Isak Dinesen Quotes

A golden rule: to leave an incomplete image of oneself.

Ambiguity is necessary in some of my stories, not in all. In those, it certainly contributes to the richness of the story. I doubt that thematic closure is never attainable.

The more you know about Bob Dylan, the less you know. A truly enigmatic artist, Mr. Dylan's work and life offer vaporous handholds, explanations, and instructions. Attempt to grasp them, and they will only dissipate and re-form into another contexture or idea.

one does not only wish to be understood when one writes; one wishes just as surely not to be understood.

The guys that write Once Upon a Time were major writers on Lost, and we had lunch when I started on OUAT and the first thing I said to them was, "I spent five years on Lost, you have to tell me, was my character good or bad?" They looked at me and said, "We have no idea." That's why you have to make your own backstory. I decided Widmore was the evilest of the evil, but in the end, not even the writers knew.

But there was more to it than that. As the Amazing Maurice said, it was just a story about people and rats. And the difficult part of it was deciding who the people were, and who were the rats.

The first thing we see about a short story is its mystery. And in the best short stories, we return at the last to see mystery again

Each of us chooses the tone for telling his or her own story. I would like to choose the durable clarity of a platinum print, but nothing in my destiny possesses the luminosity. I live among diffuse shadings, veiled mysteries, uncertainties; the tone of telling my life is closer to that of a portrait in sepia.

Life is a mystery,but man wants to reduce it to a problem!

The library is inhabited by spirits that come out of the pages at night.

O Cuckoo! shall I call thee bird, Or but a wandering voice?

But mark, madam, we live amongst riddles and mysteries--the most obvious things, which come in our way, have dark sides, which thequickest sight cannot penetrate into; and even the clearest and most exalted understandings amongst us find ourselves puzzled and at a loss in almost every cranny of nature's works.

She was "a woman of uncertain age.

I've tried to consider stories that I have read, making them into films, but they would turn out unnatural. If a producer wants that, he should call other people. Not me.

There were mysterious questions, but a mysterious answer was a contradiction in terms.

I would like to make one thing quite clear. ... I never explain anything.

Dear child, some stories have no morals. Sometimes darkness and madness are simply that.

A good story needs only a good storyteller.

The world is like that -- incomprehensible and full of surprises .

Who is the third who walks always beside you? When I count, there are only you and I together But when I look ahead up the white road There is always another one walking beside you Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded I do not know whether a man or a woman -But who is that on the other side of you?

I only know one story. But oftentimes small pieces seem to be stories themselves.

Keep the extent of your abilities unknown.The wise man does not allow his knowledge and abilities to be sounded to the bottom, if he desires to be honored at all. He allows you to know them but not to comprehend them. No one must know the extent of his abilities, lest he be disappointed. No one ever has an opportunity of fathoming him entirely. For guesses and doubts about the extent of his talents arouse more veneration than accurate knowledge of them, be they ever so great.

It's only a story, isn't it?"... "Who's to say what's only a story and what's truth disguised as a story?

When I can't immediately define the character, and there's an element of mystery to it and still a lot to be explored, that's when I say yes.

Having wandered some distance among gloomy rocks, I came to the entrance of a great cavern ... Two contrary emotions arose in me: fear and desire--fear of the threatening dark cavern, desire to see whether there were any marvelous things in it.