Sayings about Tales
The man who comes with a tale about others has himself an ax to grind. ~ Chinese Proverb
Every man’s tale is good until another’s being told. ~ Scottish Proverb
Tale-bearers are just as bad as the tale-makers. ~ Traditional Proverb
Many a good tale is spoiled in the telling. ~ Scottish Proverb
Don’t ask questions of fairy tales. ~ Jewish Proverbs
A tale is soon told; a deed is not soon done. ~ Russian Proverb
A tale never loses in the telling. ~ Traditional Proverb
Every tale can be told in a different way. ~ Greek Proverb
Dead men tell no tales. ~ Traditional Proverb
Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter. ~ African Proverb
A good tale is none the worse for being twice told. ~ French Proverb
A drink is shorter than a tale. ~ Traditional Proverb
Don’t tell any more fairy tales when the child has gone to sleep. ~ Burundi Proverb
Quotations about Tales
History is nothing if not an epic tale of missed opportunities. ~ Graydon Carter
Where no wood is, the fire goes out; so where there is no tale bearer, the strife ceaseth. ~ Bible
Who tells a finer tale than any of us. Silence does. ~ Isak Dinesen
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, and every tongue brings in a several tale, and every tale condemns me for a villain. ~ William Shakespeare
Happiness is like those palaces in fairy tales whose gates are guarded by dragons: we must fight in order to conquer it. ~ Alexandre Dumas
I’ve had a fairy tale life. I had a perfect family, a beautiful childhood, an incredible upbringing. I lived a lot of life but a lot of good life. ~ John Stamos
And what’s romance? Usually, a nice little tale where you have everything As You Like It, where rain never wets your jacket and gnats never bite your nose and it’s always daisy-time. ~ D. H. Lawrence
If you see the magic in a fairy tale, you can face the future. ~ Danielle Steel
Never trust the artist. Trust the tale. The proper function of the critic is to save the tale from the artist who created it. ~ D. H. Lawrence
Religions are the great fairy tales of conscience. ~ George Santayana
To me, a fairy tale seems to have become reality. ~ Nelly Sachs
Nobody has any conscience about adding to the improbabilities of a marvelous tale. ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne
The value of life lies not in the length of days, but in the use we make of them… Whether you find satisfaction in life depends not on your tale of years, but on your will. ~ Michel de Montaigne
The good historian is like the giant of the fairy tale. He knows that wherever he catches the scent of human flesh, there his quarry lies. ~ Marc Bloch
In the tale, in the telling, we are all one blood. Take the tale in your teeth, then, and bite till the blood runs, hoping it’s not poison; and we will all come to the end together, and even to the beginning: living, as we do, in the middle. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin
We love a tale of heroes and villains and conflicts requiring a neat resolution. ~ Barry Ritholtz
American cinema is international like the fairy tales were international. ~ Bernard Tavernier
Great deeds give choice of many tales. Choose a slight tale, enrich it large, and then let wise men listen. ~ Pindar
Every man’s life is a fairy tale written by God’s finger. ~ Hans Christian Andersen
The minute that you bring a unicorn into a story, you know that it’s a fairy tale or a fable, because unicorns don’t exist as animals. They exist as fantasy creatures. ~ Gloria Vanderbilt
I like that ‘once upon a time’ quality, where the telling of a tale has an elevated sense of story. There’s a whimsical quality to it. Sometimes in fairy tales more things seem possible, even though often they’re real world based. ~ Erin Morgenstern
Thank God for dirty dishes; they have a tale to tell. While other folks go hungry, we’re eating pretty well. With home, and health, and happiness, we shouldn’t want to fuss; for by this stack of evidence, God’s very good to us. ~ Author Unknown
Adolescence is the time in life when girls quit believing in fairy tales and start to believe in love. ~ Author Unknown
I’d imagine my wedding as a fairy tale… huge, beautiful and white. ~ Paris Hilton
Trust the tale, not the teller. ~ David Knopfler
Usually, the fairy tale ends with the girl marrying the prince. But mine started as soon as the marriage was over. ~ Diane von Furstenberg
I am your fairy tale. Your dream. Your wishes and desires, and I am your thirst and your hunger and your food and your drink. ~ Klaus Kinski
‘Star Wars’ is more fairy tale than true science fiction. ~ Mark Hamill
The teller of a mirthful tale has latitude allowed him. We are content with less than absolute truth. ~ Charles Lamb
When I wrote the eight fairy tales that appear in ‘Horse, Flower, Bird’ I was working toward a completely new form of artistic expression, trying to create a new kind of tale that also felt vintage: innocent and childlike, but haunted. I tried to write a picture-less picture book. ~ Kate Bernheimer
As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters. ~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca
I never thought I’d have children; I never thought I’d be in love, I never thought I’d meet the right person. Having come from a broken home – you kind of accept that certain things feel like a fairy tale, and you just don’t look for them. ~ Angelina Jolie
I want to talk about political and economic fairy tales. ~ Ronald Reagan
Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased by tales, so is the other. ~ Francis Bacon
Whether you find satisfaction in life depends not on your tale of years, but on your will. ~ Michel Eyquem De Montaigne
I’ve learned that I want what I deny. I want someone who is crazy about me, who treats me like a princess. I want the picture-perfect fairy tale stuff. ~ Selena Gomez
Obsessed by a fairy tale, we spend our lives searching for a magic door and a lost kingdom of peace. ~ Eugene O’Neill
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury; signifying nothing. ~ William Shakespeare
Years ago, fairy tales all began with Once upon a time… now we know they all begin with, If I am elected. ~ Carolyn Warner
A tale is born from an image, and the image extends and creates a network of meanings that are always equivocal. ~ Italo Calvino
As I live and am a man, this is an unexaggerated tale – my dreams become the substances of my life. ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge
The mind’s passion is all for singling out. Obscurity has another tale to tell. ~ Adrienne Rich
All men are children, and of one family. The same tale sends them all to bed, and wakes them in the morning. ~ Henry David Thoreau
I cannot tell how the truth may be; I say the tale as it was said to me. ~ Sir Walter Scott
Maybe my fairy tale has a different ending than I dreamed it would. But that’s OK. ~ Kim Kardashian
Your tale, sir, would cure deafness. ~ William Shakespeare
No matter what you write, you actually can’t help retelling a fairy tale somewhere along the way. ~ Catherynne M. Valente
Yes, hell exists. It is not a fairy tale. One indeed burns there. This hell is not at the end of life. It is here. At the beginning. Hell is what the infant must experience before he gets to us. ~ Dr. Frederick Leboyer
There are few joys to compare with the telling of a well-told tale. ~ Charles de Lint
Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale. ~ Hans Christian Andersen
Nature is a book, a letter, a fairy tale (in the philosophical sense) or whatever you want to call it. ~ Johann Georg Hamann
Having achieved and accomplished love… man… has become himself, his tale is told. ~ D. H. Lawrence
There’s not a wind but whispers of thy name; And not a flow’r that grows beneath the moon, But in its hues and fragrance tells a tale Of thee, my love. ~ Bryan Procter
There must be possible a fiction which, leaving sociology and case histories to the scientists, can arrive at the truth about the human condition, here and now, with all the bright magic of the fairy tale. ~ Ralph Ellison
Life is as tedious as twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man. ~ William Shakespeare
