Jerome Bruner Quotes

I try not to interpret things of the world into a single meaning. Rather, I try the opposite.

Truth is often a multiplicity of perspectives, and sometimes the more viewpoints and versions of events there are, the closer the reader gets to an overarching truth.

There's a million different ways you can look at a moment.

Truth can be stated in a thousand different ways, yet each one can be true.

There is no single right answer or path forward, but there is one right way to frame the problem.

When you write, you take the ball and you hold it up to the light and you turn it slowly, and let people draw their own conclusions. And try to bring empathy to all sides of the equation.

…In the human and social sciences it is well to be aware above all of the plurality of methods and viewpoints, each of which reveals only one aspect of reality which is so complex that it defies simple and univocal explanation.

I can explain it to you but I can't understand it for you.

If you understand something well, you can represent it, describe it, embody it in several ways. Indeed, if you can only present it in one way, then your own mastery is likely to be tenuous.

I find the world just too complex to embrace a single ideological point of view.

We try to write things that can be interpreted on lots of different levels. There's not a right way or a wrong way... people can adventure a little.

'Wicked' gave us a story that 'The Wizard of Oz' did not. Two sides to every story.

History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.

A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as many versions as it has readers.

Uneducated people are unfortunate in that they do grasp complex issues, educated people, on the other hand, often do not understand simplicity, which is a far greater misfortune.

May the ability to see many points view keep us gentle.

Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren't.

We have not read an author till we have seen his object, whatever it may be, as he saw it.

One line plus one line results in many meanings.

When you're making a critical decision, you have to understand how it's going to be interpreted from all points of view. Not just your point of view, not just the person you're talking to, but the people that aren't in the room. Everybody else.

Literature tells very little to those who understand it.

It is not often that we use language correctly; usually we use it incorrectly, though we understand each others meaning.

That's what I love about poetry. The more abstract, the better. The stuff where you're not sure what the poet's talking about. You may have an idea, but you can't be sure. Not a hundred percent. Each word, specifically chosen, could have a million different meanings.

No one really understands quantum mechanics.

It is safer to try to understand the low in the light of the high than the high in the light of the low. In doing the latter one necessarily distorts the high, whereas in doing the former one does not deprive the low of the freedom to reveal itself as fully as what it is.