt

Beware of self-indulgence. The romance surrounding the writing profession carries several myths: that one must suffer in order to be creative; that one must…

— David Brin

Your job as a writer is to find storylines, narrative structures, and characters to show the things that you believe rather than saying them…

— Philipp Meyer

We can never tell what is in store for us.

— Harry S. Truman

When we read a story, we inhabit it. The covers of the book are like a roof and four walls.

— John Berger

I have always been fascinated by the supernatural elements in stories, whether fairy tales, myths, film or literature.

— Trudi Canavan

If you do weave one-liners into a story, you have to have an overall story as well, otherwise it doesn't really count as narrative.

— Tim Vine

“A disproportionate number of stories are love stories – and what is homosexuality but a special narrative of love?”

— Christopher Bram

“Anyway, it's a pretty good story," I said. "You have to admit." "Yeah?" He crumpled up the Kleenex, having dispatched the solitary tear. "You…

— Michael Chabon