“On the whole, stories don't write themselves.”

“People talk about books that write themselves, and it's a lie. Books don't write themselves. It takes thought and research and backache and notes and more time and more work than you'd believe.”

“Write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.”

“So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.”

“The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it’s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I’m not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.”

“People take on the shapes of the songs and the stories that surround them, especially if they don't have their own song.”

“Does that change things?” asked the old man. “MaybeAnansi’s just some guy from a story, made up back in Africa inthe dawn days of the world by some boy with blackfly on his leg,pushing his crutch in the dirt, making up some goofy storyabout a man made of tar. Does that change anything? People respondto the stories. They tell them themselves. The storiesspread, and as people tell them, the stories change the tellers.Because now the folk who never had any thought in their headbut how to run from lions and keep far enough away from riversthat the crocodiles don’t get an easy meal, now they’re starting todream about a whole new place to live. The world may be thesame, but the wallpaper’s changed. Yes? People still have thesame story, the one where they get born and they do stuff andthey die, but now the story means something different to what itmeant before.”