“Only half the story is true. The rest is necessary.”

“You think you got something big to say? Something momentous? Or is it what you had to memorize in order to escape the men with lightning in their eyes? ”

“True love is willing to warn, reprove, confront or admonish when necessary.”

“No story has power, nor will it last, unless we feel in ourselves that it is true and true of us.”

“Stories last longer: but only by becoming only stories.”

“The story was gradually taking shape. Pilon liked it this way. It ruined a story to have it all come out quickly. The good story lay in half-told things which must be filled in out of the hearer's own experience.”

“A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as many versions as it has readers. Everyone takes what he wants or can from it and thus changes it to his measure. Some pick out parts and reject the rest, some strain the story through their mesh of prejudice, some paint it with their own delight. A story must have some points of contact with the reader to make him feel at home in it. Only then can he accept wonders.”