Glen Duncan Quotes

Sometimes, I get ideas from dreams. Often, my stories are based on adventures that I, or my friends, have actually lived.

When I was little, I made up my own fairy tales, and the ghostly echo of 'Once upon a time' shapes all the fiction I've ever written.

Dreams are not without meaning wherever thay may come from-from fantasy, from the elements, or from other inspiration.

I always take a story that's kind of out there, like an urban myth. I take some possibility that people imagine, that they are familiar with, and try to turn it into a story.

From as far back as I can remember, I always loved the King Arthur stories, fairy tales, mythology - things like that. So it was very natural for me when I came to write the 'Prydain' books to sort of follow that direction.

I'm drawn to dreams.

His stories are good to hear at night, because we can dream about them asleep; and good in the morning, too, because then we can dream about them awake. (Cowslip)

Fairytales were maps formed of blood and hair and bones; they were the knots of the sub-conscious unwound. Every word in every tale was real and as true as apples and stones. They all led to the story inside the story.

The Land of Dreams, that mystical realm, where the oddest of visions appear, come wander through scenes of joyful peace, or stampeded through nightmares of fear. Dare we open those secret doors, down dusty paths of mind, in long-forgotten corners, what memories we'll find. Who rules o'er the Kingdom of Night, where all is not what it seems? 'Tis I, the Weaver of Tales, for I am the Dreamer of Dreams!

Well, Company of Wolves was about that literally, about fairy tales.

I never set out to write literature; I set out to tell stories. And some of my work may be very raunchy and very bloodthirsty - but life, for me, is a violent thing.

Fairy tales opened up a door into my imagination - they don't conform to the reality that's around you as a child. I started reading when I was three and read everything, but I wanted to be an actress.

My son craves picture books about Transformers and Ninja Turtles and the Hulk; they show one fantastic creature smashing or zapping another into smithereens on page after page. They are dull and ugly and show no interesting stories or models of conflict resolution or character building.

I'm fascinated with the stories that we tell. Real histories become fantasies and fairy tales, morality tales and fables. There's something interesting and funny and perverse about the way fairytale sometimes passes for history, for truth.

Fairy tales are really violent, the original ones.

In fiction workshops, we tend to focus on matters of verisimilitude largely because such issues are so much easier to talk about than the failure of imagination.

Horror, for me, has to involve some sort of fantasy. Horror is something that is in your dreams or your nightmares.

I wasn't a big science-fiction fan growing up. But I loved Jules Verne and Sherlock Holmes. Both came into play on 'The X-Files.'

I believe excellent fantasy reflects us all, and yes, it can use those myths that underpin societies, our subconscious yearnings and longings, and perhaps our barren spirituality.

All of my work is influenced by fairy tales, and I hope my work shows Hans Christian Anderson's influence.

I don't remember my dreams too much. I hardly have ever gotten ideas from nighttime dreams. But I love daydreaming and dream logic and the way dreams go.

It was always a dream as I was growing up. I would watch movies, mostly American movies, and be so engrossed in those stories, all I wanted to do was be there. I wanted to be part of that romance or that fantasy or be that warrior or that struggling soul who finally makes it good.

Good dreams are better than films or books.

My dad would tell me bedtime stories, and he used to always leave them open-ended and finish at a crucial point with the words, 'dream on'. Then it was my responsibility to finish the story as I was drifting off to sleep. We would call them dreaming stories.

In kindergarten that used to be my job, to tell them fairytales. I liked Hans Christian Andersen, and the Grimm fairy tales, all the classic fairy tales.