Endings Of Stories Quotes & Sayings

It didn't matter that the story had begun, because kathakali discovered long ago that the secret of the Great Stories is that they have no secrets. The Great Stories are the ones you have heard and want to hear again. The ones you can enter anywhere and inhabit comfortably. They don't deceive you with thrills and trick endings. They don't surprise you with the unforeseen. They are as familiar as the house you live in. Or the smell of your lover's skin. You know how they end, yet you listen as though you don't. In the way that although you know that one day you will die, you live as though you won't. In the Great Stories you know who lives, who dies, who finds love, who doesn't. And yet you want to know again. — Arundhati Roy

Life has no happy endings, actually, no endings at all, just an ongoing series of beginnings. A story - whether it's happy or sad, whether it makes sense or not, what its meaning is - depends entirely on where you start it and where you end it. — Judith Ryan Hendricks

Losing something happens in a day. An end takes one day. We all seem to focus on that one day, on that ending, rather than on the beautiful story that was created before the end came. We are obsessed with endings, so much so, that we would rather not live at all, than live and then lose. So, we have two choices: to not create our stories because we know that one day they have endings, or, to build our stories and therefore to live, filling the many years with memories and moments! An end takes one day to happen, but life takes place in the moments and in the memories that we choose to feel, to build, to hold. Don't miss out on the years, for the fear of one day. — C. JoyBell C.

I usually make up stories for my kids.I like to tell them stories and make up any kind of crazy to involve them in characters. The kind of fairytales I don't like are the ones with happy endings, where there's just good and evil and things are perfect. I think when there's a good story for children it has a moral tale, so that's what I try to teach my kids. — Angelina Jolie

At the Foley Center for the Study of Lives at Northwestern University, McAdams studies the stories that people tell about themselves. We all write our life stories as if we were novelists, McAdams believes, with beginnings, conflicts, turning points, and endings. And the way we characterize our past setbacks profoundly influences how satisfied we are with our current lives. Unhappy people tend to see setbacks as contaminants that ruined an otherwise good thing ("I was never the same again after my wife left me"), while generative adults see them as blessings in disguise ("The divorce was the most painful thing that ever happened to me, but I'm so much happier with my new wife"). Those who live the most fully realized lives - giving back to their families, societies, and ultimately themselves - tend to find meaning in their obstacles. In a sense, McAdams has breathed new life into one of the great insights of Western mythology: that where we stumble is where our treasure lies. — Susan Cain

Your life is not A story

But rather an assortment of small ones

Some endings are happy

Some, sad

Others - ironic

In some stories you are the hero

In others - the villain

Still others, a bit player - in someone else's saga

We all are but players

In story, after story, after story

Without being afforded one rehearsal or script

But collectively we share the hope

To bow out gracefully — Joseph DiFrancesco

And there are never really endings, happy or otherwise. Things keep going on, they overlap and blur, your story is part of your sister's story is part of many other stories, and there is no telling where any of them may lead. — Erin Morgenstern

I get tired of stories that keep going and going and never get anywhere. It's like a promise that's never fulfilled. Stories need endings. Otherwise, they aren't really stories. Just pages. — Ted Naifeh

Endings are the most important part of stories. They grow inevitably from the stories themselves. — Dennis Covington

As this world becomes increasingly ugly, callous and materialistic it needs to be reminded that the old fairy stories are rooted in truth, that imagination is of value, that happy endings do, in fact, occur, and that the blue spring mist that make an ugly street look beautiful is just as real a thing as the street itself. — Elizabeth Goudge

I learned a long time ago that life introduces young people to situations they are in no way prepared for, even good girls, lucky girls who want for nothing. Sometimes, when you least expect it, you become the girl in the woods. You lose your name because another one is forced on you. You think you are alone until you find books about girls like you. Salvation is certainly among the reasons I read. Reading and writing have always pulled me out of the darkest experiences in my life. Stories have given me a place in which to lose myself. They have allowed me to remember. They have allowed me to forget. They have allowed me to imagine different endings and better possible worlds. — Roxane Gay

That's the thing they never tell you about love stories: just because one ends, that doesn't mean it failed. A cherry pie isn't a failure just because you eat it all. It's perfect for what it is, and then it's gone. And exchanging the truest parts of yourself--all the things you are--with someone? What a slice of life. One I'll carry with me into every single someday. — Emery Lord

