Gene Wolfe

“We are all heroes of our own stories.”

“When a gift is deserved, it is not a gift but a payment.”

“The best books are the ones that tell you what you know already.”

“We believe that we invent symbols. The truth is that they invent us; we are their creatures, shaped by their hard, defining edges.”

“A letter is a soul, so folded that it can be held in the hand.”

“There is no magic. There is only knowledge, more or less hidden.”

“The past is a country from which we have all emigrated.”

“We are what we remember.”

“The beautiful is not always true, and the true is not always beautiful.”

“Hope is a psychological mechanism for continuing to desire something you cannot have.”

“It's a mistake to think that you can control a story. The story has a life of its own.”

“My definition of a good story is one that you could tell somebody else and they would be able to tell it to a third person.”

“A soldier who is not a hero is a mere murderer.”

“You never learn how to write a novel. You only learn how to write the novel you're on.”

“Weak people believe what is forced on them. Strong people what they wish to believe, forcing that to be real.”

“Pain is the most personal thing we have.”

“Love is a wonderful thing. It is more precious than anything else and it is cleansed by suffering.”

“Of all the things that are beyond my power, I believe the keeping of a secret is the most difficult.”