Charles de Lint Quotes

Perception is reality.

I don't really believe that documentary is objective reality and fiction is all illusion.

I'm very strict in my belief that non-fiction should be truthful, and fiction is for invented narratives.

I'm less interested in reality. I'm more interested in perception, the truth of the universe that we see.

Bored with obvious reality, I find my fascination in transforming it into a subjective point of view.

Like all writers, I draw from life as I know it; but it's a refracted kind of reality, and none of it is factually true.

There can be no literary equivalent to truth.

I shall try to tell the truth, but the result will be fiction.

Reality is not what it is. It consists of the many realities which it can be made into.

It's true that I don't rearrange that much in the fiction, but I feel if you change even one name or the order of one event then you have to call it fiction or you get all the credits of non-fiction without paying the price.

We never stop to consider that our beliefs are only a relative truth that's always going to be distorted by all the knowledge we have stored in our memory.

A story is a story is a story. The only difference is in the techniques you bring to bear. There are always limitations on what you can and can't do. But I enjoy that. Just like when you write a sonnet or haiku, there are rules you have to abide by. And to me, playing within the rules is the fun part. It keeps the brain fresh.

There's basically an element of fiction in everything you remember. Imagination and memory are almost the same brain processes. When I write fiction, I know that I'm using a bunch of lies that I've made up to create some form of truth. When I write a memoir, I'm using true elements to create something that will always be somehow fictionalized.

Reality is how we interpret it. Imagination and volition play a part in that interpretation. Which means that all reality is to some extent a fiction.

We live entirely, especially if we are writers, by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images, by the 'ideas' with which we have learned to freeze the shifting phantasmagoria which is our actual experience.

Reality is only a Rorschach ink-blot, you know.

No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist.

The truth is whatever people will believe is the truth.

In fiction, you are not limited by real facts. You can manipulate reality; you can invent without being disloyal to the essence of history.

We think that - as kids, you know - that kids make up stories and live in a sort of fictional place, but that, as grown-ups, we tell the truth and live in fact. But, of course, the reality is we take the facts that we know, and then we fill in all the blanks.

Perception is reality. People take what they want to from things.

In my mind, there's usually a fairly definitive kind of narrative when I write. But I don't want to enforce that on other people. I think that's why I like using metaphor so much.

I'm really not interested in writing about science at all. I mean, I try to get the information right, the details right. But fiction isn't good at conveying information: It's good at telling stories about people in interesting situations.

There is always a divergence between our perception and what actually exists.

Anything processed by memory is fiction.