Sometimes a soldier returns home and all he can do is share his story in the hopes that somehow, in some way, it helps another soldier make sense of things. And although the stories may not be perfect, sometimes just sharing is enough to make a difference. — Michael Anthony

We choose owning our stories of struggle, Over hiding, over hustling, over pretending. When we deny our stories, they define us. When we run from struggle, we are never free. So we turn toward truth and look it in the eye. We will not be characters in our stories. Not villains, not victims, not even heroes. We are the authors of our lives. We write our own daring endings. We craft love from heartbreak, Compassion from shame, Grace from disappointment, Courage from failure. Showing up is our power. Story is our way home. Truth is our song. We are the brave and brokenhearted. — Brene Brown

16. The last paragraphs of individual stories are worth careful examination and rereading. What details does Keegan set up earlier in each piece to make these endings particularly powerful? How does she seal each story while still using a light hand? When does she allow ambiguity? Which ending do you see as most effective, and why? — Marina Keegan

From depression to ceiling fans, I've been through it all. I've taken almost every step that life has to offer and invariably I've found several different endings to my Choose Your Own Adventure stories. I've lived, loved, sacrificed and scraped for this existence, this paltry little city state I call my time so far. And by God, I wouldn't change a single frame of this movie. — Corey Taylor

Let people know that you will always believe in the happy ending to the story
because the story doesn't end here. Some happy endings will never be read in this life. But the atonement of Jesus Christ promises us that our stories will all have successful conclusions one day, if we put our trust in him. — Emily Watts

All those stories need different endings - which is possible because it's my life and I do have the privelege of being able to write the story. — Laura Fraser

The inimitable stories of Tong-King never have any real ending, and this one, being in his most elevated style, has even less end than most of them. But the whole narrative is permeated with the odour of joss-sticks and honourable high-mindedness, and the two characters are both of noble birth. — Ernest Bramah

You wanted something to happen, right? " Rick says. "For all of this to be leading up to something? Closure," Rick says, pointing at the manila envelope. "That is definitely one way to have closure."
"I didn't say I wanted closure. Drama. I said I wanted drama."
"What do you think drama is, Murray?"
"How about something more open-ended?"
"Oh sure, that can be arranged, too," Rick says. "But even open-ended stories have to end at some point, right? Open endings, after all, are still endings. — Charles Yu

We said it from the beginning. No strings. No regrets. We lay, tangled in a web of sheets, Limbs and anemic light, And we passed promises back and forth like slippery stars. You told me you were recovering from A broken heart. I told you I was recovering from A broken life. Fair enough, we agreed and laughed. We wrote stories on our bodies. Middles and endings Etched onto our feet and the palms of our hands. Our hopes were lettered in black and silver On a background of stark white flesh. We traded words on our tongues like tiny drops of melted sugar. — Autumn Doughton

Many animal rescue organizations hit with a hard-core, heartbreaking message. Their videos and stories can become difficult for average people to watch. By taking a more positive, heartwarming approach to animal rescue, I've been able to engage people and keep them engaged for years. Instead of selling the agony and misery - and sadly, there is no shortage of that - I start with the happy endings. I work backwards so the first message they get is joy and success due to their involvement. Opening the mind with humor and joy gets the rescue message in that much deeper. — Elayne Boosler

Just cuz you get to the end doesn't mean you know what happened. — Karen Tei Yamashita

The secret of the Great Stories is that they have no secrets. The Great Stories are the ones you have heard and want to hear again. The ones you can enter anywhere and inhabit comfortably. They don't deceive you with thrills and trick endings. They don't surprise you with the unforeseen. They are as familiar as the house you live in. Or the smell of your lover's skin. You know how they end, yet you listen as though you don't. In the way that although you know that one day you will die, you live as though you won't. In the Great Stories you know who lives, who dies, who finds love, who doesn't. And yet you want to know again.
That is their mystery and their magic. — Arundhati Roy

These ears aren't to be trusted.
The keening in the night, didn't you hear?
Once I believed all the stories didn't have endings,
but I realized the endings were invented, like zero,
had yet to be imagined.
The months come around again,
and we are in the same place;
full moons, cherries in bloom,
the same deer, the same frogs,
the same helpless scratching at the dirt.
You leave poems I can't read
behind on the sheets,
I try to teach you songs made of twigs and frost.
you may be imprisoned in an underwater palace;
I'll come riding to the rescue in disguise.
Leave the magic tricks to me and to the teakettle.
I've inhaled the spells of willow trees,
spat them out as blankets of white crane feathers.
Sleep easy, from behind the closet door
I'll invent our fortunes, spin them from my own skin.

(from, The Fox-Wife's Invitation) — Jeannine Hall Gailey

If we can only live once, then let it be a daring adventure that draws on all our powers Let our grandchildren delight to find the start of our stories in their ears but the endings all around in their wandering eyes. — Julian Assange

She had thought often of Ada's words about inventing new endings to stories and choosing joy over sorrow. In recent years she had decided her sister had been in part wrong. Suffering and death and loss were inescapable. And yet, what Ada had written about joy was entirely true. When she stands before you with her long, naked limbs and her mysterious smile, you must embrace her while you can. — Eowyn Ivey

The way you remember or dream about your loved ones - the ones who are gone - you can't stop their endings from jumping ahead of the rest of their stories. You don't get to choose the chronology of what you dream, or the order of events in which you remember someone. In your mind - in your dreams, in your memories - sometimes the story begins with the epilogue. — John Irving

That's the way it was, always will be. nothing we can do to make it different. It's a story now, and stories have endings even when you don't know- fools like me- that you're already in the middle of one, and you're already making choices... Choices that will bring you to places you'd never thought you'd be, places in your heart you'll mourn and love the rest of your life.~Mr. Dees — Lee Martin

October knew, of course, that the action of turning a page, of ending a chapter or of shutting a book, did not end a tale. Having admitted that, he would also avow that happy endings were never difficult to find: "It is simply a matter," he explained to April, "of finding a sunny place in a garden, where the light is golden and the grass is soft; somewhere to rest, to stop reading, and to be content. — Neil Gaiman

But she couldn't start this, because then it would end. Stories like this always ended. She couldn't take this pleasure, because she would spend the rest of her life missing it, hurting from it. — Sarah Addison Allen

Read all kinds of stories to your child. Don't be afraid if they don't all have happy endings. Being exposed to peaks and valleys of life encourages empathy, resilience, and feelings of meaningfulness and gratitude for our own lives. — Iben Dissing Sandahl

Once upon a time I thought I could change stories, make them go the way I wanted, instead of where they actually went. — April Genevieve Tucholke

I like stories of adventure. Especially if there's some kind of disaster involved."
The eyebrow remains arched.
I laugh. "I read the ones with happy endings, too."
Josh gestures towards my shelves. "You read a lot."
"Safer than going on a real adventure."
Now he's the one who laughs. "Maybe. — Stephanie Perkins

With us, there were always too many false starts. I believe that what's meant to be usually has a way of working out... and with us, it never did. Call it timing, call it fate, call it what you want. It is what it is. Sometimes in the end, the girl doesn't always get the boy--and that's ok. Life goes on. You know better than anyone that some love stories never get their happy ending... but it doesn't make them any less of a love story though, does it? It doesn't make the love the two shared any less relevant. — Britney King

I admire the ballad form most of all. Stories are irresistible. I've always had a passion for stories, the endings being of particular importance. — David Massengill

Love is the spice of life!" Aunt Lydia picked up her glass and took a long drink before setting it down again. "Did it end in heartache, dear?" "Well, yes ... but it was the good kind of heart ache, Aunt Lydia. The kind where you'll always think fondly of each other, even though you know your love could never be." My aunt squealed with delight. "Ooh, I just love stories that end that way! Those happy, sappy endings in romance novels aren't realistic at all. But if you can gaze up at the stars at night and think fondly of your lost love, then it's worth falling in love and losing him." "You're absolutely right. — Lynn Austin

It is nice when things end. That is what stories do - they end. It is hard to write endings and it is hard to come to the end of things, but I think when it is done right, it is a very satisfying way to appreciate something. — Jon Hamm

Human lives seldom conform to the conventions of fiction. Chekhov says that it is in the beginnings and endings of stories that we are most tempted to lie. — Wallace Stegner

Endings are the hardest part. I find there's a great relief that at the end of every episode, every hour of TV you produce, while you want a proper and satisfying ending, it doesn't have to end The Story, in capital letters. — Vince Gilligan

Via the power of the swamplands I cast a double-decker Gris-Gris on my pirogue, to give Ol' Alfonse a VERY, Very Nasty bellyache."
"Hey now Cricket," How-Ya-Do scolded, "you better watch-out playing around with them Voodoo spells."
"Says who," Cricket countered combatively.
"You know you ain't supposed to Conja no Gris-Gris. You be just "a little Cajun-girl," not a Voodoo Priestess, like Madame Teche" How-Ya-Do reminded her, "what are you gonna do if that Gris-Gris bounces off of a tree 'n whammies somebody-else by mistake? — Darwun St. James

Khattam-Shud,' he said slowly, 'is the Arch-Enemy of all Stories, even of language itself. He is the Prince of Silence and the Foe of Speech. And because everything ends, because dreams end, stories end, life ends, at the finish of everything we use his name. "It's finished," we tell one another, "it's over. Khattam-Shud: The End. — Salman Rushdie

I'm a firm believer in stories with arcs and beginnings and endings and all that. 'Scott Pilgrim' is sort of one long novel, and it's so long that I get confused and sort of tread water sometimes. But there's definitely a goal to it. People who just dismiss it as shallow, that's their prerogative, but it's not really my intent. — Bryan Lee O'Malley

There are lots of love stories here," she says. "They either end happily, or everyone dies." She laughs, but it sound more like a sob. "What else is there, right? — Lauren DeStefano

How do you get the happy ending? John Irving ought to know. One of my favorite authors, Irving writes these multigenerational epics of fiction that somehow work out in the end. How does he do it? He says, 'I always begin with the last sentence ; then I work my way backwards, through the plot, to where the story should begin.' Thst sounds like a lot of work, especially compared to the fantasy that great writers sit down and just go where the story takes them. Irving lets us know that good stories and happy endings are more intentional than that.
Most 20 something's can't write the last sentence of their lives. But when pressed, they usually can identify things they want in their 30s or 40s or 60s -or things they don't want- and work backward from there. This is how you have your own multigenerational epic with a happy ending. This is how you live your life in real time. — Meg Jay

People relate to things that feel real to them. All the good, happy, over-sexed and moneyed endings on TV are not the way most of us feel in our lives. The success of 'E.R.,' I think, is not relying on overly sentimental stories that are solved where people's lives wrap up nicely with happy endings. — Anthony Edwards

Why would a football fan let a few flubbed minutes at the end of the game ruin three hours of bliss? Because a football game is a story. And in stories, endings matter. — Atul Gawande

Were they all just stories whose endings had already been written, the dates of their deaths pinned to the page with periods? — Traci Chee

My parents believe in the happy endings to the stories of their children. — Glen Duncan

MANIFESTO OF THE BRAVE AND BROKENHEARTED There is no greater threat to the critics and cynics and fearmongers Than those of us who are willing to fall Because we have learned how to rise With skinned knees and bruised hearts; We choose owning our stories of struggle, Over hiding, over hustling, over pretending. When we deny our stories, they define us. When we run from struggle, we are never free. So we turn toward truth and look it in the eye. We will not be characters in our stories. Not villains, not victims, not even heroes. We are the authors of our lives. We write our own daring endings. We craft love from heartbreak, Compassion from shame, Grace from disappointment, Courage from failure. Showing up is our power. Story is our way home. Truth is our song. We are the brave and brokenhearted. We are rising strong. — Brene Brown

One of the things I admire about longer stories is the way writers can work with dead time and slower, more idle moments - not only can they feel expansive, they feel lived-in; the unhurried pacing often makes the endings even more resonant and surprising for me. — Molly Antopol

You must liberate your mind of such dogmatic ideals, rid yourself of this unending illusion that stories have clear beginnings and endings. Stories never begin, nor do they end. They are comprised of people living an endless cycle of interacting, influencing each other, and parting ways. As long as stories are told they should not have clear endings. — Ryohgo Narita

All of women's stories in the 19th century had either one of two endings: you either had the good Jane Austen marriage at the end and you were happy; or you had the terrible Henry James savage downfall because of your own hubris as a woman, or you've made some great error leading you down a path to ruin. One is the story of love that's successful and the other is the story usually of reckless love that goes terribly wrong that destroys the woman. — Elizabeth Gilbert

It's hard to say where a story begins and ends. You have to draw an arbitrary line somewhere. Somewhere between perception and reality. Between what is spoken and what is heard. Between what is written and what is edited out. I know this, you can't have an ending without a beginning. Even if they are really just random pieces of the middle that tend to stand out. Staccato notes on the page. Points on a circle. — Thomas Lloyd Qualls